"Morris asked if I was feeling better today. I told him I was."
Cameron's voice was now fully repaired to its usual expressionless but female sounding tone.
Right after the car bombing, when Derek and Sarah had managed to get the mangled mess that had been Cameron from the burning wreck, John had immediately doused her head with a fire extinguisher so he could withdraw her CPU, faster and with much less finesse than before.
He had accessed her the same way he had accessed Vick, only this time he had deliberately cranked the power high to ensure that she re-started. He had managed to start talking with her through his IM box, and she had given invaluable directions for her repairs. But even with the blueprints and detailed instructions she had been able to provide, it had been a long two weeks gathering the supplies needed, some obtained more illegally than others, and reassembling her to the point where she could walk around without people staring.
All of which had been done over some strenuous objections from Derek; so strenuous in fact that finally Sarah had been forced to sit him down and explain in no uncertain terms why, for the good of The Mission, they were repairing her and what Sarah would do to Derek's kneecaps if he continued his dissidence.
What had seemed a minor issue at first, informing the school that Cameron would be out "sick" for several days, had nearly become a full blown disaster when officials from the CDSS had actually shown up at the house, investigating the claims of a minor who was a 'possible post traumatic stress syndrome case' being 'not properly looked after.' A pack of lies later, all delivered with supreme calm and believability by Sarah, things where settling back to where they had been before, not that anyone would call that normal.
"Morris said he would have been sad if I had missed prom."
"That's nice," said John absently, not really paying attention as he worked on hacking a triple encrypted military defense site, a new lead in finding the real Sarkissian and the Turk.
"The Merriam Webster dictionary defines the word 'prom' as an abbreviation for the word promenade, which can be used as a verb or a noun. As a verb it means the action of walking and displaying as if in a parade; as a noun it means a stroll or walk, especially in a public place, as for pleasure or display or it can refer to the area itself meant for walking, or it can also be used to mean a march of guests into a ballroom constituting the opening of a formal ball, or a march of dancers in square dancing, or a formal dance, prom. To which does Morris refer to?"
John stared at her as she recited the textbook definition, silently wondering how Cameron had managed to avoid being labeled some type of autistic by the school and put in one of the SPED classes.
He blinked, rapidly collecting his thoughts. "Uh… the last one. It's a dance. Morris was talking about the junior prom dance. A prom is a special dance you go to in high school. The senior class prom is considered a bigger deal than the junior one, but still, it's a big dance and…" John trailed off and waved his hand vaguely; unable to explain something that would have been high on his list of priorities if he hadn't been born the future leader of mankind. As it was, he knew he shouldn't care.
Cameron looked at him intently, clearly waiting for more of an explanation.
"It's just another high school event," he finished lamely, wondering if he was trying to convince Cameron or himself that it wasn't important. It was just another thing that normal kids focused on while he was stuck trying to figure out how to save the world. He turned back to the screen with a small sigh.
"Do all students go?" she asked
"Yeah, if they want to," he said, trying to concentrate on the computer program in front of him.
"Then why did Morris invite me if we are both already going?"
"Oh." John looked back at her and tried not to blush as he suddenly realized Cameron might not have a category in her neural processor labeled 'dating' and everything that went with it. Between the dead guy in the trunk and everything that had happened in rapid succession after that, John hadn't had time to think about the implications of telling Cameron to accept Morris's invitation. "People usually go in, uh, a pair. A boy asks a girl to go with him as his date."
Cameron looked at him with a blank expression. John could have sworn he could almost hear the gears whirling in her head as she processed and filed the new information.
"What kind of dancing will take place?" she inquired. "I have learned several types of ballet, but my investigation of the various other subcategories of dance was interrupted by my damages."
