Days of Sky Net

by keithallen

sequel to the 'day' series. John Junior and his crew have gone home. Now, John Connor faces the coming of sky net, and the rush to prepare for it. Knowing when J-day will arrive and having the time and knowledge to prepare for it, John is in a better position than humanity originally was. But then again so is Sky Net. Forget the 'genre', as always, I'll go all over the place.

34. Chapter 34

CH 34

Right after Marisa found out from Derek about the barrier Sky Net was putting up in front of her, she had worked out how to defeat it. The trench was easy, having made bridges across rivers, building a bridge across this trench wasn't going to be hard, especially if it was only 20 feet deep. The tall spikes Sky Net was going to sink into the ground would be trimmed flat by a constant rain of plasma fire, and every terminator that stuck his head up to shoot back would suffer the same fate also. In Derek's command center she laid out her plan.

Marisa was eager to advance and test her theories, but Derek told her to hold.

"Marisa," Derek said firmly, "For the moment, we want Sky Net to believe their barrier will work. We know where it's going up and they don't know that we know about it and are ready to defeat it. Now we're getting more radio jamming beacons so we can disrupt Sky Net's communications. We wait until they arrive and at least one of the two Sky Net's close to us has been taken out."

"When will that be?" Marisa asked.

"Soon, I hope. It's in the works to take out both Sky Net segments and the jammers are coming. Don't jump the gun, once we have what we need, we will move," Derek told her. "The target will be to isolate Africa from the mid-east and Asia to ensure Sky Net gets no more coltan. Your part in this will be to get through the Ukraine and around the Black sea and down to the eastern part of Iran to prevent Sky Net from trying to reinforce the area. Form a block between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, and Caspian sea to the Persian gulf. Tina is going down through the mid-east to cut off Africa and hopefully take the Sinai, then the Saudi Arabian peninsulas."

"I'm going to have one long front," Marisa said.

"You will, that is why we need those Sky Net segments taken out before we start," Derek explained. "Uncoordinated Sky Net units are much easier to deal with. We will be dealing with a mass of them."

"OK, as long as we're going after them," Marisa said in a near grumble. "We haven't moved in months. I was beginning to worry we were giving the initiative over to Sky Net."

"We may not be moving as fast as you like, but we will be moving," Derek assured her.

"I'll go start making those bridges. We will be ready when the time comes," Marisa stated.

.

In Turkey, the T-888, Tom Baringer, lay on the ground peeking over the rise. Coming up the road on the valley below was a massive H/K tank. The size of a house, the thing took up the entire roadway. It's wide tracks crumbled the pavement as it came on. He slipped down to eye flash to his terminators that had the radio direction finders. They eye flashed back that this was it. They had found the Sky Net segment.

Tom peeked back up to study the mechanical monster. The outside ws covered in plasma canons. If the other side held an equal amount, then there were 24 canons this segment was able to employ. 4 were even near the top so it could shoot straight up into the air. The bottom even had an armored skirt to keep things from getting under it.

This stretch of road only lasted another mile and a half before it met another road. By the segment's speed, it would each the junction on half n hour. He had that long to plan and execute an attack on it. A direct attack would not succeed, his terminators would be wiped out. By the weight of the thing, he knew it had thick armor, and it would know if he managed to dig into the road to plant bombs. He noted a dip on the road up ahead. Tom slid back then got up and led his terminators at a run to race to the depression in the road.

The only hope he saw of stopping this segment was to burrow under the road and place bombs, then set them off when the segment passed over. Tom and his terminators got to the depression. A dry creek bed ran close to the road, he had his terminators start digging while he kept watch.

When Tom saw the very top of the segment-machine appear, he had them stop and fill the space with explosives. They quickly packed in all the explosives they could, set the detonator, then retreated back behind the rise and laid down to wait.

Coming closer, Tom heard the tracks crunching along at their slow pace. He watched the spot where they buried the explosives closely, and when the giant tracks passed over the explosives, he hit the button when the middle of the H/K was over it.

The blast was huge, spitting out flame and rock from ground level and up the side of the H/K. Pieces of metal flew through the air. A siren on the H/K blasted out in a wail. Thinking quickly, Tom eye flashed to his other terminators to run out and look for the cause as if protecting the H/K and to not aim at it until he signaled.

