Because the Night

by phantomwriter05

Under a serious reconstruction. Jameron, Sarah/Derek.

14. Auld Lang Syne

So I'm back and will try to get back on to a regular schedule of posting chapters.

So these next couple chapters will be very dark … really dark as it's wont to be when Steel is on the loose in these stories.

I Also hope that I've written some award winning Jameron in these truly dark chapters.

Auld Lang Syne

There was very little conversation that followed the entrance of Ryan and Sarah. However there was little argument that the alcohol that they had bought was a god send after a dead silent start to the party, however after a couple of beers the party goers started to loosen up and attempted small talk to a certain degree.

"So …" Charlie Dixon walked up to Ryan who was serving himself several slices of pizza with a plastic glass of eggnog between his teeth. The leather jacket clad figure flicked his eyes to the buzz headed man with a look of pure loathing.

"How's the wound?" Charlie asked, awkwardly. The younger man shrugged almost dismissively at his quarry. "Well I'm kind of a specialist on burn injuries." He motioned to the soldier's hand.

"Listen, Dick …" Ryan put his cup in his now free hand.

"It's Dixon …" the EMS corrected flatly.

"Sorry, it's just that you look so much like a Dick to me …" the ex officer snorted sarcastically, which he received a glare from the man next to him. "I doubt this injury is going to be fixed by your Ambulance equipment." He lifted his brows and moved back to the living room.

Seeing this as a challenge to his skills and work ethic, the paramedic pursued Ryan into the living room determinedly.

'I doubt that … I think you just don't like the fact that I can fix it and you can't!" he called in an uncharacteristic shot of frustration at the arrogance and surly nature of John's men (and cyborg) in the future who treat him like garbage and keep him away from Sarah. In fact Charlie wondered if the only reason that Sarah was avoiding him was because she kept them to close to see that he was the one that she should take comfort in, not the hard ass, traumatized men of John Connor's army.

Ryan snorted again and placed his plate in front of Cameron who seemed to be taken with "Rudolf the Red Nose Reindeer" However, she took her focus to the two men when she heard that her future son had an injury.

"Tell me, Fuzzy … do you have an engineering degree from MIT in cybernetics?" he asked the EMT with a raised eyebrow. Charlie gave an angered growl at the nickname that the younger man had bestowed on him.

"No, but what does that have to do with anything?" He asked, crossing his arms.

The Captain gave a half smile and began to unwrap his bandaged hand to show Charlie his meaning. The man twitched an eyebrow and leaned a closer to get a better look at the injury.

"Oh shit!" He jumped back from the sight of the cybernetics under the black and crusted skin of his palm and several fingers.

Everyone in the room looked up at the Charlie with alarmed faces as he backed away from Ryan with a terrified face at the inhuman sight he just saw. Sarah came up and gave her grandchild a glare and went to tend to Charlie.

Cameron gave a ghost of a smile at the older man who she hadn't liked since he insulted and mocked her in the shed of their old house when she was burning Vick's endoskeleton. But it went away when she saw that Ryan wasn't smiling as he sat on the couch next to her looking a little ashamed not at scaring Dixon, but at the metal hand.

"I can help you fix it, if you like?" She looked down at the hand tilting her head at the scorched pistons and skin. Ryan gave a sad smile at her suggestion.

"Well, It is your hand … sort of." he gave a breathed laugh. She turned her head slightly as the statement seemed to bring him down a little farther.

Seeing the sadness, Cameron gave him a sympathetic look, and then with a blink she reached over and rebandaged the hand gently, when she was done she took it in hers and squeezed it comfortingly. Both traded smiles, before the cyborg took one of his pizza slices.

The smile his future mother gave him somehow launched Ryan into a Christmas memory that the man would never forget.

---

The arrival back at home plate wasn't quite the home coming the little boy of eight years of age was expecting.

Ryan wasn't sure what he had expected after three years of fostering in Master Lo's Dojo, while Skynet launched it's deadly offensive against the Resistance's defenses, but being ignored by all around him as if he was some tunnel rat looking for scraps wasn't one of them.

He saw people he recognized that didn't seem to give him a second a glance, while it was only three years ago that the women would smile at him and the men would offer a high five. Maybe they hadn't recognized him? Ryan wondered if he had changed so much in three years, because he didn't feel any different physically though now he knew advanced Jujitsu and staff fighting.

