Okay … So how do I put this … hmm
So this isn't really a Sequel to Purpose because well you don't really have to read Purpose to get into it, however those of you that did read purpose the fall out from the end of the story will be addressed.
Well enjoy it.
Prologue
The heat of the desert swept through a darkened and musty abandoned house.
Sweat stung the eyes of a pretty nurse in her early thirties.
Michelle Dixon blinked away fearful tears as she whimpered out sputtering breaths, watching a handsome blond whose face was plastered all over the news; a dead man who massacred twenty FBI Tactical Team members.
She was even in the hospital when the body of George Lazlo was taken to the morgue. Amy and Betsy, her best friends and fellow nurses, had snuck down to see it, like they were going to see a freak show at the circus. She called them weirdos, choosing instead to play Rummy with Mrs. Rosenthal, a cancer patient.
Now after being kidnapped and bound to a chair in an abandoned house, in the middle of the desert, she wasn't sure what this man, this psychopath, wanted with her. All she wanted was to be found by her husband, to feel his arms around her. However when she called him all he did was ask her strange questions, offering no comfort, no reassurances.
"Please" Michelle asked in a sob, watching her captor arrange mouse traps in an equal square pattern on the floor next to her. "Why are you doing this?" she asked, watching the blond man attach a wire to one of the traps.
He said nothing as he finished his fitting of the wire.
"Why are you …?" she attempted again, but was cut off by the loud sound of duct tape being unwound.
"No, don't tape my mouth. I won't scream." She pleaded as the man measured off a piece of the grey sticky paper. Her blond captor had no ounce of emotion as he ripped off a piece of tape.
"I swear I won't scream. I won't scream." She begged shaking her head. Her pleas fell on uncaring ears as the man fitted her lips with an evenly measured piece of restraint.
Satisfied with the muffled cries of fear the man went back to work on his traps in silence. After several beats he spoke to Michelle as if he was explaining his plans to his prisoner.
"In 1897, James Atkinson invented the mousetrap." He explained to the woman he had tied to the chair who looked at him with wide eyes, as if he had lost his mind. Without looking up he continued, "The spring slammed shut in 38 thousandths of a second." Pulling the metal spring back, he turned to face Michelle placing his hands on the chair.
"It's a record that's never been beaten." With no effort he lifted her chair, which received a panicked muffle from Mrs. Dixon as he carefully placed her on his work. A small click sounded as if something was put in place.
"It's hard to build a better one." He said emotionlessly tightening a wire.
"The same story can be applied to you, brother." A very deep voice spoke with a gravely mechanical echo to it.
Michelle and Cromartie turned to a shadow standing in the door way. The figure was huge, seven feet tall, his chest and shoulders were covered in enormous muscles that jutted through the black tanktop he wore. His thin waist gave his large powerful legs an artificial look.
Michelle let out a frightened muffled scream at the expressionless chromed-metal opera mask the large monster-of-a-man wore over his face. Through eye slits in the metal covering blood shot and crazed eyes looked at Cromartie evenly.
"Our father thanks you for your noble sacrifice." The masked figure nodded at Michelle's captor before he stalked toward the machine.
Usually stoic, mocha eyes watched a pretty, blond girl talk with a hoody-clad teenage boy . They held a strained anger as the teens smiled and chit-chatted near a magazine rack. Cameron Baum (Phillips) wondered what John saw in this new girl Riley that she didn't have, and why he chose to spend his time with the blond and not with her. She had once heard Sarah Connor refer to John as a notorious blond monger. She wasn't sure what that meant, but she had noticed that John seemed to set his sights on girls with yellow hair, such as Cheri Weston.
Even then, John always seemed to prefer to spend time with her, than to chase a clearly unviable, lanky and under-developed girl such as Cheri. The thought turned Cameron to her breasts and toned body to which she gave a small ghost of a smile at her endowments, which she learned was an advantage in this vain period of human history. Cameron's lightened expression disappeared when she caught the teens share coy smiles.