Getting up, they all ran out pointing their plasma rifles at the area around the H/K. Tom saw track damage where the explosives went off. The hole was large, and they has severe a track. That was it. The body of the H/K wasn't even damaged. Tom had his terminators surround the H/K. The H/K moved on until the track separated. They had stopped it, but hadn't done any serious damage to it.

H/K fliers appeared and a small group of silver terminators arrived to help guard the segment. One of the silver terminators inspected the damage and through the Sky Net link, ordered Tom and some others to begin repairs. Tom obeyed, and had a few more of his terminators help as well. Tom and four of his own got into the gap between the wheels as others handled the broken pieces of track. It was in here he noticed that while there was no damage seen on the hull facing out, a large crack had formed against the body and the track guard above it.

Three charges hadn't been used. There had been no time left to plant them. Neither the silver terminators nor the H/K fliers could shoot him while he was up under here. Using a weak eye flash, he signaled to the terminator with the jammer to activate it. He ordered the terminators with the charges left to come to him quickly, all the others were to disable the silver terminators and flyers.

Not expecting to be attacked by their own, the silver terminators went down quickly. His terminators even got an H/K as he packed explosive charges up into the crack. The third terminators charge went off when an H/K obliterated him. The Segment also fired on his terminators. His dwindling force got another H/K, then more of his terminators were destroyed. More H/K's were flying in. Tom realized they were not going to get away. He aimed his plasma rifle into the crack. "Everyone dies for John Connor," he announced and fired.

The explosion rocked the area, lifting the Giant H/K tank up onto it's side and pieces of terminator flew in all directions. Inside the H/K the plasma bolt, flame from the explosion, created a super heated pressure pressure wave that tried to get out. The only way out was the crack, which widened as the H/K tipped up on it's side. It also crushed and burned everything inside and ignited the self oxidizing fuel. The Sky Net segment inside ceased to exist.

.

The moment Derek learned that the Turkish Sky Net segment was gone, He ordered Marisa and Tina to attack. Getting the order, Marisa ran out of her HQ and threw a grenade into the sea. The explosion wasn't large but the sound carried through the water to the shore 10 miles away where she had pre-positioned 1000 Terminators and TX's underwater just beyond the shoreline, and behind the barriers Skyt Net was building. Upon hearing the grenade go off, they surged up onto the shore and crept across the land to get behind the Sky Net units facing Marisa. Spreading out, they planted radio jammers as they went. Marisa then went into her HQ and ordered the artillery to open up on the Sky Net line farther north. Marisa's army moved up into their starting positions and opened fire on the Sky Net lines. The battle flared into full swing.

Tina's artillery opened up on Istanbul in full force as planes flew high over the city. The missiles they carried were fired onto the far side of the bridges to destroy Sky Net's ground units. Her H/K's flew over to meet Sky Net H/K's coming to attack the planes. Sky Net units not near the battle didn't move, they had no order to do so. That gave Tina' forces there the needed advantage to start streaming across the bridges.

In the Mediterranean, Tina's army on Cyprus and Crete quickly got aboard their ships and mini-subs and set sail for the Gaza strip and eastern Sinai. The mas of ships flowed out of the ports. 140,000 were the initial troops Tina took with her, with a stug in every mini-sub, and 20 more on LST's. Riding on one LST, Tina kept in contact with her troops fighting in Istanbul. She had figured it would take a whole day at least to get through the city, but by late afternoon, Stugs were already out of the western part of the city, some setting up a line and the others going back in to back-attack Sky Net units still fighting.

As night fell, Her troops had made it off the isthmus Istanbul was on and expanding onto the mainland. Word from Marisa was she had opened up a 60 mile wide path through the Sky Net defenses into the Ukraine, and was moving along the top of the Black Sea. Sky Net Kursk was too far away to control Sky Net forces in the area and Marisa was taking full advantage of that.