What the moppy haired little boy was hoping for was to see his mom and dad again. He had sailed on a large ship on his own, among a resistance unit back to California and had made the trek back home mostly by himself like a big boy, no, like a man. He had wrote saying his training was done and that he was coming home, but their was never a response. Now that he was home he was starting to get scared that something had happened to his mom, but never his dad, nothing could hurt John Connor.

The boy felt lonely and sad as he trudged tiredly into the long hallway of the officer's quarters, his pack jingling as he sought out his family's room. He had been told in one of his dad's letters (His mommy never wrote.) that they got promoted to bigger quarters after the victory at the Battle of Whispering Heights.

He stopped at the large end room door that had his parent's names on it. He knocked several times with anticipation, but there was no answer. He didn't think his heart could sink any lower.

Curiously, he pulled down on the handle and pushed the heavy door open with great effort. After he squeezed in, the young boy strained to close it behind him.

The room was larger, then the quarters he remembered, and a little more spacious. He spotted that instead of a cot like before, His mom and dad had a bed now, though they only had one pillow amongst them, though it hadn't been an issue as his mom laid her head on his father's chest at night or his father used his mom's belly as his pillow when he slept like Ryan use to when he was really tired. They had slide able closet doors and on the far end near the foot of the bed was a metal chair and desk.

The desk had a framed picture of his grandmother Sarah Connor who looked about his mom's age in a tight sweater and short colorful skirt and a bow in her hair that his dad said was a cheerleader uniform (Whatever that was.). The teenage queen was posing for the professional camera with a pretty, but in truth a heart broken smile. The picture always made Ryan hurt on the inside and he once asked his mom if they had any pictures of her were she didn't look so sad. His dad answered for her, saying that sad things always happened to her no matter how old she was and afterward he thought he saw a tear fall out of his dad's eye as he held the picture.

Ryan looked around to make sure no one was watching, before he picked up the frame and hugged it as if the girl was the frame and he was trying to give her as much love as he could, after a moment he put it back on the desk and cleared his throat.

The boy removed his bag and slung it on the chair, feeling so light that the air condition could blow him over. He sat on the bed feeling it squishy and soft.

There was silence around him with the sound of footsteps going and passing outside the door. He gave a deep breath and took a good look around the organized room. He noticed that his mom and dad hadn't decorated for Christmas like they always use to. It sort of made him feel sad but also a little scared.

What if they weren't like the mommy and daddy he remembered? What if they decided after three years that they don't want him anymore? He had never heard his mom say she loved him, and there was sometimes that his dad was gone for weeks.

Ryan sniffled a little, his warm dark eyes leaking a tear that he stubbornly wiped away with the sleeve of his overly big faded hooded jacket. He pulled off his boots and laid back on the bed, adjusting himself on the mattress and buried his face into the soft pillow. He could smell the sweet scent of his mother's hair that made him smile.

He curled into a small ball and stared at the sixteen year old cheerleader on the desk, wondering what she would have done if he had used the time machine that his mom had to safe his dad when they where younger than the girl in the picture to 1982 and gave the beauty a hug.

"I would save her …" he muttered as he fell asleep.

He wasn't sure how long he had been asleep, but the last little boy checked he didn't think his pillow had a silk case over it. He felt a hand run through his moppy black curls soothingly which made him not want to open his eyes.

But he blinked them open anyway despite the mental protest. He got an eyeful of lights of a Christmas tree in the corner of the room with some decorations on it. Under the tree was a big and slender box. Ryan craned down to see that his head was no longer on the pillow, but on the breast of a woman clad in a familiar white silk of a sundress.

When he looked up he saw an angelic face of a doe brown eyed girl with matching dark eyes and curled brown hair.

"Momma?" a tear sung Ryan's cheek. Cameron gave a ghost of a smile and brushed a strayed lock of hair out of his eyes. It took him a whole minute to realize that it wasn't a dream.

He smiled broadly and with tears he crawled up on Cameron and wrapped his arms around her neck and buried his face in her hair. The girl gave an awkward hug to him as if not sure how to respond to the situation, which was proof enough to Ryan that it truly was his mom.

It could have been an hour or it could have been a full ten minutes that the boy held on to Cameron, till he finally let go and looked at her.

"You … haven't aged a day?" Ryan said in sudden realization that his mother hadn't changed one bit since the day he left.

"I seldom do." She answered honestly with a deadpanned voice.

