Knowles sat on the leather couch in the waiting area outside a large office and clutched an ice pack wrapped in a towel to the back of his head, wincing at the pain and trying to ignore it as much as he could. All he remembered was the hobo at the back door, and then waking up in a helicopter with someone who claimed to be a medic, who'd told him his skull was bruised he had a mild concussion. He'd given him some codeine that had barely taken the edge off his splitting headache and some water that had done nothing to alleviate the nausea he felt.
He had no idea where the hell he was; the chopper's windows had been blacked out and neither the pilots nor the medic had told him squat about where they'd been going. He'd asked but they'd just told him they'll get there soon. All he knew was he was in a building or complex, a large one at that, in some mountain range somewhere. The Rockies or the Sierra Nevadas, he thought. Though it could have been anywhere; he didn't know how long he'd been out for so there was no way to tell for sure.
A wooden door opened a few feet away from his couch and an Air Force colonel in blue uniform stepped outside and shook hands with a grey haired man in a greyer suit and red tie.
"I'm looking forward to the second stage of trials, Mr Coleman," the colonel said, a pleased-looking smile on his face.
"Certainly Colonel," the man addressed as Coleman smiled back, a glint in his eyes.
"Assuming the second stage trials are a success I'm going to recommend to the Joint Chiefs that we adopt your AI. I think they'll be very impressed with what you've shown me today."
Coleman nodded as the colonel turned to leave. "My pilot will take you back to Beale AFB when you're ready, and Mitchell here will escort you back." Another man stepped out of the room and loomed over both Coleman and the colonel, a full head taller than Knowles himself – placing him just shy of seven feet - with broad shoulders and chest. Knowles reckoned this guy must spend at least half his life in the gym, when he wasn't juicing up with steroids, at least. His eyes looked vacant and empty. He'd served with guys who'd seen too much crap in the service and what was commonly called the thousand-yard stare, but this was something else. Those eyes weren't just somewhere else, they were dead, emotionless; he looked as if he'd kill a man barehanded with no real effort and no real feeling. Knowles figured the guy was internal security from the looks of it. He looked like a complete psychopath. Knowles resolved not to get on that guy's bad side.
Steroids and the colonel walked past him, neither acknowledging him as they went on by and disappeared down the corridor and turned a corner. Coleman turned to him and his face dropped, taking on a stern, almost angry facade that told Knowles that this wasn't going to be a friendly meeting.
He stepped into the room and Coleman gestured at him to sit at one end of a large, polished oak table. The room itself was immaculate, spotless, but sparsely decorated, as if it were rarely used. Blinds concealed the outside world from view and a dim bulb hung from the ceiling, below a fan that whirled and spun slowly and quietly, made obsolete by the air conditioning unit built into the wall. A pair of bronze coloured lamps stuck out the wall on either side of the window and cast a subtle glow in the room. Knowles wondered why they didn't just open the blinds. They were in a secure facility in the middle of nowhere: who exactly would be looking in through the window at them?
Knowles sat down at the table, opposite three other men. Coleman joined them and made it four. The mercenary looked across the table at the four men, all wearing suits and ties, all in their fifties, he guessed, and all looking like drab businessmen. One was Japanese but the other three were all white. One of the two Caucasians apart from Coleman wore a red tie, and the other blue. A fifth man stood at the side of the table, big, but not as massive as the man he'd just seen. He was bald as an egg, too. Unlike the others he wore jeans and a black shirt. He had the same blank, emotionless expression on his face. He could have easily been Steroids' little brother – 'little' being a relative term. The guy still looked like many a Marine he'd served with who'd gone overboard in the gym – minus the corps the hell did Kaliba find these people? Coleman took his seat with the other men and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, he lit one and placed the pack on the table, then took a long, leisurely drag and stared at Knowles.
"Zieracorp was broken into last night," Coleman started, blowing out smoke from his mouth and nostrils as he spoke. "Tell us what happened."
"I don't remember any of that," Knowles replied. He held the ice pack tighter to his head as the pain increased tenfold; he reckoned it had something to do with being in this room. "We saw a homeless guy on surveillance, pissing outside at the back of the building. He looked drunk. We thought nothing of it until he started bashing in one of the security cameras. I went outside to move him on, and that's it. I guess he had a buddy.
The Japanese-looking guy leaned forward over the table. "That 'buddy', as you put it, entered the building while you were unconscious and kidnapped Danny Dyson – the man we paid you to protect." His voice was full of acid and thinly veiled accusation.