At 3AM, Tina launched her planes and H/K's off air craft carriers to attack Egypt. They were going after the air fields there. She didn't know which segment was controlling them, but had to reduce Sky Net's air power as much as possible. The H/K's flew in at 5000, the attack planes climbed to 35000 behind the H/K's to mask their presence. Cairo air control lit up the landing areas for the incoming H/K's. The H/K's shot their missile loads down on to the Sky Net units on the ground. On their way past, they shot plasma bolts down on structures an and Sky Net units that didn't get destroyed by missiles. The H/K's flew off and headed for Alexandria. The few remaining Sky Net H/K's took off in pursuit and met the attack planes coming down from above. Not being able to shoot up, the Sky Net H/K's were swatted from the sky. The attack planes finished what their H/K's started, and leveled the base. They then flew to the Suez canal and destroyed defenses at the bridges over to the Sinai. By this time, the Resistance H/K's had reached Alexandria and sunk the shipping in the harbor.

By morning, the shores of the Sinai were in sight. Tina's army landed with refueled planes covering her troops. Stugs ran rampant, taking out individual terminators and the occasional H/K tank they found. Since not many humans had been here, Sky Net had not put a large force in the area. The new triple gunned Stugs almost seemed overkill. By the time a Sky Net H/K tank shot one plasma bolt, the Stug it faced shot three, ripping open the armor, even in the front of the machine. Tina had to rein them back to let the other troops catch up. 100 miles in front of the rest of the army by themselves was too far away.

By the end of the day, the line from the Caspian sea to the Mediterranean was in place, as was much of the waterway line from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean. A long line of Sky Net transports hauling Coltan was seized and send back to the ships for transport. Tina's next task was finish taking the Sinai, then move on to the Saudi peninsula.

.

It had to be the beginning of a large envelopment movement, the Kursk Segment realized. It had gotten reports of a human army bombing it's forces in a southern sector. Sky Net Turkey had not reported any action, so therefore the human were attacking from the north. The bombing was to get it looking in the wrong direction. Along a 700 mile front at it's line of defense, it placed units in lines five miles deep to stop the attack when it came. It also sent message out to the other segments that humans were preparing to advance.

A commotion at the transmitter building caught it's attention. Six large explosions caused the building to crumble. It powered up the emergency transmitter and sent T-800's to investigate. through video cameras, it did see terminators heading for the area. It also saw others coming coming towards it. It commanded them to turn around and go find the human saboteurs. They ignored the command. One stopped and aimed a hand held rocket at it's bunker. The rocket shot, the emergency transmitter stopped working.

Those were human made terminators!

Sky Net Kursk ordered the bunker sealed and those terminators destroyed. A blast shook the bunker. They were coming to destroy it! Quickly, Sky Net Kursk activated the interior defenses and got it's reserve T-888 body powered up. It could not take all data with it inside such a small enclosure, so it filled external drives with the information, then transferred into the body and grabbed the case. Going down the stairs, plasma fire erupted from below. Flashes and explosions crisscrossed in the hallway at the end of the stairs. That way was not safe. It was the only way out. The servers would surely be destroyed if those human made terminators got this far. It decided to hide and let the fight pass by. Running back up a level, it opened an empty crate and climbed in.

Inside, Sky Net Kursk pondered on going to find a plasma rifle to defend itself. Then again, if a pack of those human made terminators came, shooting one would make the others destroy it. No, it's best bet was to wait here to see how this battle turned out.

The shots of Plasma rounds sounded for another few minutes, then metal feet were on the stairs. Some passed by. Who's terminators were they? IF they were Sky Net terminators, it was safe. Another explosion sounded higher up. It then received some audible communications.

"Bob, we got it."

"Good, now how do we get out of here? There are no exits other that the one we blew up and where the rest of those defense guns are."

"We wait for General Tina. We can keep the others out, we just can't leave."

"General Tina said we won't be reinforced."

"Hey, metal head, now that we got Sky Net Kursk, General Marisa is sure to attack. Someone will be coming."

Sky Net Kursk saw a chance at escape here. It lifted the lid and said, "I know how to escape."

The terminator with a chunk of some dried vegetation hanging out of it's mouth asked, "You do, huh? Just what are you doing hiding in a box?"

"I saw the situation was untenable, so I hid to preserve myself so I can report," Sky Net Kursk replied. "I can get you out and away, and get myself out too."

Another terminator pointed and said, "If this is the average Sky Net terminator, no wonder we're kicking their asses."

"Not too bright, is he." Another agreed.

