Terminator: Resistance

Chapter Thirty Three: All Quiet

Rivers wasn't sure what had happened when he first opened his eyes, struggling to sit up but realizing that he could neither move around nor see anything. It wasn't like the feeling had been lost in his arms or legs, it was more like something was holding him in place, while each quick labored breath caused him to cough from all the dust that entered his mouth. That coughing also caused the Sergeant to flail around uncontrollably for a second, struggling to get a real breath of air and… and making whatever was holding him down move a bit.

Struggling again and again, he could feel the weight on top of him shifting a little at a time until Rivers had to close his eyes from the intense light that suddenly shined through the darkness. More light came when he started moving again, getting easier to move around now too, although the loss of weight on top of his back allowed him to feel how sore and stiff his joints were, but at least now the Sergeant could take a breath. Having to rub his eyes when he was finally able to get up to his knees, Rivers coughed and looked around, realizing that the sun was up as he got used to the light, and also that he was alone.

The last thing he remembered was running back up onto the surface with the Stranger, and seeing that big Walker HK exchanging fire with the other soldiers, before… that's right, it fired a rocket at them. Having just started to join the fight, the Sergeant would have surely taken a direct hit from that rocket if the hooded man hadn't shoved him out of the way, and he remembered rolling down a short set of stairs just before the explosion, and then… well, then he woke up under a pile of rubble and debris. The battle was long over, no sign of Skynet's machines anywhere, but there were plenty of dead Resistance soldiers on the ground… if any of them had survived, the smart thing to do would have been to retreat.

Even though he had seen it himself once before, the power of that new kind of HK was almost unbelievable, the way it just stomped its way around and just annihilated everything in its path. The monster was gone now, and Rivers didn't seem to be in any immediate danger as he struggled to get up to his feet, which was great because he had no idea where his weapon was, and as said before he appeared to be alone. So where was the Stranger? Turning back around and looking up what was left of the stairs, it didn't take long to find the hooded man; part of his body sticking out from under the concrete wreckage from the doorway, while the rest of it had been completely crushed.

He was gone… the mysterious person who had been like a guardian angel to him ever since the first time Rivers entered Pasadena… was just gone. The Stranger must have taken the full blast of the rocket after shoving the Sergeant out of the way, and… and, wow, after all this time Rivers didn't even know his name. Clearly this mission was a failure, with the only gain being the data storage unit that the Stranger gave to him before that Walker appeared, but either way he had to report in… let Baron know that he was still alive. However, his radio must have been broken in the blast, because there was nothing but static when he tried to use it.

Only a couple soldiers carried a radio, and none of them could be found as Rivers stumbled his way around what was left of the campus, with even the observatory no longer standing. A fallen plasma rifle was about the only thing useful that the Sergeant could find, and now… now it looked like he was going to have to walk back to the Resistance bunker. The journey took a lot longer than the walk to the campus, since the Sergeant was sore and still kind of dazed from the explosion, and he still encountered no machines or surviving soldiers along the way. It was just a long, uneventful walk that left him even more worn out by the time he reached the entrance to the bunker.

Normally without prior radio contact, a returning soldier would have to leave their weapons with the guards outside, especially since the Infiltrator showed up, and after that he would have to give his serial number at the main door, at gunpoint the whole time. However, this time as he stumbled his way toward the hidden entrance, the guards didn't stop him. In fact, Rivers got past the perimeter, and down the metal grated stairs all the way to the reinforced door… that was open. Okay, the Sergeant thought as he raised his weapon, something was wrong; John Conner had ordered that dogs be put at all the doors, along with double the usual guard, but there was just nothing.

Stepping in through the open doorway, Rivers found that his original assessment of there being no Resistance presence was wrong, starting with the bodies of two dogs that had been all shot up. There was blood on one of the nearby walls, and a lot of impact marks from plasma fire, but no bodies so far, which was weird. Back at the campus the bodies of several soldiers were left scattered around, so what happened here? Continuing his way down the corridor, where several of the light fixtures were broken, the Sergeant had to rely on the rifle's compact flashlight in some areas, including the supply area which was usually neat and organized, now looking like a bomb went off.