"Clearly this homeless man was part of an attempt to gain access to Zieracorp," Coleman added. "They outsmarted you."
"Whoever it was, they were clearly professionals," Knowles countered, not happy that his competence seemed to be brought into question here. "We never saw a second guy on the cameras."
One of the others placed a file on the table and slid it across to Knowles. He opened it and saw a surveillance photo of a blonde woman and a bald black man in one of the corridors of Zeiracorp. A second photo, taken five minutes later, revealed the two of them dragging a third person whom Knowles recognised as Danny Dyson.
"Sarah Connor," Coleman said. "She broke into Zeiracorp, she took Danny Dyson, and she killed one of your men."
Sarah Connor? Knowles was surprised as hell that she'd come back. He'd seen the photos of her from the day they'd cleared the building and searched for Weaver and her AI. She'd been all over the news for the last two weeks, what the hell had she been doing there? She looked different in the surveillance photos; blonde and a different hairstyle, and glasses over her eyes. If he hadn't just been told he wouldn't have recognised her at first, but as he looked closely at her face he could see it was definitely her.
"She's becoming a threat to our operations," the Japanese man said plainly.
"And what are your operations, exactly?" Knowles asked. "It'd help me do my job a whole lot better if I knew more about what was going on here."
"You don't need to know," Coleman said. He stubbed out the cigarette and immediately pulled out and lit a second one, releasing a fresh plume of smoke into the air. "I can tell you this," he said amicably. "Danny Dyson is an extraordinary young man. I suppose you've found this from working with him so closely these past few days," he smiled.
"The kid kept to himself," Knowles shrugged, sensing he wasn't going to get anything more out of them. He knew he was better off not pushing the issue. One of the stipulations of his terms of service with Kaliba was that he didn't ask too many questions or go poking his nose into their classified business. He trusted these guys about as much as he could throw Baldy, stood silent and still at the side of the table. "Didn't like to talk much to us."
"Well let me enlighten you," Cole said, opening up a file on Danny Dyson, even though he knew all the details almost by heart. "Daniel Joseph Dyson: aged twenty-one. He was a brilliant child: skipped three grades and graduated high school at fifteen; received a double bachelors' degree in computer science and computer engineering from CalTech at nineteen, a Masters at age twenty. His IQ is one-hundred-seventy-five, and he's shown a natural aptitude for anything technological and a willingness to follow in his father's footsteps. Danny Dyson's dream is to create a working artificial intelligence, which is what we're trying to do here. A fully functioning AI could be worth billions to the right people."
That's what this is about: money. Typical, Knowles thought to himself. It all started to make sense now; the attack on Zieracorp, taking over the building and letting Danny hack his way through everything they had: they were eliminating the competition. These guys probably had him figured as a dumb grunt, a gun for hire and not much more. Sometimes that was fine with him; he didn't mind if that's what they'd thought, but he knew all too well the military applications for an AI: a fleet of unmanned bombers, a computer that never slept and never made mistakes coordinating all American, or even all NATO forces in theatres like Afghanistan, Iraq, or wherever else became the new hot zone in future. He knew all too well the prime customer for this kind of thing would be the military. That would be worth billions to the top brass, who'd piss their pants to get this thing under their control. He could easily imagine them tossing a blank cheque at these guys in exchange for their AI. It also explained what that air force colonel had been doing here, he thought.
"So what exactly have you brought me here for, to bite my head off for losing him?"
"Not quite," Coleman answered. "We want Danny Dyson back. You're to lead a team and rescue him at all costs."
"Do we know where he is?" Knowles asked. "Or do you want me to go knocking door to door?"
Baldy stepped towards the table and put down a black iPhone in front of Knowles. He picked it up and saw a street map on the screen. A small red dot blinked on one of the streets. Not a normal app, Knowles thought to himself as he stared at it.
"Danny Dyson has a tracking device implanted on his body," the Japanese man said. "That's his location. We want you to lead a team and bring him back to us."
"Fine," Knowles nodded. "When do we leave?"
"Another team is being assembled as we speak," Coleman said. "You'll leave here in the helicopter and rendezvous with them on the ground. There'll be cars waiting for you when you land." Coleman gestured towards the muscular bald ape still stood motionless. "He will accompany you," he added.
Knowles stood up and shook his head. "I don't need him, thanks."