Bob motioned with his plasma rifle, "Stand up, box boy."

Sky Net Kursk did. It also picked up the case with the memory chips. It stepped out of the box, three terminators blocked it, their guns up. Bob took the case and opened it.

"Memory chips," Sky Net Kursk said, "I have no weapons."

"Nope, but you do have vital information," Bob replied. "So these are Sky Net chips?"

"Memory chips, there is no programming to them. I was trying to salvage them."

Bob hooked a finger and flashed his eyes at the other terminators two more came closer. To Sky Net Kursk, he said, "Submit to chip removal. Don't worry, we won't crush it."

"I cannot, you are not authorized ..." Sky Net Kursk stopped speaking as his head was separated by a Plasma shot.

Bob picked up the head and hefted it. "We'll keep this one in the skull until help arrives. Cover the stairs and get ready to wait. If you're not covering the stairs, then go into standby for a few hours. We may be here a while."

.

With Sky Net Kursk gone, Marisa let her sub commanders finish the drive to the narrow part of Iran to shield against a Sky Net counter attack there, and turned north to clean up the smaller countries in between Iran and Russia, then move into southern Russia. Drawing more troops from her southern front line, she had them go into Sevastopol and clean out that peninsula as well as look for humans and see if there was anything left saving of the Russian fleet that should be there.

As the war went on, with the exception of a few places, they were finding fewer and fewer human survivors. Marisa knew one of John's top priorities was saving as many as possible. Once the intact chip was pulled, a terminator was all but saved. Humans on the other hand needed their whole body intact enough to be restored to health. Most of Marisa's front line troops were now terminators just for that reason. Searching slowed down her advance, but with the Sky Net to the north no longer on line, there was no rush to go all the way to Kursk to kill it. She also found Tina's forces had solid control of Istanbul and the entrance to the Black Sea so their ships could now get through.

Going back up the path they had raced down, Marisa had her troops spread out searching for anywhere survivors might be. She did find a few bunkers herself, but everyone within was dead. Many looked like they had starved or died from the radiation. She kept looking. She could no disappoint John.

.

John's plane touched down at the Denver air field. After the long flight, he was whipped. Daniel looked to be in rough shape also. For John and Cameron, this was a quick stop to check on the command center while the plane was refueling and to get Daniel home. John wasn't sure why Daniel came back, but he was sure that Claire would be happy about it.

John, Cameron and a beaten looking Daniel went into the Cheyenne Mountain complex to meet Claire and Allison. Allison ran to Daniel and hugged him, then Claire took her turn.

"You decided to come home?" Claire asked, eyeing him.

"Things were not going the best," Daniel told her. He didn't really want to explain what.

Cameron kept quiet. She did watch him closely.

Daniel noticed this. He cast Claire a half 'don't hurt me' smile and said, "Can Allison go with John and Cameron? I need to talk to you ... alone."

Claire grinned and said, "All right, I take it we need some alone time?"

"Yeah," Daniel said. He knew what she was thinking. Damn, was he ever going to give her a shock. The longer he was away from Astrid, the worse he felt about getting involved with her.

"Allison? want to come with us?" Cameron asked.

"OK! You go fun places!" Allison beamed. Spinning to Claire, she asked, "Is that OK, Mom?"

"Fine dear, as soon as Cameron tells me where you're going."

Cameron explained, "We're going to meet some officials in Argentina. We should be gone only a few days."

Claire nodded. "I'll get Allison packed. Oh, the weather has been getting warmer. We had three days where it got up to 30. For here, that was a heat wave!" she said cheerfully.

"We only spent an hour outside though," Allison added, "We watched our radiation exposure."

"Did you have fun?" Cameron asked.

"Yes! we took a ride downhill on a sled!" Allison said happily. To Daniel, she said, "Daddy, next time you have to come with us!"

"If I can, sweetie." he said, not looking happy.

"Cameron, when are you leaving?" Claire asked.

"As soon as John is done and Allison is packed. We're on a tight schedule."

Clasping Allison's hand, Claire said, "Then we better get you packed."

"Yes, I don't want Cameron to leave without me," Allison agreed. She grabbed Daniel's hand too and tugged her parents back to their rooms.

.