There wasn't any blame on John from Cameron's side. She understood that after her glitch there was a tension and uncertainty amongst her adopted family about her status and control. But it was no where near the conflict raging inside her. There was a very human fear that gripped Cameron every time her screen sputtered, every time there was a small black out in her HUD she clenched her teeth and hoped that she wouldn't come back to awareness to find that she had bathed in her best friend's, her purpose in life's, blood.
In the scattered memories of her chip the voice of an angry raven haired, brown eyed teenager chastised General John Connor.
"I rather have died in ignorance!"
Cameron felt a kinship to the stranger in her memory as a part of her wished that John would have never brought her back to fight the demons that now plagued her everyday. She wished that John would have burned her, so that she wouldn't remember the sadness and fear of her core programming taking over her body, where she could only watch as Skynet's phantom hunted John and Sarah like animals. It was only by a burst of will that she could overpower the override the ghost of Skynet cast on her.
Yet, the damage had been done. Skynet had knowledge of her inner most thoughts and had used it against John. If she had had control of her own body she would have begged John in tears, not for mercy, but for death as her dark father's will was ever inside her, trying to force its way out and to take control of its fallen angel, and she was unsure how long she could hold it off.
When she had woken in those first moments, saw John holding a gun to her, and scanned the thermite scattered over her torn body, she knew he had brought her back. The action alone was a silent answer to her private questions about why he looked at her when he thought she wasn't looking, or why he was caressing her face when she came back from destroying the ARTIE system.
He would never admit it to her, but he was in love. That was why he couldn't be trusted anymore. He loved her and as long as he did, he would risk his own safety for her and she couldn't let anything happen to him.
"Dude your sister."
Cameron caught the couple she was glaring at look in her direction with Riley pointing. Cameron locked eyes with John just as a group of people passed in between the three teenagers. When they passed, John and his blond were gone. She stood swiftly from her coffee house table and found no trace of them.
"Bitch whore."
A dusty cloud of sand trailed an old, beat-up Jeep that rushed down a heated desert highway toward an abandoned house. Sarah didn't like this, she didn't like going in blind, without intel, or even the semblance of a plan. She sighed from the passenger seat and ran her hand through her mane of long, raven locks and looked out the side window. She watched the dunes pass by like yellow blurs. From the side mirror she spotted Charlie; he was a nervous wreck, sweating and shifting uncomfortably in the back seat. He looked exactly the way she felt inside.
"This is a trap to get John, why in god's name am I out here?"
Sarah knew the reason why. It was her desperately clinging to a future that was no longer attainable. It was a future with a white picket fence, and a man who loved her. Where she would give John a home to spend his days in peace, make friends and go to college to learn to be whoever he wanted to be.
That dream died the day Charlie gave her the sparkling ring the John had chosen for him. That night she let him make love to her, but she couldn't help but feel guilty as she felt his lips and hands trace her gorgeous body. She couldn't help but feel like she was forgetting Kyle, like committing her love and life to Charlie in a white gown was somehow turning her back on all her soldier had given her.
With a turn, she glanced at the man behind the wheel. Derek Reese had a focused look; not nervous or distant, simply focused, like an old professional. He bothered her. It wasn't his existence, or the way he pushed her and John, she could handle that. What bothered her was that she didn't feel the same guilt that plagued her and Charlie's relationship when she was with him. Why did she feel so safe with him around? Maybe it was because they shared a bond in Kyle and John, or maybe it was the plan simple fact that she felt safest with a Reese. The two weren't together, hell they couldn't even spend ten minutes in the same room without digging at each other.
There was something that separated the two men in the car with her. Charlie had limits; there were things that he wouldn't do, lines he wouldn't cross for anyone. Derek Reese, on the other hand, he would do anything and everything he needed to do to protect John. He would die for her son and in the back of Sarah's mind, she knew that he would do the same for her.
"What do you say to that?"
Her gaze turned to the junior Tech-Com officer's hand that clutched the shift stick. Parts of her wanted to take the calloused hand in hers and intertwine them. Derek turned from the road, and looked at Sarah. She knew she had been caught staring and reached out and grabbed a Glock resting near the stick to cover. She checked the magazine then returned the look. He gave her a reassuring grin and nod. She returned it with a scowl and turned away from him, feeling a calm settle inside her that wasn't there before.