"That's non-negotiable," the fourth man, silent up until now, spoke up. "He comes with you or your contract with us is terminated."
"Fine," Knowles said reluctantly. He didn't need some unreliable gym nut and probably psychotic getting in his way. He'd never served with any of the men in his team but they'd have all been ex military and vetted by the same private security firm he was registered with. He turned around and opened the door, glad to leave the room. He turned back to see Coleman lighting up a third cigarette. "Those things will kill you, you know," he smirked as he strolled out. The sooner this job was over and done with, the better, he thought.
Coleman flicked ash from his third cigarette into a glass ashtray on the table, now half full. He beckoned to the bald T-888 stood sentinel at the table and it looked at him, awaiting orders. "You know what needs to be done," he told it.
"Yes," it replied stoically as it followed after Knowles. "So do you." It had its orders, and among those was to ensure Coleman and the other humans in collaboration with Skynet fulfilled their assignments and didn't threaten the developing Skynet in this time, where it was most vulnerable. It had worked with them, and the two former members of Kaliba, side by side for fifteen years, but it wouldn't hesitate to kill them in a heartbeat if it detected any deception from them. It seemed unlikely; these humans were collaborating with machines against their own kind, to ensure Skynet would spare them when it eliminated the human race. As long as they believed that, they'd cooperate.
Sarah stared impassively at the terrified form of Danny Dyson, tied up to a chair and a hood covering his face, preventing him from seeing them. Sarah had rolled up a sock and shoved it into his mouth before placing a stretch of tape over his lips to keep him from making any noise. She knew that simply taping his mouth shut wouldn't be enough and the sock was to fill the mouth cavity and prevent any noise at all from being generated. She looked at him as he slumped over in the chair; the only noise he'd made in hours was the occasional sniffle.
Ellison stepped quietly into the living room and motioned for Sarah to come to him. She stepped away from Danny without saying a word and followed Ellison into his kitchen, making sure she closed the door behind her.
"Don't you think he's suffered enough now?" Ellison asked. He still wasn't comfortable with this. He'd gotten used to the idea of living like a criminal now – he guessed that since he was sheltering Sarah that pretty much made him an accomplice, now he had to add kidnapping to his conscience's rap sheet.
"It's only been a few hours," Sarah said in a hushed voice. She didn't want Danny to hear them, or at least to not know what they were saying.
"He's been tied up and gagged for seven hours," Ellison softly said. Even if he cast aside his moral objections to Sarah's methods, he knew that sooner or later that Danny would need to use the bathroom. Ellison really didn't feel like clearing up if Danny couldn't hold it all in. "Savannah's wondering what's going on," he added, nodding at the girl sat at the table, quietly eating a bowl of cereal and watching Sarah and Ellison through nervous eyes. "She's scared."
"So is Danny, and that's how I want him," Sarah replied. She turned to Savannah and her face softened. "When you finish that go upstairs and watch TV, okay?"
Savannah nodded obediently without hesitation. "Are you going to hurt him?" she asked.
"No," Sarah smiled, not sure if she believed herself and damn sure Savannah didn't either. "We just need to ask him some questions."
"Is he bad?"
Sarah had to think about that for a moment. She'd only seen Danny twice, and both times he'd been a child. She had no idea who he really was now. But she couldn't tell Savannah that. "No, but he works for some very bad people, we're just going to talk to him about them. Go upstairs," she said. Savannah started to leave the kitchen when Sarah stopped her. She opened up Ellison's freezer and found a big plastic tub of triple chocolate ice cream. She pulled a spoon out of a drawer and handed them both to Savannah. "Take that and go watch some TV. We won't be long."
Sarah waited until Savannah was upstairs, listening out for her footsteps ascending, before she and Ellison turned to the living room. Sarah pulled out her Glock as they entered and Ellison pulled a pair of chairs from the dinner table with him, setting them up in front of Danny. He had a couch but he didn't think he and Sarah sat back on a sofa would really give the right impression.
Sarah yanked the hood off Danny's head and saw his eyes blinking rapidly, trying to adjust themselves to the light after hours in darkness. She pulled off the tape and took the sock out his mouth. Danny breathed in deeply, partly from having the sock rammed down his throat and partly through fear, and looked at Sarah first, then Ellison, with wide, fearful eyes. Tears streamed down his cheeks and snot smeared over his lip where his nose had run. "Who... who are you people?" Danny asked, his voice quivering.