Once Allison was on her way with Cameron and John, Claire put an arm around Daniel and led him back to their quarters. Noting he still hadn't cheered up, she asked, "Australia was that bad?"

"It ... didn't turn out like I expected. Thankfully, Cameron showed up and got me out of there," he said truthfully.

"Well, that's all over now, so forget about it. If you want to keep helping, another cavern was made down in the food levels here. I heard they want their own fish farm, so you can help and be home too," Claire assured him.

Daniel nodded. "Thanks hon. I promise, I'm never going to go anyplace again unless you're with me."

"Good," Claire stated and hugged him. "I was missing you and so was Allison."

Holding his wife, he took her advice and decided to forget all about Australia. He returned her hug and said, "I love you. I always will."

In the command post, a message was received from Australia about a kidnapping of one Daniel Young and and an assault on an Astrid Cunningham. The culprit suspected of the crime was named Cameron, suspected last name, Young.

.

In Argentina, and once people came back out of the jungles in Brazil, John found there was a decent number of survivors. So far, the count was 430,000. Enough were educated so governments were able to be rebuilt. In southern Brazil, John met with the provisional presidents and worked out a treaty. Since the Maya were well organized, the Mayan general there with General Jacobson promised to do what they could to help get the people back into homes and get an economy re-started.

One thing John wanted was a strong United Nations. Not a weak one that passed measures but didn't to much. New York was too far North. The Mayan General proposed a small town in the middle of Nicaragua, just east of Managua as the place for the first new UN. Reason being it was central to the continents, had decent weather and didn't suffer from bad weather like hurricanes. The Maya also wanted to give their contribution to the new world that was springing up. Everyone agreed on this proposal. They also agreed for the time being, John Connor would supply the military for the UN, since their only enemy was Sky Net, and he had the only forces capable of fighting them.

Thus, John Connor became the first General of the world. It also meant that John had to pick a good representative for North America to the new UN.

.

"What's this?" Derek asked as he looked at the message. "What UN?"

Laura peeked over his shoulder. "I see your nephew has been busy," she said with a grin. "So, you need to pick a UN representative in 30 days. It should be easy. Let the British pick theirs, pick one for Spain and France, and since Italy is kind-of populated, they pick theirs."

"Laura, the UN in New York is toast. It's gone," Derek reminded her.

Studying the message, she pointed and said, "The new one will be built in Nicaragua. I'm sure John is doing this to re-establish a world government. Look down here, sweetie, he is the world's General now."

"This is enough to make your head spin," Derek said vacantly.

"No, my head only turns 93 degrees to each side," she teased.

"Ha ha. So the UN is going to be in a Banana republic?" Derek asked.

"Dear," Laura said as she rubbed his shoulders, "If you remember, the Maya now is one country from the Yucatan down to the Panama canal. John is reorganizing the world. Possibly you might consider re making Europe into provinces, and send one delegate to the UN? There isn't very many people, if any who would argue with you."

"Anyone left with national pride would," Derek countered.

"Like who, the Spanish? The French? they are all in England now. At the rate Tina and Marisa are moving, you can either go crazy with delegates, or split Europe into regions," Laura explained.

"This is going to take some heavy thought," Derek grumbled.

"How about this, let me worry about the delegate situation, and you stay focused on defeating Sky Net?" Laura asked in a purr.

Derek looked at her and asked, "You'd do that?"

"Anything for you, dear. I've been looking for a good way to help you," she said, took the message and kissed him.

"Thank you," he said with a sigh of relief.

.

Sarah stared at John over her desk. "Did you just say you want ME to be a politician?" she asked in disbelief.

"Please, Mom?" John asked. "We are started a new United Nations. You would be the representative for North America. It's not really being a politician..."

"The HELL it ain't!" Sarah snapped back. "John, aren't you getting enough? Where did this idea come from?"

"Listen, Mom." John said firmly. "We're all over the place from Australia to Turkey. A real government is needed, and to keep the peace after we do defeat Sky Net, we need a world government, as well as regional ones. That has to start someplace, and the sooner we get it started the better. I need someone I can trust implicitly to represent North America."

"I am not good at politics, John." Sarah said firmly.