The frown on the little boys face only lasted a moment before a smile broke over. He had learned to except his mom's strange sense of humor a longtime ago and he giggled at her statement and kissed her cheek and hugged her tightly again.

"We were going to meet you when you got here, but your father suggested that we decorate for Christmas before you get home, but you arrived while we were looking for a tree." Cameron explained no longer returning the hug.

"You could have woken me up when you got home." Ryan's voice was muffled into the base of her neck.

"You needed your rest … it was a long journey back." She responded sitting up.

There was an awkward silence as he sat in her lap and she stared at him almost like how the old T-500's scanned people. He never told anyone, but sometimes he felt like his mom could be a machine with just the way she would stare at him, or even just touch him and could immediately tell when he was sick or if he was nervous about something.

"I got you a present …" Ryan looked up at Cameron who tilted her head at the claim.

"Is it tight?"

"I hope so …"

The boy shrugged and slid off his mother's lap and went to the chair and dug through his bag before he pulled out a large purple jewel on a silver chain and handed it to her.

"I was foraging through the mountain passes for the Dojo and I came across this village where Skynet's machines had went on a rampage and there was this old woman looking for her granddaughter and I told her that I would find her, and when I did the old lady gave me that as token of appreciation when I told her that I didn't want to marry her granddaughter." Ryan laughed at the memory as Cameron stared at it blankly. "The color of the jewel reminded me of you …" the boy said hopefully.

"This can be a target …" Cameron said in a chastising tone. "It's easy to pick out on the battlefield." She handed it back to her son with an open palm. Ryan dipped his head not taking it back.

"You don't have to wear it on the battlefield." He muttered.

"If I wore it in the tunnels, then people would think that there was more valuable things in our room and than we would be robbed." she countered.

"Fine!" Ryan snapped and snatched the necklace out of his mother's hand and pocketed it bitterly. "I'll hide it …" he growled tossing his bag off the chair and plopped down on it turning his back to Cameron staring at Sarah's picture trying to hide the tears of his disappointment.

Several moments later he felt a slender hand reach into his pocket and pull the jewel out. Ryan turned misty eyes to find his mother looking down at him with a sympathetic look.

"I got you a present too." She offered with a slight smile. "You can open it if you want …" she motioned to the tree with an innocence that hurt Ryan when he went back to Sarah.

"Only if you wear it … at least once." Ryan motioned to the necklace in Cameron's hand.

She twitched her lip and smoothly unraveled the chain and looped it over her neck and onto her cleavage where it sat snuggly, fitting perfectly to the girl's attire and complexion.

They both paused for a moment sharing an identical coy smile that made Ryan feel good. He slipped off the chair and toward the lit Christmas tree where the large box sat. He looked back at his mother to which she nodded solemnly pointing to the big box.

Ryan plopped down on his knees and dragged the box till his back was against Cameron's ankles where she sat straight backed on the bed looking down at the boy. He looked up and grinned to which she smiled back.

He turned and untied the ribbon on the box and pulled off the lid. His face was shocked when he reached in and pulled out a new looking large dark brown leather jacket with buttons. He turned back to Cameron with astonishment.

"Your grandmother use to wear a male leather coat just like this one when I first met her … she had always meant to give it to your father, but it got ruined and we ended up leaving it behind in a warehouse garage in Los Angeles. So, since I can't give you my purple jacket I found something that I can give you of the same symbolic significances, it was suppose to be you're birthday gift, but I think today is just as appropriate." She explained staring at the jacket.

Ryan was speechless and didn't think that moment couldn't get any better.

"I don't know, Angel, I think he might need sometime to grow into it more … what do you think?"

Ryan turned to the doorway at the sound of the deep yet youthful voice that he knew all to well. Leaning on the doorframe was a tall and broad young man with hard emerald eyes and thick stubble. His light brown hair was spiked and there was a deep smile on his brilliantly handsome face. He dressed in a plain black T-shirt and fatigue pants with brown motorcycle boots.

"Daddy!" Ryan shouted with joy, he stuttered to his feet and Jumped into the waiting powerful arms of John Connor.

"Hey, Cowboy!" He laughed hugging the boy tight, kissing his temple and bury one of his large hands into the moppy black curls on his boy's head.

Cameron smiled broadly. Standing with a dancer's grace, she moved toward the two. John effortlessly shifted the boy to one arm and reached out and stroked the purple gem in Cameron's cleavage.