The truck took a sharp turn and slowed to a halt near a ruined foundation of a shack that once belonged to the ramshackle home several yards away. Derek was first out of the car, with his grenade launcher in one hand, and a wood pump tactical shotgun in the other. He walked several paces, observing the area, before he slid the shotgun across the hood, so Sarah could grab it. Without a word he took off to the ruined wall, taking point. Sarah watched him a moment with a nervous clench of her belly.
"Wait, how do we get inside here?" Charlie asked observing the looming building ahead.
"Getting inside isn't the problem." She replied, meeting him in front of the truck with her own observation of her surroundings. Charlie gave her a look that said he wasn't sure what to do next.
After a beat Sarah pulled a pistol from the waist band of her khaki cargo pants. "Try to hit something metal." She handed him the pistol followed by the clip. He took both, glancing at her like she was someone he didn't know. Sarah snatched her shotgun from the hood of the car, and gave Charlie a look that told him that he had now seen the real Sarah. Wordlessly she rushed to catch up with Derek who was sidling the wall.
He stuck his hand out telling her to slow down, she complied, stopping. He took a quick tactical sweep of the open area around the house before continuing forward.
It was at these moments that Sarah questioned if he was taking the team leadership out of pure instinct, or if he was taking point for her protection in case of an ambush. She would rather it be the former, because she absolutely detested the idea of being treated like a fragile princess that needed protecting. There was only one man she would allow to keep her safe and take care of her and he died doing it.
With his back to the wall Derek listened closely to the wooden door of the entrance, sensing no ambush he pulled the door open and rushed inside. Sarah followed closely as his cover as he swept from room-to-room of the rundown building. Both took opposite sides of a doorway, with Derek looking into a large open area that might have been a living room.
"Charlie …?" a scared voice called. Dixon jumped from cover to run to the voice, but was slammed back by Sarah.
"Is someone there?" the voice called again with a sob.
Sarah motioned Derek to check it out. With a sucked in breath he moved into the line of fire and disappeared around a corner.
"Clear!" Derek's voice echoed through the house. Charlie didn't wait for Sarah to clear him; he shoved her pinning arm down and rushed down the corridor. Sarah closed her eyes for a second before following her ex down the hall.
Once inside the large room she came across a turned over chair where a pretty, blond woman sat tied while Derek was busy remedying the situation with a knife. The woman was crying hysterically, bucking to get out. Charlie was kneeling next to her shushing her as he stroked her dirty hair. Sarah walked up to the three observing the scene quietly.
Though it had been eight years to Charlie, it had only been several months since she had been engaged to the man, so when Derek's work was done a small pain stung Sarah's chest when the blond rushed up off the floor and embraced Dixon. Not wanting to see anymore, Sarah took a step back, hearing a snap, and feeling a small pinch to her heel. Looking down she saw that she had stepped on a tossed aside mouse trap.
"What was that?" Derek asked coming next to her. Skillfully Sarah bent her knee and plucked the wooden mouse catcher from its hold on her boot.
"Mousetrap?" she held the object up to her partner with a confused frown. However he was no longer focused on her; there was a look of shock and alarm on his face.
"Sarah …" he said in a concerned voice, taking her arm and turning her to what he was looking at.
A decapitated body hung upside-down, hoisted by a rope, from the aluminum rafters. . From the scene in front of them it appeared as if someone had ripped the head off in a brutal, unclean fashion. Crackling circuits hung from where the head should have been, as synthetic blood leaked from the popping wires.
"He took its head!" Michelle screamed in trauma, sobbing into Charlie's chest. Sarah and Derek both looked at the woman, then each other.
This time it was Sarah who spotted something and turned her partner toward it. On the far wall there were words written in blood.
A GIFT FOR MY BELOVED
WE'LL BE TOGETHER SOON.
Something about the sentence made Sarah's blood run cold.
"What the hell is going on?" Derek mused to Sarah who unconsciously took a step closer to him. Something told her that it was left there for her.
