The room was crowded with people, all skilled fighters with serious combat time in their past, but their presence was needed. The terminator girl lying on the table glared at us as if she wanted to murder us all.
"I don't want to do this." Cammie huffed despite her skull being open and Del already working on her brain.
A few minutes earlier, she'd threatened to rip off Chase's arms if he dared to touch her, so he'd thrown his hands in the air and stepped away.
"Now, now," Del said. "We were created to help people, and this is what we're doing. I don't want to hear another word about it."
"Easy for you to say it," Cammie grumbled. "It's not your brain that's being cut."
"I would happily volunteer my brain, but it doesn't have enough organic matter to mimic a human brain."
"Fools. He's going to kill you all." She didn't sound like she would have minded that.
Lucky for us, and not so lucky for Gabriel, we were past the phase where that could have still happened.
"All this talk about brains is making me hungry," Alec whispered beside me.
"But yours does," Del continued, ignoring all the muttering. "You can even copy Gabriel's mutation and trick the chip into thinking it's still in his head. You're wonderful."
"I don't think she needs any more praises. She's vain enough the way it is," Alec said.
"Shut up." I hissed at him.
"I'm ready, Dr. Chase," Del said. "If you care to give me the chip…"
Chase handed him the chip, and Del inserted it into Cammie's brain.
"How does it feel?" Del asked.
"Awful," Cammie blurted out. "There are no protocols to filter the data. Everything pours in."
"Cut the jamming signal," I told Del.
He turned off the switch on the machine. "And now?"
Cammie's body visibly relaxed. "Better."
"Okay, Cammie, I want you to reset your internal clock to the next date the show airs," I said.
"I don't want to," she whined. "It's next week. I'll be a week older, and I'll miss my birthday."
"It's all right. You'll set it back when we're done."
"And we'll make you a big cake." Del patted her shoulder.
"Hmpf."
We waited. Chase checked the time, obviously concerned for his human patient who waited with his head open in the bed nearby. We didn't have much time.
"Did a port open?" I asked.
"Yes," Cammie said.
"Do you receive anything?"
"There's a small data stream coming in."
"What does it contain?"
"Orders."
"Can it take control over you?"
"Not a chance."
I let out a relieved breath. That had been our main concern. A terminator out of control wasn't something we were looking forward to deal with.
"Okay. Can you identify the module in charge with the communication?"
"Yes."
"Can you locate it on the chip, please?"
The structure of the chip appeared on the screen, and the left side corner lit up.
"We can remove it, right?" I checked with Del.
"It doesn't seem to be a problem." The NS-5 robot nodded.
"Great. Take out the chip and let's get to work. We only have twenty minutes left."
"Wait," Cammie said.
"Cammie, this is not the time to—"
"You told me we were built to help people. Let me help her."
Every pair of eyes in the room turned to me as I was the only other her there aside from the terminator girl.
"Okay, but hurry or we'll lose Gabriel," Del said. "He needs our help too."
"Twelve seconds … done. Take it out."
Del did, and Cammie stood up. On the back of her head, her skin was closing by itself.
"You, you, and you." She pointed at Preston, Robbins, and Alec. "Come with me."
"What about me?" Jim shouted at her back.
"You're crazy," she said over her shoulder and walked out of the room.
The guys followed her.
"Can we hurry?" Chase asked. "The initial estimation might have been too optimistic. It looks like he'll be seizing soon."
"I'm working as fast as I can," Del said, bent over his workbench where he cut and remodeled the chip.
Ten minutes later, he was still working.
"Del, come on," I murmured.
"I'm losing him here!" Chase yelled from the other room.
"I'm coming, I'm coming." Del blew over the chip as he rushed to him. "Here it is. I hope it's not going to fry his brain."
Chase inserted the chip, and we all watched the monitors, holding out breaths. The seizing stopped, and soon the tremors did too. Chase closed him up.
"Do you get anything?" I asked Del.
"Not one byte."
"He's sleeping," Chase said and grinned at me. "We should too."