"I've died and gone to heaven." John said seriously getting a good look at Cameron. The girl only smiled brighter and took his hand off the purple stone and placed it on her cheek. John took his arm and pulled Cameron tightly to him.

Being sandwiched between his mom and dad in a hug was one of the best presents the little boy could have asked for.

---

Ryan wiped away a tear out of his eye with the old leather of his brown jacket.

Not thinking, moving more on instincts of his eight year old self, Ryan leaned over and kissed the cyborg on the head and placed an arm around her as he leaned back on the couch. Cameron leaned back as well eating contently, liking the affection that had been avoided since the day John carried his shredded body home.

"I didn't realize Cameron was so close with you guys uncle …"

"Damn it!"

Both future Connor's gave Riley and John a tight smile as they walked up. Riley seemed to have fake interest in it, while John couldn't seem to hide his suspicious and some what jealous stare for the soldier who had an arm lovingly around Cameron.

The ex officer tried to play up his cover story as Sarah's younger brother, which came from Derek who pointed out that it could work seeing as that he had Sarah's hair and seemed to have a striking resemblance to Cameron, bridging the gap between the fact that Sarah and Cameron don't look alike.

"Yeah … I mean, she's my niece … I helped deliver her." Ryan said unevenly.

"I didn't just say that!"

"You delivered John and Cameron?" Riley sounded interested in the potential story of the twins birth, while John began to choke on his eggnog and Cameron stopped mid bite of Ryan's pizza.

"Oh … yeah … totally, it was just me and Sarah there in South …"

"Central!"

"Central America …" Ryan raised his index finger when he was corrected by John and Cameron together.

"You must have been like what fourteen?" the blond asked trying to get him to tell the story with a face that said she didn't buy it one bit, as if she knew that Ryan wasn't in fact Sarah's younger brother at all.

"Sure … maybe." He flicked to John, then to Cameron for any sort of help they might offer.

"Yeah, I don't think he wants to talk about that … I mean he got a lot more of mom, than he ever wanted to see." John cleared his throat and nudged Riley. Ryan pointed to John with acknowledgement and a nod.

"There are some things you can't unsee …" Ryan whispered in a traumatized voice. Riley nodded as if understanding, to which John and Cameron followed.

"Hey …" Sarah walked up to the small group, happy to see some conversation going on in the house. "What you guys talking about?" she smiled and crossing her arms.

There was a silence between everyone as if choosing who was going to walk the plank first. It was at this time that Cameron decided that it should be everyone.

"Your vagina …" She said with a polite smile.

The sound of eggnog shooting through John's nose and onto the back of Riley's Christmas sweater filled the living room.

"Uh, John!" Riley called in surprise at the white drenched sweater and blond hair.

"Sorry …" John glared at the small satisfied look on Cameron's otherwise emotionless face.

Sarah stood with a puzzled look not quiet following the conversation. "Wait, your talking about my what?" she didn't think she heard right.

Cameron came to the same conclusion.

"Vagina , Cudder, Vagjayjay, Baby door, Cunt …"

John slammed a hand on Cameron's thigh. "Hey, when her face turns red in embarrassed rage … that means she gets it." He explained to Cameron, who nodded.

Sarah turned too glared at the group with an anger that was past the word bloody murder.

"I'm going up stairs to go … wash this stain out." Riley slipped out. Angrily Sarah turned back to her "Children" all of them.

John and Ryan immediately at the same time pointed to each other at the sight of the Sarah Connor death stare, While Cameron gave an innocent face of an angel. Both Ryan and John began to push their hands down, which looked like a slap fight.

"Hey, Cam … you want your Christmas present?" John asked as Sarah approached.

"It's not Christmas day yet …"

"Hey it's five o'clock somewhere."

"Actually ..."

John grabbed Cameron by the hand before she could finish her correction and tugged her to her feet, pulling her up the stairs. That left Ryan sitting alone with Sarah looming above him.

"I gotta go talk to Derek …" Ryan cleared his throat and pointed to the front porch and stood to leave.

While he walked nervously he felt arms hug from behind with the strength of a pissed off boa constrictor and a chin dug into his shoulder muscle.

"If you want a good look at it … all you have to do is ask." There was a dangerous tone to Sarah's sarcastic voice as she whispered into his ear like a serial killer.

"I'll remember that." Ryan strained.

Sarah reached up and patted his cheek three times with slap like force before she kissed the red mark and let him go.