North Africa
A hot wind blew across the sands of a ancient wasteland, carrying dust and sand in whirlwinds where the mountain-like cliffs blocked the scorched air, creating many blistering dirt devils at their base. Amongst the many eroded cliffs one stood out above all others. Into the face of the rocks was carved a sanctuary in the shape of a robed man with a ceremonial sphinx headpiece. An ancient holy place of worship once, now a home and hide-out for a wandering tribe of desert dwellers, mystical and superstitious their old ways were guarded from progress by the unforgiving climate known to many as hell-on-earth.
There was a hole in the cavity of the robed structure where one can look out for many miles of open desert. Inside the stone room, behind the glassless window, two men sat cross-legged in front of a carved wooden table. One of the men was dressed in red robes and a turban that covered everything except slanted, almost-black eyes. Across from him sat a man in his late-twenties; he wore a thread-bare navy-blue t-shirt and black fatigue pants. His feet were covered by worn, muddy-brown motorcycle boots. The young man was tall, and his ruggedly handsome face was covered with thick stubble. A diagonal scar ran across his eyes, ending like a check mark on his cheek. His thick mane of curled, raven hair was grown out and disheveled yet styled. Both men sipped a steamy liquid in brittle china.
"When I was in the trance I saw things … my past, the present, and my future; yet there were things that didn't happen to me that I saw, and places that aren't there in the future." The younger man said, flicking unusually stoic mocha eyes to the crimson clad figure in front of him.
"The conclusion of the trials is supposed to show you the path you must walk on, young warrior. This confusion means only that you have reached a crossroads in your journey." The man spoke with a deep voice that was almost musical. "Tell me, what it that you saw?" he asked inquisitively.
"My grandmother … I was five and sitting in her lap. She was reading me a story in Spanish, 'The Wizard of Oz', except that my grandmother disappeared before I was even conceived, and also we were in the woods, yet the world was destroyed when I was three." The t-shirt clad man frowned sipping the liquid.
"The Thogal is a powerful state of mediation and it is often rumored that one who experiences such a trance is capable of seeing the future." The man said sipping his steaming cup. The raven-haired male watched with a narrowing of his eyes before he spoke.
"I know what is coming in the future …" was all he said, going back to his drink.
There was a pause between the room's occupants.
"May I ask you a question, Young Warrior?" the turban covered figured asked placing his cup down.
"Can I stop you, Ster?" the younger of the two gave a tired pirate grin.
"Why …? Why travel through time and space, brave the desert's rage to subject yourself to such a rigorous mental test? Those who enter the Trials are those who suffer from demonic possession, and look to cleanse their souls?" Ster asked with a puzzled tone.
"I'm not sure about demonic possession, but I did it because I'm afraid." He answered simply.
"Afraid?" the older man tilted his head.
"Both my grandmother and my father … they suffered from burdens that transformed them, and splintered not only their personalities, but their perception of reality. By mastering the Thogal, I can not only keep my sanity intact … but also keep who I am from splitting into different forms in my mind." The man replied with a slurp, finishing his drink.
The red-draped older man chuckled and shook his head. "You are quite an extraordinary man, Mr. Connor to have survived two weeks of isolation in the blackness of the cave." This time it was Ster who finished the drink.
Setting his cup down, Ster pressed a button and a compartment in the table opened with a shudder. With metallic clinking the man pulled out a leather utility belt with a dented and scared chromed .45 pistol with a black rubber handle holstered inside it.
"Your weapons …" he offered the young man the belt. He nodded and took it. The oldest of the pair got to his knees and stood.
"More tea?" the young soldier asked. The man shook his head at the offer.
"I must make arrangements for your return trip through the desert." He turned to leave.
The younger man clenched his teeth in hatred and with a flick of leather he drew his firearm and blasted the older man in the chest from behind with three deadly shots. Ster turned with a look of horror at the soldier.
"Why!" he wheezed and dropped to the floor with blood oozing from the clean holes in his chest.
The raven-haired man blew the smoke from the pistol barrel and stalked up to the body, looking down upon the motionless face plastered with betrayal.
"How stupid do you think I am?" he spat, pulling the hammer back, aiming at the dead man.
There was a small, evil chuckle that sounded from the body; with a flash the crimson-clad dead man opened his lids , revealing red eyes. "That remains to be seen, Ryan." A female voice with a Scottish brogue answered.
