John Connor removed his field knife from its sheath on his hip and cut the fuzzy black mold from the end of his bread. The rest was good. No sense wasting a hunk of bread when only the tip was spoiled. John ripped off a chunk of the stale bread with his teeth and chewed it slowly. It was hard to chew, but it was nutrition all the same.

He was lucky to have it, and he knew it. God, was he thankful for it. Those memories of when he could walk into a grocery store and just pick up a loaf of fresh bread seemed far away. They were clouded and distorted. Mists of regret and sorrow veiled the worn memories to some extent.

John sat on the low seat of the officer's lunch table that was nothing more than a few mismatched chairs around a table that had three good legs and one propped up by a rusty rod. He shifted in his chair while he chewed. He watched Captain Perry on the other side of the table unroll maps and mutter co-ordinates. Perry had a flashlight between his teeth. The dim light did nothing to penetrate the perpetual darkness of the bunker. The flashlight trembled as Perry mumbled to himself.

John felt a tug on his pants. He paused and looked down. A filthy little child flashed him a toothy grin. His dirty blond hair hung in his eyes and he had an old helmet on his head that fell over his eyebrows. His cheekbones were emaciated and his legs were bony. The child gave him a salute. John saluted back.

"At ease, soldier," John said.

The child pointed to John's bread with a grimy finger.

John, with effort, tore it in half. He handed the child the larger portion. The child smiled, gave a salute, and dashed out of the room.

John returned to staring at the maps until a voice interrupted him.

"John, are you showing your compassionate side? I wasn't aware you had one."

John turned his eyes up to Kate as she entered the room, "I've gotta feed the future fighters."

Kate rolled her eyes and walked past John, tapping his chest armor, "Hard to believe you've got a heart under there."

Kate placed a stubby candle on the table and lit it for Perry. He grunted his thanks. Kate pulled up a seat beside John and rested her head in her hand. She looked tired. Her hair was stringy and she had dark circles under her eyes. Nonetheless, her eyes seemed to give off more light than Perry's flashlight and the candle combined.

Perry rolled up his maps, "I'm going to organize a team to go and get Swanson and his team ready for the re-capture of Sector 5's HQ."

"Radio me whenever they're on their way, Perry," John called to Perry.

Perry switched the radio on his hip to on. Immediately, sound flooded the room. Desperate screams for backup. The bark of gunfire. Cries of agony. Pleas for mothers. Perry exited.

Kate pulled the candle between her and John. The light flickered on their faces. It cast sharp shadows across John's face and made him look older than he really was. The scars on his face, the unshaven face, and the dull and dead eyes.

The two didn't say anything for a moment. They just sat and enjoyed each other's company. Much like they had in the fallout shelter at Crystal Peak. It was mutual pity and sorrow. A quiet, unspoken agreement resonated from each of them. Neither of them knew the other didn't deserve the fate that lay ahead.

Kate took John's hands in her own. They were thick and weather-beaten, hardened by the cold steel triggers of plasma guns and barbed wire. But they were warm.

John squeezed Kate's hands slightly. He cleared his throat; "We haven't sat like this for a while."

"I like it," Kate said through a smile.

Something in that set John off. Perhaps it was the word "like." Like. How could you like anything in this dismal world of death and devastation? What was there to like? Could you like the scorched earth? Could you like the sensation of crunching skulls that you often had to step on? Could you like diving for your life behind a pile of rusted cars?

John jerked his hands away from Kate and threw his chair back. It clattered to the hard cement floor. John was on his feet. Screaming all of these thoughts and more. None of them had to do with Kate. He knew he was being irrational, but he just didn't care. The emotions had been torn from him raw. Every skull. Every bloody uniform. Every filthy child begging for bread. It was salt on the open wounds torn open by fate and fire.

Kate's eyes dropped and her eyes welled with tears. They spilled over and rolled down her dirty cheeks leaving clean streaks. They dripped onto her torn uniform. Why was he screaming at her? He didn't know. He wasn't screaming at her, he was screaming at the world. John knew that inside, Kate was screaming too.

John shut his eyes tightly and exhaled slowly. He had a throbbing headache and his heart hammered against his ribs. John set his chair back up and moved it over closer to Kate. He took her chin in his hand and tilted her face to his. He wiped her pearly tears away with his thumb.

"Kate, I'm sorry. I wasn't yelling at you, I was just …"

But he couldn't finish his sentence. He didn't know whom he was angry at. Fate? The machines? Himself?

Her lip trembled and she nodded, "I know, I know…" she repeated over and over.

He kissed her cheek and then helped her to her feet. She stood shaking slightly in his arms for a moment, but she seemed to compose herself instantly. Kate looked up at John and smiled. The lingering tears made her look so much prettier.

John blew out the candle as they made their way to the exit.

"We should go check on the food supply. Maybe we can get more…"

But John never got to find out what they were getting more of because a rumbling tremor rocked Sector 1 and threw them both to the ground.

John flicked on the radio at his hip and heard between the static a frantic voice, "…Aerial…attack…Sector 1…infiltrators everywhere…"