"Uh, yeah, no, you probably shouldn't do anything too elaborate at the prom," he stammered, wondering once again what kind of Terminator she was. "Wouldn't want to rip those steel stitches," he added flippantly. Then, more serious, "Just follow the example of how the other kids move. Proms aren't really about, whaddya say? Displaying? It's not about displaying your ability to dance; it's just about having a good time." He broke off, feeling suddenly embarrassed about trying to explain the concept of fun to a Terminator.
But, "Thank you for explaining," said Cameron, sounding sincere - as she always did. Then she tilted her head to the side, almost bird like. "Which girl are you going to ask?" she inquired.
John ran his fingers through his hair, getting exasperated with the pseudo sibling experience.
The perfect distraction came into the room at that point. "Mom!" said John, trying not to sound too relieved. "Cameron needs a prom dress."
"A prom dress? Are you kidding me?" asked Derek from where he was standing slightly behind Sarah.
"Derek," Sarah said in a warning voice.
Derek shot Sarah a look of exasperation, "Yeah, I get it that it was useful to repair the machine. I remember your little speech." He turned from Sarah back towards John and Cameron to glare at them as he went on, "But dressing it up for prom like she's gonna star in Rock the Date?" he asked with no attempt to disguise the contempt in his voice.
"In Rock the what?" asked John, confused.
"It's a movie about prom; came out in early 2011 with Miley Ray Cyrus- never mind, that's not the point," said Derrek, interrupting himself before he could be distracted by future memories, and clearly ready to ramp up to one of his the-machines-are-evil speeches.
"The point is," said John, cutting him off coldly, "is that right now we still need to pretend to be normal. Cameron already got noticed for missing a week and a half of school before we could pass her off as human again. She can't do anything that would raise any more suspicious or even remarks from anybody, not even Morris. We really don't have time to deal with child services. Again."
"We don't have to time to waste on dances," growled Derek.
"She's going," said John in a voice that suggested there would be no more debate on this.
The coolly calculating look he gave his uncle made Derek have to resist the urge to salute and say 'Yes Sir, Commander, Sir.' At a glance John was still just another kid, but when he pierced someone with his eyes and gave orders like that, it was easy to see the future leader of the Resistance who could give the order for suicide missions without batting an eye.
Derek turned and stomped away. He could deal with a nephew. He could deal with a commander. He was still unsure how to deal with both at the same time.
Later, at the mall…
Sarah fingered the dark blue satin. The dress was almost business like in it's severity of cut and style, but the fabric was cool and smooth to the touch. Comforting. Reassuring. Real. Everything else at the moment felt decidedly unreal. More so than usual.
"I have succeeded in finding a total of eighteen dresses in my size," said Cameron, standing in front of her with the various prom dresses, every color, style, and fabric that the Macy's at Century City Mall had to offer filling the robot's deceptively small arms as she reported the progress of her current mission.
Sarah Connor, mother of mankind's only hope of survival in the future from a reign of robotic terror, was shopping for a prom dress for one of those very robots. She couldn't decide what was more disturbing – the fact that she was working with one of them, or that people were actually fooled into thinking that this machine was her flesh and blood daughter.
Should have stayed in the mental hospital, Sarah, an inner voice mocked her. Out loud all she said was, "Dressing rooms should be over there," pointing towards the back. The two made their way through the store, maneuvering through a maze of bright gowns on display, waves of taffetas, silks, satins and rayon overflowing from the racks, all promising to make each and every girl a princess for that one special night.
Once in the dressing room they had to wait for a stall to become available – besides the women of all ages using that Saturday afternoon to try on bathing suits, business suits, casual wear, and undergarments there were quite a few pairs of mothers and daughters also prom dress shopping at the mall. In front of the three paneled mirror in the general area of the dressing room outside of the stalls a young Latino girl twirled around in a chocolate brown dress, multilayered like a wedding cake, as two women, probably her mother and grandmother, cooed and made admiring noises and she excitedly repeated in Spanish that this dress was the one; meanwhile behind one of the stall doors a girl was wailing in English that she would never find the right dress, moaning as if it was the end of the world.