All at once the blood seeping from the wounds turned to mercury, and slithered back through the exit wounds. The martial arts master known only as Ster transformed into a sleek, human mold of mercury before it formed into a sterilized ice-queen-like, attractive female with pale skin and flaming red hair.
"Neat trick … Weaver" Ryan said darkly, moving from the woman.
"Yet, not neat enough to fool Captain Ryan Connor, the Tech-Com hero" She cued adding the last sentence with mocking with a Cheshire grin. "I'm curious, though, as to how you knew it was me?" she asked with a lift of an eyebrow.
Ryan tossed her the cup she was drinking out of. Catching it, she stuck her finger in and traced the lingering herbs of the flavoring.
"You poisoned the tea." She tossed him the glass back. "I wonder what would have happened if the real Master Ster came to meet you?" she asked the officer.
"I think he would have had a hard time getting here with a metal spike through his head, don't you think?" He asked bitterly.
"You're not wrong." Weaver tilted her head.
"What do you want?" he asked darkly after a pause.
"You cut to the chase … just like your mother. I like that." She grinned. The soldier pointed a gun at her again.
"I won't ask again." He warned her. Weaver twitched her head before Liquid metal transformed into a soft haired, browned eyed, angelic beauty dressed in a saintly white gown. The two people shared eye color and skin tone with a generally close resemblance.
"You gonna shoot your Mommy, huh Cowboy?" Cameron asked with an innocent voice.
"Enough with the games!" he warned her behind bared teeth of a deep hatred.
"I came to discuss an opportunity with you." She said staying in her Cameron glamour. Ryan made a disgusted snear before he scoffed at her, pressing the hammer foward.
"I don't make deals with devils." He said quietly, turning his back on Weaver.
"Your parents did. How do you think you got your cybernetic arm and eye?" Weaver asked coming closer. "Your mother sacrificed them to you with my help." Weaver stroked Cameron's silken hair.
"You kidnapped my mother … held her against her will for years. Why would I help a monster?" Ryan shot back picking up his belt.
Weaver quirked an eyebrow at the comment and looked coldly at the soldier. "You think this is easy for me? You killed Savannah in chin when you were fifteen."
"Eye for an eye." He replied smoothly, twirling his pistol like a gunfighter before stuffing it back into the holster.
"Your parents massacred my John Henry before you were born, not to mention your father imprisoned me in a metal box. So the better question is why should I come to you?" she was emotionless, but there was mutual hatred oozing from her cold exterior.
"That's a good question." Ryan didn't back down.
"Because I know despite this little rivalry, we're on the same side of a war, just a part of different factions. I believe we can achieve our goals through cooperation." She explained in a business-woman like manner.
"No" he said simply, the silver buckle on his utility belt clicked loudly when he buckled his weapons to his waist . "I don't work with or for machines … they can't be trusted." He said distractedly looking out at the vast wasteland below.
"You truly have no idea." Turning to a deep feminine voice, she called. "Has Cameron told you how you were conceived?" Her image changed to a beautiful raven-haired, green eyed woman in a silken, emerald gown with a slit in the front holding back cleavage, and exposing a smoothly toned belly.
Ryan ignored Sarah Connor as she sashayed toward him.
"You see, your grandmother, me." She grinned. "She disappeared in prison just before your parents were going to rescue her. The word was that Sarah Connor died in jail, but it was nothing more than a clever Skynet plot. But then you know that, don't you?" Weaver wrapped her arms around the man's chest and pressed her head into his back.
Ryan shrugged out of her hold on him.
"So there sat little orphan John Connor in a black hole of grief. Cameron … she knows that her purpose in life is thinking about killing himself, because he didn't want to be separated from his mother. So when she kept the sharp objects away from him … well, he decided to destroy my company's headquarters, he thought it would be suicide. But sadly lady luck was by his side, and her name was Cameron. Your parents went in and destroyed everything I worked so hard to build. They killed my boy without hesitation and in their ignorance John and Cameron Connor took a sledge hammer to the only defenses this poor planet had against Skynet." Sarah sighed in mock sadness.
Ryan said nothing, standing quietly in front of the hellish scenery. Weaver pressed on judging that she still had an audience.