"Possibly you're a better pick than a politician," Cameron pointed out. "You don't talk bullshit, and you tell people what the score is, like it or not. I think John wants honesty, not self absorbed maneuvering to get this government started."

"Yes," John agreed.

Sarah eyed her son, then asked, "So, who's our president? Who do I answer to?"

John stared at her. "We don't have one." he admitted sheepishly.

"No, John, we don't. We have you to lead us. So, Mr. World General, North American President, ruler of Europe, just WHO am I representing?"

John winced and said, "Just North America."

"This is backwards, John," Sarah complained. "I know why you haven't reconstructed the government here, and I agree. You can do what you need to with no interference from anyone. WHY make a world body who can start telling you what to do?"

"It won't be like that," John offered.

Sarah raised an eyebrow. "Oh no? You got a few countries now involved that see eye to eye with you. What happens later on when you do defeat Sky Net. You think the Chinese or the Russians will agreed to what you want? What if Japan decides they want every island in the pacific for themselves, then China does too?"

"That's why we have a UN, to solve problems that come up," John countered.

"And what if they don't agree, or pull out of the UN?" Sarah asked.

"We won't let them."

Sarah face planted. "You really haven't thought this out, have you?" she asked in a grumble.

"Mom, we need a strong world government," John stated. "One that will stop wars and prevent things like Sky Net from ever happening again."

"Then declare yourself king!" Sarah said with a flail of her arm.

"I don't want to be a king," John told her.

"What you want, John," Sarah growled, "Is to maintain control of the situation AT LEAST until Sky Net is buried." She paused, then said, "Tell you what, to get things started, sure, I'll be the North American rep IF you be the first President, and pick a good vice President."

"Sarah is making sense, John," Cameron said. "You also need a machine representative as well. we have 4.53 million terminators on line, they will be very unhappy if they are not represented somehow."

"Tin Miss has a good point," Sarah agreed. "So, who will that be? And don't forget, you're going to need a cabinet too. I suggest at least one more terminator in that. And don't forget the law making procedure. That's going to be another can of worms you will need to deal with."

John rubbed his forehead. This was going to be much more involved than he thought.

.

Like all problems he faced, John got to work writing up the beginnings of a constitution for his UN, and the presidential staff. He made all nations mandatory members in a parliament style assembly. Even as he wrote out his ideas, there was a problem with the parliament. If each country had one representative, then small countries would have as much say as larger ones. Places with a low population would have as much say as places with large populations. Go the other way, representation by population, then the small countries would have almost no say at all. A two house congress? Ugh.

Cameron forced John away from his desk for late dinner then some snuggle time before he passed out holding her. Once John was sleeping soundly, Cameron got up and looked at his notes and scribbles. Cameron then started putting his government together.

President : John Connor

Vice President : Catherine Weaver

Cabinet : Terminator selected by Catherine Weaver, Jesse Flores, Member from the Mayan Nation, Member from Australia, Member from Europe, assistants to handle individual presidential affairs.

Parliaments : Nation's house, People's House

International Court of Law

Presidential powers: Command in Chief of all armed forces, emergency actions including disaster response, civil unrest and construction or rebuilding efforts, call Parliaments into session, Making temporary (120 day limit) executive orders. After 120 days, parliaments must approve and certify actions into law or else they expire. Submit laws to parliaments for consideration and attend parliamentary discussions on laws and proposals.

Vice Presidential powers : Act in place of the President if the president is missing of out of communication. In concurrence with the president, may submit laws or proposals to the parliaments for consideration.

Parliament powers: Making international law in accordance with the international constitution, provide members who will oversee the laws are abided by and inform the president and Vice president if violations are found so appropriate action can be taken.

International court of law : Verify all laws and resolutions passed by parliaments are in keeping with the international constitution, settle legal disputes between nations, perform fair trials against suspected offenders where the defense hears all the evidence and has the right and given every reasonable opportunity to be present and the prosecution must present all evidence at the beginning of the trial. Every defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

Cameron stopped at adding to a basic international constitution. She wanted to go lie down with her husband for a while. Besides, the UN members needed to think about these things also.

.

Tina's forces had captured the fourth land convoy of coltan headed for Asia. The biggest problem she had with thee convoys was getting the across the Mediterranean to Italy so they could be shipped on to where they were needed. There just wasn't enough cargo ships. Disabled terminators rode back on an LST with the fourth load of coltan they had captured.