The end of the world. Sarah felt a chill as she thought of what both of the Reese boys had told would happen to people like this, to places like this. Even though all of her efforts to try and explain the truth to people had only gotten her presented with a straight jacket, there were still some days when she wanted to scream in people's faces that the end really was coming, so who were they to be so blissfully ignorant and wrapped up in their banal existence?
She thought, now and then, on that person she had been before meeting Kyle Reese, and didn't know if she wanted to slap her for being so oblivious to how great an ordinary life was without the burden of destiny, or to yearn for that time when she had thought things would always stay the same.
Sarah usually didn't let herself think about what ifs or long for what might have beens. Usually there just wasn't time as protecting and training John had filled up her life. That and the knowledge of the future usually pushed aside any thoughts about what it was to be just like everyone else. However, being so close to normalcy, pretending to be just another mother and daughter out shopping, made it harder to ignore thoughts of what it meant to be 'normal.' If Fate hadn't grabbed her by the neck and thrown her into the maelstrom, then she very well could have just another mother. Maybe she would have had a daughter and gone shopping with her like this. If.
If only everything else hadn't happened. Would happen. Was happening.
A stall became available and Sarah resolutely pushed aside thoughts of verb tenses and normalcy aside and tried to focus on the current mission – Operation: Keep Cameron Normal Looking. Something that only two weeks ago had seemed impossible as they had struggled to put the broken doll back together.
Sarah immediately vetoed the first dress Cameron tried on; a black lacy outfit that looked like something Helena Bonham Carter would wear to a Tim Burton film premiere. "It has to be floor length; your feet shouldn't show," she pointed out.
Cameron glanced down to where the stitching was still visible on her ankles, nodded at Sarah, and returned to the stall, only to come back out a few moments later in her bra and panties, holding out the next dress.
"I do not understand the mechanics of this garment." she said.
Sarah examined the garment and grimaced. The cerulean silken affair had little more cloth to it than Princess Leia's gold bikini – and just as much metal and chains involved. She didn't envy any mother who tried to talk her daughter out of wearing the skimpy thing.
"The metal circle goes in front," said Sarah. "And this piece," she held up a gauzy wisp of blue, "wraps around the left arm while these two bits should tie in the back."
"Oh. Thank you for explaining," said Cameron and started to go back into the stall.
But Sarah grabbed the dress before Cameron could go try it on. "You should pick something with enough fabric to hide a gun somewhere on you."
"I am programmed with one hundred seventy two different forms of unarmed combat along with a sub-routine capacity of improvisational action," Cameron told her.
"If things get violent, using a gun will be less suspicious than knocking someone through a wall with those Colton bones of yours," snapped Sarah. She glanced around at the oblivious fellow shoppers as she hissed, "We are still trying to stay off the radar."
Her words came out angrier than she had meant them to. No matter how many times she reminded herself how utterly useless it was to get mad at the machine, that yelling at her would do no more good than berating the dryer for yet again losing another sock, she still found her hackles raised by Cameron's lack of nuance. She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Let's see some more," she said tiredly, sounding more like just another mother at that point.
Sarah rejected a crimson Grecian goddess get up, followed by a wispy pale green dress and then a gold lamé gown for the same reason of lacking cover ability. She didn't bother tying to explain to Cameron the idea of a reputation, the definition of the slang term 'loose,' the assumptions people made about a correlation between clothes and actions, or the moral issues of dressing like a sexbot.
Next Cameron came out of the dressing room in a dark grey dress with silver stripes. Sarah shook her head. "Not quite. It's too… formal."
Cameron looked at her with wide eyes. "A prom is a formal event. We are shopping for a formal dress, as opposed to the other dresses I already own because they have been rejected as being too informal. Why is this too formal?" From an actual teenager the words would probably have been delivered in tone dripping with scorn. Cameron asked because she was actually curious.