He gave her an embarrassed two finger salute, exiting the house.

---

John and Cameron had been alone in his too small bedroom for several minutes. The room was quiet and still as John sat on the bed concentrating on the ground really hard, his hormones pulling him in every different direction. This was what he had been avoiding since Cameron set down the rules between them. She was alone in his room, with no one there to see him kiss her, to see him rip her dress open and …

"So …!" John cleared his throat and looked at Cameron who had set herself at task to disassemble Riley's protector Lego robot, with prejudice.

"So" Cameron said looking up pulling off the head of the robot with snap.

Looking into her eyes, John forgot what he was going to say, or what he was even supposed to be doing. All he could think was how much he wanted to kiss her and to feel the skin of her stomach under his palm again.

"What?" He cleared his throat.

"You wanted to give me a present …" she said taking her Lego filled skirt and dumped them in the toy box near the closet.

"Right …" John said nervously, trying to avoid staring at the slight exposure to Cameron's showing black panties as she pouched the blocks in her skirt.

Cameron turned and examined the young hero, seeing the nervousness coming off him like the smell of powdered cheese on a crunchy cheesy puff. She gave him a bright and reassuring smile that in turn made him grin as well.

"I'm sure I'll like it … it will never be a horrible present as long as it comes from you."

John's eyes watered slightly at the words, yet he wasn't sure why. He felt a rise of emotions that cleared away the hormones and left him just wanting to spend the rest of his life with the girl in front of him.

"I'll get it, Just a moment." He stood and cleared his love stung eyes and walked toward the door. In front of him stood Cameron who stepped in his way when she saw the tears fall ever so slightly from his misty green eyes.

"Did I do this?" She asked, reaching out and touching his damp cheek. He let her hand linger on his soft teenage stubble a moment looking into her brown eyes one more time. After a moment she returned the stare.

"I'm sorry …"Cameron apologized.

"Don't be …"

John took Cameron's hand off his cheek and gently kissed it. She watched and despite the confusion of why it was okay for her to make him cry she smiled gently.

After a moment he patted her waist for her to move, to which she complied. John opened his closet door and pulled another Lego box up and stepped on it revealing a hidden door above the main door frame. With a strained grunt he opened the door and smiled slightly. He pulled out a long rectangular box wrapped in shiny purple wrapping paper.

He climbed down the box and marched back into the room and walked back to the bed and placed the long slender package on the bed. Cameron walked up and waited for John's okay to grasp it, which she did when he motioned for her to open it.

She ran a slender hand over the wrapping paper that seemed to glisten with purple shine on her cheeks. John watched on with a smile as he backed up to his closet door and leaned against the frame.

Turning the box over, Cameron methodically removed the tape that held the folds together. When John let out a snicker at the time it was taking for her to unwrap the present, she turned to him with a chastising glare.

"I like the wrapping paper …"

John put up his hands defensively, letting her go at her own pace.

When Cameron finally removed the sheet of paper that took John all of Saturday to wrap, it revealed a white slender box.

When she removed the lid, it took her a moment of staring before she reacted. The girl ran a hand over the item.

"So what do you think?" John asked.

Cameron turned and gave him one of the most beautiful smiles he had ever seen in his life.

---

The outside of the large brick home that housed the Connor family was quite cold, colder than Derek Reese would expect in California, but not a cold he wasn't use to.

In fact in the dark of the night in the climate he could almost feel the need to rush out on a mission for John, or go on a search and destroy recon. But the blinding pain in his thigh brought him back to reality. He swigged his beer hoping that the numbing would go more to his leg and not so much to his head.

He looked out at the city lights of Los Angeles never quiet expecting to see the metropolis not in ruins that he had become accustom to since his second semester in high school.

"It's seems too different …"

He mused silently with a nasal breath that filled the air with white haze that looked like steam. He listened to the sound of his cane click against the souls of his shoes, going back and forth like the rocking gold knob of a grandfather clock.

Jesse wasn't picking up again; it had been a week since the two had gotten into it about Sarah and his leg. In truth Derek didn't feel like he had the right to be as broken up as he was about their split. He had gone there to break up with Jesse, it wasn't her fault she beat him too it and with good reason. Derek wasn't the unfaithful kind, when a Reese chose a lady it was for life, so when the woman he once loved raised the picture of him and Sarah kissing on the century bench he couldn't help but feel that he hadn't just betrayed Jesse, but the entire generations of Reese men before him.