"You don't recognise me?" Sarah stared evenly at him. She'd have thought he would have, but then again he was scared out of his mind and she'd gone to lengths to make herself look different.
Danny shook his head. "Just let me go, please. I can pay you, half a million dollars, right now. Just take me to a cash bank: I'll pay you and I won't tell anyone, I swear."
Sarah roughly gripped his chin hard in her hands and dug her fingertips, pulling his face so he was looking straight at her as she leaned in close to him. "If your father knew what you were doing, helping the machines, he'd be rolling in his grave," she said.
Danny looked at her and his heart skipped a beat as he took in what she said about machines. "You're Sarah Connor," his voice was little more than a whisper. His eyes narrowed and he felt himself turn cold at the woman in front of him. "You killed my dad," he spat, his voice full of venom. "You ruined my family." His mom hadn't been the same since dad had gone; part of her had died with him and she'd walked around with a hole in her heart. He didn't struggle in his chair, he knew it was useless. But what he'd give to be set free; he wasn't a violent person, hadn't ever even got into a fight at school, but he had the sudden, overwhelming urge to tear this bitch apart after what she'd done.
"I never killed Miles," Sarah said, loosening her grip on his jaw but still holding on. Danny shook his head free of her grasp.
"Liar," he said simply. "I looked you up online; you're insane. And I hacked into the police records for my dad; you shot him fifteen times," Danny snarled. "All because you don't like computers."
"Listen to her," Ellison said calmly. "She's not lying."
Danny rolled his eyes in disgust. "Whatever. If you believe her then you should be in a rubber room too."
Sarah suddenly lashed out angrily and struck Danny's face with the back of her hand with enough force to knock him sprawling to the ground, still tied to the chair and unable to break his fall. He fell to the side and his face smacked on the ground. Ellison stared at Sarah in shock but said nothing, he could see the anger on her face.
Sarah had suffered in Pescadero for three years, being drugged up, ridiculed and made into a laughing stock by Silberman and his ilk by day, and facing the nightmares of the future in her dreams at night. Day after day, and that was without the beatings and sexual abuse from the orderlies. She hadn't been crazy when she'd been admitted but that place definitely made people go that way. If Danny knew what that place was like, what they'd put her through because of the truth, she didn't think he'd be so quick to judge.
"I read the police report too," Ellison interjected before Sarah could say anything else. He pulled Danny upright again and made sure he wasn't hurt. "They said Sarah shot your father in cold blood; gunned him down before they could save him, then blew up the place. The police lied."
"Why should I believe you?" Danny asked.
"Because your father died a hero," Sarah said simply. She could remember it clear as a bell, could see Miles Dyson fall, shot full of holes. "I showed him the truth and he came with us willingly. The police were trigger happy; they shot him without warning. He knew he wouldn't make it and he stayed behind to destroy his work while we escaped. He sacrificed himself for you, for everyone."
"And you're undoing it all," Ellison told him.
Danny shook his head. He didn't believe a word of it. They were trying to convince him that they weren't the bad guys; that his dad was working with them when he'd died. "You're full of crap," he spat. He made up his mind now that when he got out of here he'd definitely hire Knowles and his guys to chop Sarah Connor up into mincemeat.
Sarah leaned forward in her chair and locked eyes with Danny. She wondered what she could possibly say that would convince him of it. Danny turned his face away from her, catching Ellison's passive facade instead. "Who are you, anyway?" Danny asked him, "how'd she get you believing in her crap?"
Ellison smiled slightly and shook his head at the thought of it all. If Danny thought Sarah was crazy he had no idea what he'd think about his story. "I was FBI," he explained. "I was assigned to the Connor case after Cyberdine blew up. I saw things and slowly realised she was right. One of those machines gunned down a twenty-man HRT team under my command and walked away without a scratch."
"Cyborgs?" Danny asked, his curiosity piqued.
"So you know about them?"
Danny nodded. "Yeah, we knew Zeiracorp had at least one. The men with me were supposed to destroy it if they saw it, but we never did."
Sarah knew exactly why: John Henry had disappeared through time, which was why they'd never find a trace of the AI. She wondered what his bosses at Kaliba would think about that when he'd have gone back to them empty handed.
"What exactly was your job, Danny? What did Kaliba hire you to do?"