The Sinai was hers now, and half of the Saudi peninsula. Her troops had been through Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and part of Iraq as well as down into Saudi Arabia. She was removing the disorganized Sky Net forces, but as far as finding any survivors, no live humans had been found as of yet. Even the caves they came across had suffered poison gas attacks, killing anyone inside. Her troops found only plenty of corpses and skeletons. One thing they did find was operating oil wells and refineries. Careful attacks on these killed the Sky Net units but kept the oil flowing. Now the fuel trucks were headed for Europe instead of Asia. It was easy to see why John Connor wanted to take this area away from Sky Net. They were removing many of it's resources. He wanted to strangle Sky Net's ability to produce terminators and feed it's H/K's. Marisa had moved into the Caucuses region, another big oil producer. Sky Net could not let this situation go on. Tina knew a counter attack was coming, so she planned for it.

.

Sky Net Kursk and Sky Net Turkey were both out of communication. Sky Net Perm near the Ural mountains, and Sky Net Jaipur in India were the next closest segments to that area. They did get replies from some northern units in Europe, but not may due to the distance. three million units were in that area, so the possibility that humans had destroyed them were small, but possible since the flow of coltan had stopped, and oil deliveries had slowed down to trickle. It was known humans were using radio jammers to defeat communications. To stop this, they send out a wave of H/K's to destroy these jammers. Missiles seeking radio signals were made and fitted onto the H/K's. Sky Net had units in the area, reconnecting contact was what was needed. In the chance that those segments were not operational, another Sky Net segment was made. This was a mobile segment on a heavily armed and armored H/K tank that would go with it's own army to find out what was happening farther west. Sky Net 'M' set out to restore whatever was wrong in the Mid-East.

John Henry of course was privy to this information and informed John Connor immediately of the mobile Segment as well as the route this Segment was going to take with it's army. John passed this information on to Derek, who sent it to Tina and Marisa.

.

To save time, Derek reassigned Marisa's forces in Iran to Tina. Marisa had forces just east of Tehran. With the Caspian sea, and a large lake nearby, Tine had half those forces take cover off shore to hide them. The rest were hidden with camouflage. To the middle and southern sections, she brought in troops and had them borrow into the sand and conceal themselves. High altitude flights kept a watch out for this Mobile Sky Net and it's army. With 200,000 troops on the line, and another 100,000 backing them, and with Marisa having a sizable force in reserve, Tia was not about to let Sky Net retake this territory.

Tina inspected her line and ensured every local commander knew what to do. While doing this, she got a report from a scout plane. The Mobile Sky Net and it's army had been spotted in southern Iran, 150 miles up from the coast. It was a full Sky Net army with flying H/K's. H/K tanks and terminators. 500 flying H/K's, roughly 2000 H/K tanks, and around 100,000 terminators.

Tina almost laughed. For the first time, she had the advantage in numbers on an active Sky Net army. She left a screening picket in the north and had most of the Northern force re position to the middle of the country 25 miles ahead of her line and 50 miles north of the Sky Net army's route, then get concealed. Her extreme southern force was moved to 25 miles ahead if her line and 50 miles south of the oncoming army. She had artillery standing by, as was her H/K's and attack planes.

Watching the advance through remote optics, Tina had all her units hold their fire until she saw a large wave of H/K's coming. When they got withing 5 miles, she ordered the anti-aircraft missiles to fire, and her own air force to launch. She then called to the artillery. "Prepare to fire. Point seven, altitude 5000 feet, open fire!"

The wave of missiles shot up at the H/K horde. Most got through. Burning H/K's fell like rain. Directly after the missiles did their work, shells exploded among the H/K's. While the fragmentation shells did not harm the H/K's armor, the shrapnel did ruin their engines. The continuous barrage send many more H/K's spinning to the ground. The large pack of H/K's was reduced to a mass of individual fliers. She stopped the barrage as her H/K's came into sight, high above the attackers.

"Ground units, open fire, make sure it' a Sky Net H/K you're shooting at," Tina ordered.

