The Terminator franchise is the property of Paramount Pictures, The Draka are the Property of S. M. Stirling. At least I think, either way both are not mine.
Everyone Knows Terminator, So I won't explain that too much, there will be a few characters from the original but quite a few outsiders as well.
The Draka are the Creation of S. M. Stirling, and are seriously not nice guys. If you don't know about them I'd recommend reading the wikipedia page on them before reading this
The Draka are the worst sort of Evil Empire in the sense that they have A. no redeeming qualities and B. Always seem to come out on top. So what happens when you are being chased by a big fish? Well, a bigger fish comes along...
(...)
Two billion lives ended on November 4th 1998. On that day, The day the survivors would call Judgment day, the Final War Began. We thought it would be the triumph for the Final Society. Instead of ruling the world the Race was plunged into a new kind of war. The war against the Machines.
-Gweldolyn Ingolfsson
September 28th 1990
"Project Prizefighter is, to put it simply, a deadman's switch armed with nuclear weapons." Emilio Sanchez motioned towards the presentation playing for the generals and scientists in the room and the picture changed from an image of him and the other people at Cyberdyne Labs working to missiles and various military hardware.
"At the present state of development Cyberdyne Labs will have it complete and ready to be implemented in less than a year. Once it is finished even if all of the Alliance's civilian and military leadership was killed or otherwise immobilized by the snakes, it could still hit them with everything in our nuclear stockpile." Emilio noticed that the general with Bright blue eyes and was checking his watch. He needed to get their attention back.
"However, with four to five more years of work we could expand it from just reacting to an attack and firing all our nukes until half the world is flat to something much more fine tuned. We could make it a truly global system of defense." He motioned again and this time an image of the planned robotic hardware showed up on screen, including the crude mechanical infantryman. This made the blue eyed general shift uncomfortably.
"We call it Skynet." as he said this he motioned and the word "Skynet" appeared on the screen in silver block capital letters. "It would be able to manage everything from fleets of aircraft to small teams of infantry. It wouldn't just be able to kill our enemies, it would be able to win the war for us. With Skynet on our side we may even be victorious without even firing a shot. Now if there are any questions I will do my best to answer them now."
Several hands went up, including the blue eyed general. Emilio elected to answer him first. "Yes, you in the middle. General..."
"General Cameron, Mr. Sanchez. I must say I am not wholly cavalier about removing the human element out of warfare. What if It became compromised after we put it in control? Or maybe this 'Skynet' would just decide that it didn't want to take orders anymore?"
"Well that is an excellent question General Cameron. First off Skyent's mainframe would be totally hack-proof just like our other computer systems. and Skynet would not be truly self-aware, so it wouldn't be able to decide it didn't want to do anything. As for removing the human element from war, we live in dangerous times. Drastic measures are needed."
"Very well." the General said, clearly not getting the answer he wanted.
Emilio pointed to another General with his hand raised. "Yes, you. What can I answer?"
"Thank you Mr. Sanchez, I just want to know where exactly did all this development come from in such a short time? Just a eight years ago you said the Tech was 20 years away at best."
"A lot of hard work and breakthroughs." He said with a smile, while in the back of his head he said "and a pile of scraps found in an LA factory."
We didn't question where it came from to be honest. It was like a gift from god. It had American tags and numbers and Identification. Maybe people in the future sent it to us to help us Defeat the Snakes. Maybe it had some malicious purpose. It wasn't like we just hooked up the thing's central processor to our Nuclear defense system. It just gave us ideas.
-Emilio Sanchez
Excerpt from Los Angeles Police Department surveillance footage. Dated October 26th 1984
(Video shows four people, two police officers, Lieutenant Winston and Sergeant Mariano as well as one Police psychiatrist, Dr. Silberman, and One suspect, Kyle Reese)
(Dr. Silberman offers Reese a Cigarette, Reese Refuses)
Silberman: So, you're a Soldier? Fighting for whom?"
Reese: With the American Patriots movement, under Dewey, from 21 to 27.
Silberman: That's the year 2027?
Reese: That's right, and for the last two years I was assigned as security and recon for John Connor.
Silberman: and who is the enemy again?
Reese: Skynet. An AI defense system built by Cyberdyne systems.
Silberman: Not the Snakes? (Silberman Glances at Winston and Mariano and raises an eyebrow)
Reese: No, not primarily.
Silberman: Why is that?
Reese: Skynet smashed their military apparatus to paste. They didn't pose a serious threat to us anymore.
Silberman: I see, and this AI wants to solidify its hold over the Alliance by killing John Connor the leader of this "American Patriots movement", in fact before he is even conceived, as a kind of retroactive abortion. (Silberman glances at Winston and Mariano and nods with a slight smile)
Reese: Yes.
Silberman: Why doesn't this Skynet just kill Connor then? In the future? why this elaborate scheme involving time travel and the, uh, Terminator?
Reese: Connor has people who would take his place in my time. killing him then would make no difference. By Killing him now it stands to gain more.
Silberman: And that's when you broke into this lab complex with this, uh, time displacement equipment?
Reese: That's right. The Terminator had already gone through and Connor sent me to intercept.
Silberman: Well how are you supposed to go back?
Reese: I can't.
(Winston and Mariano exit)
Silberman: Why didn't you bring any weapons or equipment, something more advanced. Aren't plasma weapons common in your time? Show me a piece of futuristic tech.
Reese: Nothing inorganic can go in, something about the field generated by a living organism. Nothing non-living will go.
Silberman: Why?
Reese: I DIDN'T BUILD THE F****** THING
Silberman: Okay, Okay. This cyborg its a metal...
Reese: Surrounded by living tissue.
Silberman: of course of course, so why didn't the Terminator go right to her?
Reese: When Skynet took control it didn't have access to most official documents. No full name, no address, just the city she lived in.
Silberman: Alright, alright. So you claim you were born with Skynet in charge of the bunker you lived in, why didn't it...
Reese: Look, you've heard enough. I need to...
(Useable footage ends, Official records indicate that an unknown assailant attacked the station and Killed a large number of officers. Kyle Reese was Killed two days later by an explosion of his own making. Sarah Connor's whereabouts are not known at this time.)
Comments and Criticism Are welcome