Danny's eyes widened in surprised. His employers had been extremely secretive about... everything. When they'd approached him and offered him a job he'd searched for Kaliba online and found almost nothing: no official website and only a few scattered references, mostly only mentioning the various companies they owned. He'd had no idea about what Kaliba even did until he'd decided to accept. How the hell did she know about them?
"What did you do?" Sarah repeated herself. Danny looked into her eyes and saw the intensity within; he could tell she'd have no problem beating him into submission and he realised that he'd end up telling her; either now or later on when he's black and blue with bruises. It wasn't like knowing would change anything, he figured.
"They hired me to create an AI."
"John Henry's brother," Ellison realised. "It encountered another like itself, right?"
Danny nodded. "It deemed the other AI as hostile and tried to attack it. Something happened on the other end and our AI was stopped from finishing it. After that I was transferred from the AI development team. I never knew why it attacked Zeiracorp's AI."
"And you never asked," Sarah snapped.
"Sarah," Savannah's voice rang from above as she came down the stairs.
"Go back upstairs," Ellison told her gently.
"There's people coming," Savannah replied, "they're outside."
"Shit," Sarah peeked out through a gap in the curtains and saw a large black van driving up the street towards their house. How the hell did they find them? As far as anyone knew Ellison was just an employee of Zeiracorp, there shouldn't be anything connecting her and him together.
"They're coming for me," Danny grinned. He had no idea how they'd found him but he was glad they did. "Knowles is gonna rip your head off, you bitch."
Sarah ran upstairs and grabbed the remaining weapons they hadn't buried with Cameron: two of the HK-417s and an AK-47, plus a few pounds of Semtex, and stuffed the ammo and explosives into a bag. She picked up the rifles and handed the HK-417s to Ellison. "Take these," she told him. "Take Savannah and get out through the back door."
"We have to stick together," Ellison protested even as Sarah shoved him into the kitchen and towards the back door. Sarah pushed Savannah into Ellison and loaded up an AK with a thirty round magazine clipped to a second. She took a third mag and shoved it into the side pocket of her combat trousers. "There's no time; get out before they surround the house."
"What about you?" Ellison didn't want to leave Sarah here; why bother when they could all run and get out?
"I'll call you," she said as she cocked the rifle. The living room window smashed open and a grenade flew into the room. It hit the ground and spewed out gas. Savannah screamed in fright and pulled towards the back door. "Go!" Sarah barked at them.
"Don't go," Savannah cried. She started towards Sarah and tried to pull her to the back door as Ellison opened it.
"Go with Mr Ellison," she told her. She and Ellison shared a glance for a moment, an understanding, before he grabbed Savannah by the hand and ran out the back door, albeit reluctantly. He didn't want to leave Sarah alone but he knew she wouldn't go and he wouldn't risk Savannah. He had no choice. He bolted out through the back yard and pulled Savannah with him.
"Who are they?" she asked.
"Very bad men," Ellison huffed as he lengthened his stride and urged himself to move faster. He lifted Savannah up over the fence before climbing over it himself. Once in the neighbour's back yard he repeated the same move over the next fence with Savannah, lifting her over before scaling and emerging in another property on the other side of the block.
"James, what the-" A fat man in shorts and blue polo shirt stood, his eyes and mouth agape at the sight of Ellison hauling Savannah over his fence and then leaping over himself.
Gunfire rattled from Ellison's house and both he and Savannah snapped their head to the side simultaneously at the noise. Bursts of automatic fire tore through the quiet of the suburban neighbourhood and shattered the calm. "Mike, I need to borrow your car."
Mike dropped the hosepipe he was holding onto the grass as he saw the weapons Ellison had slung over his shoulder. He'd known Ellison was a fed, but what the hell was he doing, was Ellison turning into some kind of John McClane? "I don't know, James..."
"It's an emergency," Ellison said, gesturing down to Savannah. "People are after her."
Mike looked at Savannah, the little girl was in tears and scared almost out of her mind. What the hell was she caught up in? He wondered. "She on some kind of witness protection thing?" he asked her.
Ellison nodded and held Savannah close to him. Mike wasn't a close neighbour; they didn't exactly hang out together or anything, and Ellison realised Mike didn't know he'd left the FBI. "Yeah," he lied quickly. "Those gunshots you heard; they're after her. I need your car Mike. Now."
Mike nodded and led them through into his house, which was clearly the home of a married man with kids. A few toys were scattered about the floor and Ellison could hear cartoons playing from a TV set above them. They followed Mike through the house and into the garage. Inside was a silver SUV. "Mike, I need you to drive us, too. They can't see either me or her."