From above and below Sky Net H/K's took a rain of fire. Triple gun Stugs plastered each H/K they aimed at, breaking the fliers apart. True to Sky Net units, not one tried to retreat, but stayed on the fight until they were shot down. As the H/K's were destroyed by weight of fire, high overhead, the attack planes flew on to raid the advancing army. Tina lost 31 of her own H/K's but had downed the hundreds of Sky Net units.

20 minutes later, the attack planes returned. They were missing six plane. The flight leader reported they had gotten 10 more H/K's, 46 confirmed kills on H/K tanks and one big H/K tank that absorbed 5 missiles and from what they could tell, was not seriously damaged. For an air raid, that wasn't bad. The lead elements of the Sky Net army was 8 miles away. Tina called her north and south forces to close in behind the main Sky Net army and engage. She also directed artillery to begin bombarding the Sky Net army.

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Sky Net Mobile was surprised at the air attack. It's H/K's had been ambushed, and enemy planes had spotted it. The planes had been flying too high for accurate plasma fire. Before those planes could return, it had to find their base and destroy it. It sent it's terminators out running forward, the H/K tanks moving as fast as they could. Then the bombardment began. It was getting close to the human forces. More reason to hurry and engage the enemy ground units. IT was again surprised they had gotten this far, but after fighting the units that were already here, they had to be weakened.

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Tina saw the terminators running at her line. She ordered all her troops to open fire. A flood of plasma fire opened up on the advancing terminators, cutting down thousands. Return fire was weak due to Sky Net terminators not shooting the friendly ones in front of them, then fell right after the ones in front of them fell. Like all the other engagements, Sky Net terminators stood upright while Tina's crouched low and used cover. Apparently, they hadn't learned yet. They would, after she took their chips and they were processed. At some time, the terminator mindless charge stopped. Tina was counting the minutes to when her forces now behind the Sky Net army would engage.

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Sky Net M recalled it's terminators after discovering there was a large, well armed force in front of it. It had the surviving terminators return to form up with the H/K tanks. It had lost 25000 terminators and hadn't even gotten close to the human line. How was this possible? It had all it's forces on the line now. The bombardment had stopped also. It concluded the artillery had ran out of ammunition. It ordered all forces to advance and destroy the humans.

Moving forward, a massive amount of plasma shots were coming in from behind and to the sides. H/K tanks and terminators were being destroyed in droves. Sky Net Mobile tried to shoot back and found it's guns had been destroyed by the air attack. Small, fast vehicles sporting a trio of plasma canons closed in on it's forces that were facing the human line. The destruction of it's army was continuing. It ordered all units to turn and face the new attackers. Plasma bolts did hit and deflect off these fast, deadly vehicles. One came close and melted it's tracks off. Another came from behind to damage it's tracks on the other side. Sky Net Mobile called for it's troops to close around it.

Plasma fire now came from the advancing human line. More of those small fast vehicles and humans firing plasma from their arms hit it's troops that had turned to destroy the back attackers. Overhead, the attack planes returned to bomb it's troops. It's army was being slaughtered from all directions! The thick armor of it's H/K was being melted away by the sheer number of plasma bolts hitting it.

Sky Net Mobile lost it's external sensors. The internal sensors detected a fire. Then Sky Net Mobile went off line.

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As the Sky Net army disintegrated, the battle became broken up into pockets of fighting. Tina almost felt sorry for the units that would not stop fighting. Surrounded and with no hope of winning, they did what they were programmed to do, and fell to the withering fire from her forces. She had no choice but to press the attack until not a single Sky Net unit was intact. It took two days to completely eradicate the Sky Net forces, but from the beginning, she knew she had this battle won. Sky Net was still under the impression it was fighting humans with questionable weaponry. Too bad for it.

For the next week Tina's forces were cleaning up the battle field and shipping intact chips and terminator remains back to be processed.

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Sky Net Jaipur had monitored Sky Net Mobile, and saw what happened. The human force was much, much stronger than anticipated. It and the other segments had grossly underestimated what they were facing. The oil fields in Iran were now in danger of being taken over as well. All of Sky Net Asia agreed, it needed to concentrate it's forces and hit the human/terminator army with everything it had. Besides the Asian forces, it called on Sky Net Africa and Sky Net Americas to send help to prevent a disaster. The army it was going to build this time would not be destroyed so easily.