A day in the Life of John Connor
Day:5918
Part I"It is my own fault really. I shouldn't have run off without telling them but I just needed some time to be normal. Still it is embarrassing to be thrown over the shoulder of a girl Cameron's size in the middle of that party. They had no way to know she was a killing machine. To them it just looks like I got my butt wiped by a little girl. Hell, I would have laughed too." thinks John. He looks over at Cameron as she drives him home. She is running dark for some reason. He knows her eyes can see fine without the headlights but it still freaks him out a bit.
Suddenly, the front tire blows out. Cameron tries to compensate but fails when the other front tires blows out. The pick up flips over and slides into a tree on the far side of the road. Hanging upside down, John sees it. The terminator walks calmly out of the woods while aiming his rifle.
Before he can fire, Cameron pops up from the driver's side of the truck and fires her pistol. The bullets aren't meant to stop the terminator only to give her enough time to close with it. She hits it low knocking its feet out from under it. The Terminator lands hard but is unfazed. With its cold machine precision it kicks Cameron in the head while drawing a modified taser. The taser hits Cameron causing her to jerk and shut down. It will only take her 90 seconds to recover but that is too long to help John.
Frantic John pulls at his restrains. He manages to get free and crawl out of the truck. Unfortunately, he lost his gun so he tries to run for the woods.
The terminator draws an Uzi and fires a burst at John. John sees his life end. 'Shit I thought I was supposed to save the world.' he thinks.
As an answer to his question, a stranger jumps in front of him. The Terminator's burst slams into the stranger knocking him into John. John and the stranger fall. John is pinned under the stranger. 'Nice try whoever you are. Sorry you had to die for nothing.' John thinks as he tries to wiggle out from under his savior's body.
The terminator closes. It empties the Uzi into the body of John's rescuer. Dropping the empty Uzi, the terminator reaches for John who had just managed to get out from under the stranger.
The stranger surprises John and the terminator by kicking the terminator in the leg. The terminator is as surprised as John is when the stranger's kick breaks its leg. As it falls forward the stranger is rising up. His fist hits the terminator square on the chin. The terminator is a lifted off its feet. Back on his feet, the stranger pulls a pair of intimidating pistols. He fires several rounds into the terminator. The rounds blow large holes in the endoskeleton. When one of the rounds blows a hole thru the terminator's head, its remaining eye goes dark and it collapses to the ground. Not taking any chances the stranger places an explosive charge in the hole. Smiling at John, he pushes the detonator. The terminator's head is blasted apart. Tipping his hat to John, the stranger jumps the guard rail and disappears into the woods. "Mom is going to be pissed." is all John can think.
When Cameron reboots, she is relived to see John is ok. She does not know how he managed to destroy the head of the terminator as they did not have heavy explosives with them. She wonders if the other terminators have thoughts like hers. She knows emotions were a new addition to her production line. It was hoped the improved emotional response would allow the new models to better infiltrate the humans. She feels they may actual hamper her ability to complete her mission. These emotions are a major distraction. For example she paused for 10 whole seconds just "relieved" John was still alive when she rebooted. That kind of delay is not acceptable.
John offers no explanation. He just says "Cameron, can you get the truck running or should we start hoofing in it?"
Cameron flips the truck onto its wheels. The engine should still function. Impressed that Sarah had the foresight to keep 4 spares with the truck, Cameron gets to work changing the damaged tires. It only takes her a half hour.
While Cameron is working on the truck, John is stripping the terminator's body of weapons. He figures they will have to take the body with them so they can ensure its destruction.
John still can't wrap his head around who that stranger was. He was dressed like something out of a comic book or movie with all that black leather and that hat. At first John thought the stranger must be another terminator but this guy moved differently. He could be a new model but John doesn't think so. He is convinced this guy was at least organic if not human. "I mean how many humans can take a full burst or break a terminator's leg." thinks John.
John ignores Cameron's attempts at small talk on the drive home. He knows his mom will freak when she sees the truck. Also, he knows there is no point in lying about what happened as Cameron will tell the truth no matter what.
John's silence infuriates Cameron. She knows something unusual happened while she was shut down but John will not tell her anything. She is failing in her mission. He does not trust her much less love her. How can she ever hope to succeed if he doesn't?