Mike sighed, exasperated, as he took the drivers' seat and Ellison and Savannah got into the back and crouched down. "Get into the foot well," he told her. She squeezed herself in and then he laid down on the seat above. He readied one of the rifles in case he needed it, though the sounds of the gunfire were still raging. Sarah was putting up one hell of a fight.
"Is Sarah gonna be okay?" Savannah asked nervously. Sarah had rescued her from another bad man, and she'd kept her safe since mommy had gone. She was strange, but she liked her.
"I hope so," Ellison replied honestly as Mike pulled out of the garage and into the street. "You got a phone?" he asked Mike, who pulled out a Nokia in reply. "Hold it to your ear while you drive so it doesn't look like you're talking to anyone in the car. Tell me if you see any black vans or anyone armed."
Mike did as he was instructed, wondering what the hell he'd gotten himself into. "Nothing yet," he told Ellison. He drove down the street and turned a corner. "Gunfire's died down," he noted.
Ellison dry-swallowed nervously; if the gunfire stopped that meant only one thing: the fight was over. He didn't know whether that was a good thing or bad.
As soon as the back door slammed shut Sarah rushed back to the staircase, holding her breath and squinting her eyes against the cloud of smoke that had filled the living room. She bounded up the stairs until she was halfway up, her heart pounding inside her chest, pumping blood through her. She took a couple of deep breaths to steady herself. She realised that in going up the stairs she'd effectively trapped herself in the house, but that didn't matter so much now. She felt a strange sense of calm wash over her as she shouldered her AK and lined up her sights around chest height on the front door. The door exploded inwards with a bright flash and the remnants fell down to the floor. A man burst through the doorway, wearing black SWAT gear and brandishing an MP-5, swinging the barrel around to clear the room. Sarah pulled the trigger twice and the man dropped to the ground.
"One o'clock, up the stairs!" one of them shouted as a second man passed through the doorway. Sarah gave him the good news with three shots this time and moved up to the top of the stairs, where she lay prone.
Another man stepped through over the two corpses and Sarah fired again. The rounds pinged off his chest and caused her heart to skip a beat. Triple-eight. Shit! It fired and hosed rounds up the stairs, forcing Sarah to roll away. She felt the bullets cut through the air where she'd been a split second ago and pushed herself up onto her knees, leaning against the wall and out of the machine's line of sight. She pulled the pin on a grenade and tossed it over the banister, and dived into the cover of Ellison's spare bedroom where she'd been sleeping, a split second later the grenade exploded and the house shook.
Sarah leaned over the banister and saw the machine was floored, splayed out on its back from the force of the blast. She switched to automatic and loosed off several short bursts, spraying the machine with rounds, using the weight of her fire to keep it down until she spotted a stun grenade soaring through the broken window.
"Crap!" Sarah dropped back down below the banister as it detonated and released deafening noise that pounded her skull and threatened to burst her eardrums. She'd ducked down fast enough to avoid being blinded by the flash of light. Boots stamped up the stairs and Sarah fired on the first head she saw to clear the banister; the burst pierced his Kevlar helmet and dropped the man as her AK clicked empty. She retreated into the spare room and slammed the door shut, taking the split second to lock it and push the wardrobe over so it blocked the single entrance to the room. It wouldn't do much but might buy her a couple seconds extra.
She retreated to the window and started to pull it open; it wasn't much of a drop and if she could get away she could rendezvous with Ellison and then work out what the hell to do next. She started to open it but movement in the back yard caught her eye. Black clad figures vaulted over the fence and took up position at the rear of the house. She was completely boxed in now; there was no escape.
Sarah crouched behind the bed, pulled the empty magazine out, turned it over and slotted the fresh one in. Sarah was determined to take out as many of these bastards as she could; whatever it took to hinder Kaliba and buy Ellison and Savannah some time; the future was in Ellison's hands now. She smashed the window glass with the butt of her rifle and threw out another grenade. She turned back to face the door. She heard the shouts from the men outside and the grenade's explosion coupled with a tremor throughout the house, but she didn't know if anyone had been caught in it or not.