"But that wasn't enough for John; he cursed himself and his fate that he lived through the mission. If he couldn't find a quick way to be with his mother, then he would take the slow route, so night after night he would be in a drunken haze slowly trying to kill his brain. Your mother, she needed to think of something fast or soon John would get what he wanted. So that's when she came across a little sealed file in her CPU called General Order 66, it states that in the event of the TOK 715 cover being compromised that she could execute the order to which she would use one of Alison Young's stolen eggs hidden inside her to impregnate herself with John Connor's child, because who would believe a machine could have a baby?" Sarah asked.
"So Cameron put on her silk lingerie and her pout and seduced your father. So the day your mother played dumb and told John that she had gotten accidentally pregnant, John Connor became a changed person. He accepted his love for your mother and grew to love you." Sarah concluded the story, reaching out and caressing Ryan's grown out hair.
"So here you stand, the ultimate and darkest form of a machine's manipulation. You are nothing more than a replacement for a mother whose son mourned her like a lover." Weaver stroked Ryan's hair.
The man folded his arms across his chest. "I'm sure there was a point in that little story, though you are a fan of hearing yourself talk." He shot at the woman, ignoring the chill in his chest from the tale.
"My point is that what I told you is a truth that Cameron didn't even tell your late father. I told you in good faith to show you that I'm not here to lie." Weaver explained in Sarah's voice with a seductive edge. Ryan remained pensive ignoring hands tracing circles on his shoulders.
"What would you want in return for this partnership?" Ryan asked. Weaver smiled a Sarah smile.
"I know why you're here; you want to protect Sarah Connor from Skynet, to alter the timeline. So in exchange for my information on Kaliba movements, you give me your vow that you'll keep that psychotic woman on a leash and keep your mother and father away from my company." Weaver announced with a whisper in his ear. The officer didn't respond. "Well for one I can tell you with certainty that Skynet has shifted in thinking and has sent someone back to supervise a new tactic." She said coyly.
"Who?" he turned to the green eyed beauty
"You haven't agreed to anything I set down." Weaver shook her head. Ryan sighed in thought.
With a turn he looked into Sarah's green eyes.
"Deal" he stuck his hand out to her. Weaver gave him a victorious smile, but shook her head at him.
"That's not how I seal it."
Without warning she wrapped her arms around his neck and locked lips with Ryan. A glare wrinkled the handsome man's forehead as he stayed stoic, not returning the kiss from Sarah. Weaver broke the kiss and looked disappointed at her old nemesis.
"Something I said?" she grinned.
"The names of who is on deck for Skynet?" he ignored her quip and pushed on.
"I'll tell you when you get to America; I have an open door policy." She said casually. Ryan gritted his teeth and snatched her by her waist.
"That wasn't the terms of the agreement." He growled.
"What good is a name on dried lips in the sand?" Weaver asked. "Think of me holding back as inspiration for you getting out of the desert alive." She shrugged.
The two locked eyes a moment, and then with a ruffle of silk, Ryan unhanded Weaver. There was a silent pause between them before she pressed her face into Ryan's chest.
"When this is all over I do look forward to settling our differences in a more pleasurable manner." She said with a whimsical sigh.
There was a sound of mechanical wiring and with his left hand Ryan snatched up Sarah by the neck.
"When Skynet's gone, it's going to be me, you, a lava pit and an isotope gun." He threatened in a dark gravelly voice. Weaver smiled.
"Sounds kinky … Sarah does a mean bubbly cheerleader." She whispered, then like ice on a summer day, she disappeared into liquid and slithered out of sight.
There was a pause in the room as the officer closed his eyes and settled the adrenaline in his veins. Ryan took a shaky sigh and looked at the vast dunes of the challenge ahead of him.
Author's Notes
Alright so I hope I didn't lose anyone …
To anyone who read Purpose, yeah I know Ryan is supposed to be dead, but … you'll see why he isn't.
I hope I covered how Cameron can conceive a child well enough.
The Thogal is a real mental trial in Buddhism, but it's a little more complicated than what I explained.
So this story is going AU from Mouse Trap but all the non Cromartie stuff will be left in.