There was no useable equipment or weapons left, and the walls were charred black, with no sign of the quartermaster anywhere, so Rivers moved on. Next on the corridor was Alvin's lab, and unlike the supply room, most of the equipment in there had been left alone. The scientist himself was not present, and the deactivated Infiltrator's body was gone as well, but… but now there was a sound coming from back out in the hallway. Quietly moving back over to the doorway, staying back behind the wall so he wouldn't be seen, the Sergeant's mouth ran dry when he heard not only a dragging sound, but also that of a T-800's rhythmic mechanical footsteps.

No matter how many times Rivers had encountered this model of Terminator, it always terrified him to be in such close proximity, trying to keep his breath quiet while the machine walked right past the doorway, dragging the body of a human by the ankle behind it. But that wasn't the worst of it… this wasn't just any body being dragged along the floor, its chest full of plasma wounds… it was Ryan. The older man's lifeless eyes seemed to stare right up at the Sergeant, Rivers' mind immediately flashing back to escaping from Pasadena on that bus and everything that happened at the hideout… oh God, Ryan, why didn't you leave the bunker?

Was this what the Stranger had been trying to warn him about? But how could the hooded man have known that it was going to happen? Whatever the case, he couldn't let Ryan's body be taken away like that, and he was about to shoot the machine in the back with a round of violet plasma, when the Sergeant was forced to duck back inside the lab upon hearing more mechanical footsteps behind him. The next T-800 to pass by was dragging another body, this time a uniformed soldier, and now it was starting to make sense why there had been no bodies as he walked in… it was because Skynet was collecting them.

So, was this why only that Walker HK was waiting for them at the campus? Was it because Skynet was planning a similar strike as the Resistance base at the same time? So, was everyone dead? No, they couldn't be, the bunker was huge, and there had to be survivors in there somewhere. As tempting as it was to just start blasting his way through the machines, Rivers knew that he was alone and heavily outgunned, so he reverted to the same tactics that he used back at the university hospital, waiting for each sentry to pass by before advancing forward into the next hiding place, be it a small room or whatever.

The good news was that the T-800s didn't even stop and check any of the places he was hiding in since they apparently believed that all humans had been cleared out, but now the Sergeant had to see each place where the people apparently tried to hide, areas that were all shot up with plasma marks on the walls with small blood trails leading out. The infirmary was the worst so far, with the machines still in the process of collecting the bodies, many of whom were bedridden from the last battles and couldn't have defended themselves. Erin was also there, the older woman lying face down on the floor with a plasma wound in the center of her back and some blood around her face as if she had hit the ground hard.

For a moment Rivers was able to hide hear the bodies, underneath one of the beds while one of the T-800s came in to take Erin away, and… wait a second, that wasn't a T-800. It was a dark skinned man with a bald head, standing there with a blank expression on his face as he bent down to grab the older woman's ankle and drag her away. But why would a human… oh, shit… was that another Infiltrator T-850? The bald man wore the same heavy cannon on his back that the first Infiltrator did, and… oh God, Dr. Mack was right… Skynet was beginning to mass produce them.

There were no machines beyond the infirmary, perhaps not having expanded their collection efforts this far back, but this also meant that there were bodies. Weapons must have been collected already, since there were no rifles laying around the fallen soldiers, but all the people, soldiers and civilians alike, were still there. Some of them were behind covered positions as if fighting, while others had been cowering in small rooms or under tables, and so far no one had been spared. Rivers was losing hope at this point, since there wasn't much bunker left now, and all that was left was the command room.

Up until right now, the Sergeant had believed that any T-800s damaged or destroyed during the fighting had been collected back up by Skynet, but there were three deactivated Terminators laying on the floor in the command room. They weren't simply deactivated, but all shot to hell with parts of them scattered around, and the reason for this was made obvious when a figure popped up from behind the desk with her violet plasma rifle aimed right at him. It was Baron, her face all dirty and clothes torn, and apparently the Commander didn't recognize him at first, since she didn't hesitate pulling the trigger.

"Wait, Commander, stand down!" He yelled, probably louder than was wise. "It's me, it's Rivers!"

"Rivers?" She asked, out of breath and clutching her stomach. "Rivers… what happened… we lost… contact… and…

Suddenly her words were interrupted by the sound of rhythmic footsteps, metallic ones that belonged to a T-800 that had probably heard the yelling and gunfire… now on its way to check things out.