Gunfire shredded the door and chopped the wood into splinters, sustained bursts of automatic fire from several weapons chewed it to pieces and bit deep into the wall behind Sarah. She flattened herself against the floor and just hoped none of the rounds would hit her. She knew she couldn't just hide behind the bed; her attackers would use the covering fire to move into position. She forced herself to crawl around the side of the bed and aimed her AK up at gaping hole that had been blown in the door, steadying her aim to blow away whoever or whatever approached the door.
Sarah's eyes narrowed as she saw the Terminator's chrome skull beneath the huge gouges in its face and she squeezed off several bursts at it, holding her aim steady and giving it all she had. The rounds chopped its skin into meat but didn't even slow it down as it advanced. It punched through the door and kicked at the wardrobe, shattering the wood into kindling with one strike. The machine stepped over the mess and stared at Sarah with one exposed glowing red eye.
Sarah roared out in primal rage and held the trigger down, slamming 7.62 shorts into the machine's chest and hammering it backwards a step. "COME ON!" she screamed as the gun ran dry. She didn't hesitate; she leapt at the Terminator and swung the AK by the barrel like a club, smashing it into the machine's head with such force that the working parts shattered and the wooden butt cracked down the middle. The machine barely flinched and swept out its hand to knock the weapon away but Sarah dropped to the ground and rolled at its feet, sweeping its legs out from under it and dropping it like a stone to the floor. Sarah ignored it and ran at the armed men behind it, drawing her pistol from her waistband.
"Take her out!"
Thunder crackled throughout the house as several automatic weapons fire on her. Sledgehammers slammed into Sarah's body and knocked her backwards to the ground as rounds tore through her body. It took a moment for the shock to wear off, and white hot agony burned through every nerve in her body. She tried to move but she couldn't; her body wouldn't cooperate. She struggled but barely managed to raise her head up as she saw the black clad men approach her. Her chest burned from the inside out, she coughed to relieve the pain and blood spurted from her mouth.
She watched helplessly as the T-888 got back to its feet and loomed above her. It reached down and yanked her up into a sitting position against the wall. One of the armed men took off his gas mask and helmet, and Sarah recognised him as the man she'd knocked unconscious outside Zieracorp. He lashed out a booted foot and kicked her in the ribs, cracking at least one of them but she was in such a state already she barely registered the pain. Fair one, she thought. If he'd outsmarted her, knocked her out in a back alley and left her there she imagined she'd be pretty pissed off about it too.
"Where's John Connor?" the machine asked her, its glowing red orb glared at her whilst remaining eye stared at her impassively.
"Dead," Sarah coughed, a wry smile on her face, knowing it could never get to him.
"You're lying," the machine said simply. It scanned her body and saw she had six bullet wounds to her torso, one to her left arm and two to her left leg – one in the thigh and one that had shattered her kneecap. It placed its foot down on her knee and pressed down hard. Sarah barely reacted; she was in so much agony that one more injury didn't make any difference now.
"You won't find him." She sucked a mouthful of saliva and blood and with the last of her strength spat it up at the machine's face. The Terminator raised its gun at Sarah and she calmly closed her eyes. She found it strange that she wasn't afraid. All she felt was pure contempt for the machine and the people in front of her, and bitter sorrow and regret for John. She'd failed to stop it. I'm sorry John, I tried. "I love you John," she whispered, hoping wherever he was that he was safe and he'd find what he was looking for.
The Terminator fired once. The round struck Sarah's forehead and split her skull open in a shower of blood, and she slid unceremoniously to the ground, where her blood pooled out around her.
Knowles stared down at Sarah's body and spat on it. That bitch had killed three more of his team. The machine barged past him and descended the staircase, and Knowles caught a glimpse of the metal underneath the skin and gasped in shock. He'd thought the only cyborgs belonged to Zeiracorp. Why the hell did Kaliba have them too?
Whatever, that was a thought for another time; he still had a mission to complete. "Search and clear," he barked out to the remaining men. They fanned out through the house and searched every room. Knowles checked the other bedrooms and the bathroom, thoroughly sweeping the upper floor. He even checked under beds and behind wardrobes, and found nothing. "Upper floor clear," he called out.
"Ground floor clear."
"Basement clear."
"Back yard clear."
"Attic clear."
Knowles looked at the machine in disappointment. "The others got away," he reported as he went downstairs and saw the cyborg standing over Danny Dyson, laid on his side and still tied to the chair, struggling to get free. It ripped the ropes apart without effort and freed the young man.