But what truly was the origin of his sadness was that he might have won Sarah, but at what cost? The woman who had loved him, his leg, the memory of his brother? All those things plagued Derek Reese's mind, Plus the one constant. Was it right to make Sarah wait hand and foot for a cripple? Despite the doom and brood that Sarah Connor surrounded herself with, she was still a beautiful woman full of energy, that jogged and ran miles at a time and never been one to think twice about dropping dead weight.

"Is that what I am now, dead weight?" Derek looked mournfully to his leg.

"the only dead weight is in that head of yours …"

Derek smiled grimly at the voice of Ryan who walked to the brick balcony he was sitting on and perched himself on the edge next to his great-uncle.

"You're getting as good as the metal at stealth …" Derek commented to the soldier who smirked at the distaste in his tone at the mention of Cameron.

"I wonder why that is?" Ryan chuckled to himself quietly.

"I wouldn't want to know." The crippled man responded with another distasteful grunt.

There was a silence that over took them as they watched the skyline pensively, taking turns at tensing at the buzz of an aircraft overhead, or the sound of a vehicles echo through the darkness.

"It's hard to look at it and not remember how it will look in a couple of years." Derek spoke out loud when he felt he needed to find someone who could understand the things he went through on a base level.

"I hear that …" Ryan nodded drinking some eggnog.

"I remember a couple of months ago a plane flew by on a low pass and without thinking I took Sarah to the ground anticipating the strafing run." Derek scratched his stubble and smiled when he heard his companion give a laugh.

"How bad did she take it?" The soldier's voice sounded like an echo into his plastic cup.

"Like a champ … well, a heavy weight champ … I think I still have a bruised rib." He chuckled.

"Sounds about right." Ryan nodded with a snort.

Another pause entered the conversation as the soldier enjoyed the beverages that they thought they wouldn't taste at some point in their lives.

"What do you remember about pre Judgment day?" Derek asked curiously, wondering if he or Sarah would come up.

"Not much …" Ryan sighed with a hint of sorrow. "Flashes mostly, nameless places and faces." He shrugged.

"Huh" Derek swigged his beer watching a raccoon skitter into Kacy's backyard.

"Though I do remember sitting on my mom's lap while she was reading the newspaper and stealing some sips of her chocolate milk when she wasn't looking …" he smiled melancholy at the memory. "Dad laughed when she finally caught me … she was wearing that white silk sundress of hers, which meant that she was less strict on those days, though I never knew why." Ryan laughed and shook his head.

"You mean the one that John had in his office in the glass case?" Derek looked up at him.

"That's the one …" he nodded taking another sip of his eggnog. "After she left, he use to stare at it for hours at a time." He sighed bitterly.

"He missed her." Derek clinked his bottle against his cane.

"Yeah I guess …" Ryan trailed off, closing the subject of John Connor's beloved future wife for the night.

Time passed as the sound of music being turned up at Kacy's house, prompting Derek to ponder if Bruce Springsteen had ever released a Christmas album.

"How is your theater of the war going?" Derek asked.

Ryan shook his head with his wariness showing for the first time in awhile. "There's too many leads to follow … I feel like someone is running me ragged on purpose, trying to beak me and there is nothing I can do to stop them." He stared at his hand with a voice of youthful gravel that made Derek think that he was sitting next to Lieutenant General John Connor for a moment.

"Red Mask and her Murder's row?" Derek pushed.

"Possibly … but she's got Skynet into a corner." He replied to the other soldier's query.

"Not the worst news I heard tonight." Derek replied finishing his beer with a sigh of satisfaction.

There was a foreboding tone in Ryan's voice that gave Derek pause. "You know more than anyone what happens when Skynet is backed in the corner … it lashes out in cataclysmic ways or have you forgotten that business at Eagle Rock?"

Dead teenage lovers in rags spooning in a bunk bed, holding each other in their arms desperately flashed through Derek's mind as did a pregnant mother with her litter of children pressed to her all dead also.

"Skynet brings nukes to gunfights … I know" Derek nodded.

"Yeah well if you ask me it's only a matter of time before that bastard does something stupid that will put all of us in danger." Ryan had a cautious tone that set the mood from nostalgic to prophetic in one foul swoop.

"Yeah …"

There was a silent pause that once again claimed the front porch as the occupants sat with their own thoughts that plagued each with their own interpretation of the events that might unfold.