Sarah sighed as she mentally reminded herself that it was good for Cameron to be learning. "Formal yes – but not too serious," she tried to explain. She leaned in closer to say in a quieter tone, "I'm trying to make you look like an innocent 16 year old girl instead of a heartless assassin."
As Cameron returned to the stall to try on something else, two of the other people in the dressing room began raising their voices above the rest of the hum in the room.
"I don't care if he has a car, he was suspended for fighting and even if the school is going to let him go to the prom, that doesn't mean you have to go with him." The woman was probably in her late forties, but doing her best to fight back time with heavy makeup, young clothes and Botoxed tightened skin.
"It wasn't a fight," snarled the girl as she struggled to zip up the back of the neon pink dress she was trying on.
The woman was ample in proportions with blonde hair while the girl had a much slimmer figure and dark brown hair, but the identical frowns on their faces and the matching blue eyes that glared at each other made it obvious they were mother and daughter.
"It was just some shouting," the teenager tried to explain angrily, "but the school wigged out because they have a big ole stick up their butts and freak if any of us don't act like good little robots and do exactly as we're told all the time." She continued to struggle with the zipper as she spoke, but the zipper refused to cooperate as she blindly tried to tug it up until finally her mother gestured for her to turn around and, brushing the hair aside, zipped it up herself.
"You look beautiful," said the mom tightly, as they both stood in front of the three paneled mirror outside the stalls and glared, a phalanx of mothers and daughters glaring back at them from the mirrors. "Is this the one you want?"
"Yes," said the girl, just as tightly.
"Ok, change back and meet me at the register," the woman said icily, the subtext clear to everyone in the room that the dress was going to cost the girl her date of choice. The girl made an exasperated noise as she went back into her changing stall.
Sarah decided she hadn't missed out on anything, not going prom dress shopping with her mother. Her mom had made her prom dress for her to save on money, since their budget had been so tight then. Still, her mom had obligingly made the dress the height of fashion, which back then had involved having enough ruffles on the skirt and sleeves to outfit a team of ice capades dancers. It had been a shiny, bright teal.
Sarah remembered choosing a new set of make up to match the dress. By the end of the night the wide streaks of blue and green on her eyelids had become hopelessly smudged by the hot lights and fast dances. There had been an after party at a bar, and the memory of that night had gotten somewhat fuzzier toward the end. She remembered her friends Ginger and Maggie laughing hysterically when her ruffles had gotten stuck on a door handle and she had nearly torn her whole dress in half. Sarah grimaced at the memory as it led to others. Poor Ginger, collateral damage in Skynet's attempt to destroy her.
Cameron stepped out of the dressing room in a soft golden orange and cream colored dress that billowed like something from a Disney movie. It had little white flowers randomly embroidered all over it on both the skirt and bodice.
"Nice," said Sarah with an approving nod, ignoring her own inner turmoil. "You actually look like a young teenager off to her first ball in that. Just remember to smile." Sarah demonstrated with a brittle one of her own. "Girls tend to be happy about prom."
She tried to keep the bitterness from her voice as the inner part of her that refused to trust anything with a computer chip asked her what she was doing, dressing up the same type of thing that had killed so many she cared about, treating it as if it were just some harmless porcelain doll.
Her eyes went past Cameron into the stall behind her, her gaze falling on the rejected gowns. In the other dressing stalls where mothers and daughters were also on the mission to find The Perfect Dress for prom dresses lay scattered, abandoned and heaped in desolate piles; all of the rejected dresses Cameron had tried on were neatly re-hung with a mechanical precession, ready for someone else.
She didn't know what to say. Part of her was reminding her that the whole situation, going all the way back to 1999, was all kinds of wrong, while another persistent voice chanted, just pretend to be normal. Since the worrying would get her nowhere at the moment, she simply straightened her shoulders and pretended to be just another mom getting her daughter a prom dress.
"Change back and meet me at the register," she said.