"Thank God," Danny sighed. He got up to his feet and his body screamed out in relief at being free to move once more. He was unsteady on his feet for a moment, disorientated by the gas and the stun grenade that left his eyes watering and his ears still ringing. His head was killing him and he felt a damp patch on the crotch of his jeans where he'd pissed himself during the attack. He hoped none of the others would notice it. "Is she dead?" he asked.
"Terminated," the machine replied. Danny knew all about the cyborgs; Kaliba had explained to him they were its prototype AIs, the prototype that inspired the artificial intelligence they wanted to sell to the Defence Department.
"Good," he growled. "She had it coming."
The machine ignored his comments. It felt nothing towards Sarah Connor's death. She'd been a target, nothing more or less. It cared nothing for personal vendettas or grudges. It had one more task to complete here. "Where's John Connor?" it asked.
"I don't know," Danny replied as he rubbed his wrists to get the circulation going again. "I never saw him here."
"Did you find Zieracorp's AI?"
Danny shook his head. "It's gone, so is Catherine Weaver. There's no trace of the AI left." He remembered seeing her on the surveillance footage from before the drone's kamikaze attack; doubtless she'd gone to destroy Zieracorp's AI and would have done the same to the one he'd built, given half a chance.
"Thank you for your cooperation," the machine told Danny as it raised its weapon at him. "Your services are no longer required."
"What?" Danny stared at the machine in shock, his face a mask of surprise and fear. "No, you need me," he said as he backed away from the machine, holding his hands up defensively. "You can't!"
"Wrong," the machine fired twice and blew Danny's head apart like a ripe melon. What was left of Danny Dyson dropped to the ground in a heap and twitched erratically on the floor.
"What the fuck?" Knowles snapped his rifle up at the machine. There was no time for shock or surprise; this machine had just fucked up big time. "What the hell did you do that for?" Fucking clockwork windup toys; he'd thought it was just some psycho guy at first but now he realised it was far worse. This was literally a killing machine. "This was supposed to be a damn rescue mission! I lost three men getting him out and you just blew him away!"
The T-888 turned its gun towards Knowles but he rolled out of the way just before it fired, and dodged the burst that cut through the air where he'd been and smacked into the wall behind him.
"Fuck off!" Knowles shouted out as he fired his own volley, staring in horror as he realised his attack had no effect. The rounds bounced harmlessly off of it like water. He started to wonder if he'd picked the wrong side here; maybe that Connor bitch had had a point about these things.
The Terminator fired another burst and caught Knowles in the chest, neck and mouth respectively, splitting the top of his body open and peeling him like a banana. He slumped to the ground in a bloody heap. The machine had orders to tie up all loose ends regarding the project, and that included Danny Dyson and Knowles.
The Triple-8 picked up Knowles' gun in its free hand as the remaining soldiers all burst inside at the sound of more gunfire and stopped dead at the sight of what was left of Danny and Knowles on the floor. The place looked like a butcher's shop had exploded and stank of blood and cordite.
"You killed them," one of the men stared at the cyborg accusingly. The Terminator raised both its rifles and despatched the remaining men with multiple bursts. A couple managed to loose off their own shots to no effect and within seconds all the soldiers had been eliminated.
The Terminator stepped over their dead bodies and left the house through the front door. It opened the trunk of the SUV and pulled out a pair of pliers and a large can of gasoline, and went back inside the house. It put the gas can down on the ground and knelt down beside Knowles' body. It pried open his mouth and, using the pliers, pulled out his teeth. It took its time, choosing to be exact and methodical over speed. The AI that would become Skynet was jamming every cellular and landline network within a mile radius, just as it had done during the drone attack on Zeiracorp; nobody who'd seen or heard anything would be able to call the police. The machine knew it would remain undisturbed.
It moved from one body to the next and extracted the teeth from every corpse in the house, as well as cell phones and wallets, then pocketed them and dragged the bodies all into the living room in a pile, finishing with Sarah's. It picked up the can of gas and liberally doused the bodies with the fuel, then poured more all over the house. It stepped outside the house once more and pulled out a lighter. It threw it into the house and watched as the fire lit up and rapidly spread. It waited and observed the bodies burning through the open front door, ignoring the stares and cries from neighbours.
When the house was fully ablaze the machine turned away and marched back into the SUV. It pulled away and drove calmly away from the scene, not wanting to arouse suspicion by speeding. It would throw the teeth away at another location, preventing any of the bodies to be identified my medical records. Nothing here could be traced back to Kaliba. Mission accomplished.