"Well …" Ryan sighed after a moment. "J-day won't be tonight." He rubbed his stubble thoughtfully. "It will be better for everyone if we leave the war for another day." He turned his head toward Derek.

"You're not wrong …" Derek replied with a nod and with a grunt he twisted around and with a painful exhale of breath, he stepped on the cold tiles of the porch with his cane to steady him. "I'm going inside." He announced to the younger officer who still sat where he was.

"Go ahead …" Ryan nodded. "I'm gonna stay out here a little while longer." There was pensiveness to his tone that caused Derek to lift his eyebrows in interest.

"Suit yourself."

Ryan heard the door open than close leaving him alone with nothing but the animals and the sounds of the city rumbling from afar.

Yet for all the stillness it felt like something wasn't quiet right about the night, he couldn't put his finger on what it is, but he knew somewhere below in the city there was something that was waiting to pounce.

"Something is on the prowl tonight…"

---

John stood outside Cameron's bedroom door tapping his foot anxiously, waiting for the cyborg to make her day view with his present.

"How long do I have to wait?" John called to the closed door.

"Just a moment" Cameron called behind the wooden barrier.

There was a part of the young man waiting outside the door, a teenage boy part of him that wanted to kick the other part of his brain in the balls for suggesting that she change in her room when she was willing and offering to change in front of him and that it was dork part of his brain that commanded the girl to change in her room.

"Shut up, jackass!"

"Come on Cam … how long is it going to take to change?" He called through the door.

"Patience is a virtue, John!"

"So is changing faster!"

"Is it?"

"Right now it is!"

"Hold your whores, John." Cameron called through the door. John snorted out loud.

"It's horses"

"What?"

It's horses!"

"I suppose if they're truly unattractive …"

"What?"

"Step away from the door."

As commanded John stepped away from the door and waited in anticipation before it was opened by Cameron who stood in the middle of the doorway.

She had on a beautiful silk cream sundress that fit her slender figure like a glove, John also noticed that she had changed her hair to a small bun on top of her head making the rest of her cascade of curled locks fit the dress better.

"It's perfect" She said with a bright smile and a tilt of her head.

"No …" John cleared his throat unable to look at or notice anything other than Cameron in the dress he had bought her. "You are." He wasn't sure what he was saying; to him it was meaningless dribble that seemed unchecked by his brain in the presence of a goddess.

She took him by the hand and led him into her bedroom and sat him on the bed where she stood in front of him, barefoot.

"It fits to my every movement without constriction or unwanted wardrobe malfunctions, like other things in my closet." She explained swishing the skirt in demonstration. "If a fight where to occur at a moment's notice, then I wouldn't have to change or be hindered." There was a bounce to her voice that for a moment made John hear a happy teenage girl and not a machine, even if it was just for a moment.

"Well … that wasn't what I was going for when I bought it, but if you feel that way than I'll go with it." John laughed as the girl looked at herself in the mirror twirling the skirt.

Cameron turned her head back almost guilty at the smile on his face.

"What?" he asked not understanding what the problem was that seemed to creep on her at the last minute.

"I didn't get you anything as special as you have for me." She admitted with a tighten of her right cheek and frown. John gave her a sympathetic chuckle.

"Look mom probably got me a …" He paused for a moment in thought. "Well let's just say that if I open a gift early tomorrow morning, because god knows that mom turns into a five year old on Christmas morning and sits on my bed at five - thirty in the morning and stares till I get up … but anyway if I hide a gift behind the couch then you know it was from mom. And Derek probably got me some … condoms or … six pack of Miller Light … well something that mom is going to confiscate, so to quote my favorite gift giver, no matter what you give me it will be cool, because you gave it to me." He couldn't help but feel on a high looking at the girl light up in her own machine way at the quote.

"So it's a process of elimination?" Cameron asked.

"More like fate." He chuckled.

"So I'm your fate …?" she frowned.

There was a pause between the two as if it just occurred to them what she just said. John didn't realize he was holding his breath till his face started a shade red. After he blew out a breath he laughed at the deepness of a passing curious question.

"I tell ya … that would be one hell of a pick up line at a bar." He raised his eyebrows in a way that left no doubt he was Sarah Connor's son.

"You think so?" she tilted her head.

"I don't know about me though …" He trailed off getting lost in her innocence.

"Why?" Cameron seemed interested at the prospect that there might be a flaw in her infiltration system.

"Because you would have had me the moment you walked through the door."

John had another moment were he blurted out something without thinking about what it was, he would curse the dress, but then he knew it wasn't the dresses fault that destiny had made it specially for the girl.

Cameron seemed to process the words in her chip, before she reached down and took John by the hand pulling him to his feet.

"What's up?" John looked down to see her continue to hold his hand without a wisp of a hint of letting go.

"I'm going to give you your Christmas present." She retorted stepping into his body space.

Cameron pressed her lips to John's as if she was unsure how to go about it, mostly because John was always the one who kissed her not the other way around. It took a moment of positioning before John took the reins and placed his hand on her neck and the two found their connection.

John got lost in the moment while Cameron felt her emotional simulators go off without her giving a command. A tear escaped her eyelash and stained John's cheek.

They broke the kiss and John looked up to see her misty eyes.

"You okay?" he whispered taking the hand on her neck and wiping the wet trail.

"Yes … I don't understand why I'm crying, this experience is not a sad occasion?" She reported to John.

"It'll be alright; sometime tears don't always come from sadness." John cupped her cheek and kissed her again passionately.

He wanted to move her to the bed and become one with her, to share his soul with the cyborg, to make her understand what love was and he didn't think tonight she would protest at all. But as they moved closer and closer to Cameron's bed John felt the air in the room drop to below zero.

In that moment of something being off, John knew things will and would go terribly wrong in so many ways. In the doorway of the conjoining bathrooms stood Riley in a camisole with her Christmas sweater in hand, forgotten by John and Cameron that the girl was in their bathroom trying to remove an eggnog stain.

The girl's blue eyes were big and shocked, looking from cyborg to teenage hero without so much as a blink.

"Riley …" John said calmly, the name finally turned Cameron's head while she stayed in John's personal space.

Suddenly Riley's confusion transformed to hatred and she turned to Cameron. "You sick bitch!" she screamed at the other teenage girl and stormed out of the room.

"Shit … Riley, Shit!"

---

"You'll shoot your eye out, kid."

The kitchen echoed the 24 hour marathon of "The Christmas Story" which was the only voices that played out over the sound of Charlie Dixon making drinks for him and Sarah.

"It's sure quiet out there." Charlie shook some ice and alcohol in a container. Sarah shrugged as she sat on the counter.

"What do you expect? The only person that everyone seems to not hate is John …" She lifted her eyebrows and ate a cherry from a bowl. She caught Charlie staring at her with a smile that uses to make her heart flutter.

"What?" she shook her head in confusion at what that stare meant.

"Nothing … just, nothing." He went back to mixing.

There was a silence again as neither knew what to say to one another, the last time that either one had seen each other was after John viciously beat down the EMT when he found out Charlie had, had sex with Sarah while he was gone. The truth was Sarah didn't want to talk about it, which she knew was what her ex was trying to lead up to, the reason she didn't want to talk about it was that it hadn't meant anything to her, all night she thought about Derek and their kiss. She felt ashamed, because she had used Charlie and she didn't have the decency to tell him that it wasn't about them that night, it was about distracting herself.

"Hey you remember that Christmas back in Nebraska when we got snowed in all that week and we couldn't buy each other gifts." He laughed longingly.

"Yeah … John drew you a motorcycle on notebook paper and he wrapped up my newly laundered underwear and gave them to me as a present." She smiled cradling a beer to her chest, while Charlie laughed.

"I remember your present to me …" He trailed off with a mischievous smile.

"I bet you would." She took a sip.

"Hey … it's not every day a girl wears lingerie made from shiny red wrapping paper and ribbons." He turned back to her.

"I had a lot of time on my hands." Sarah shrugged.

Both looked at one another then turned away, one nervously, the other with a smile.

"Sarah …" Dixon spoke her name with a tone that could have gone a thousand ways, all in directions Sarah couldn't let them go.

"Charlie" Sarah cut him off. "Let's not go there." She shook her head.

"Why not!" he said in sudden frustration at her request. "Why can't we go there I …"

"Don't"

"I love you."

"Damnit Charlie." Sarah slammed her hand on the counter with force.

"What … what is it that's keeping us apart?" He asked. Sarah shook her head not wanting to stay to hurt him. "Is it this life of yours … I can adapt, hey!" He took her arm and turned her back to look at him. "If this is your life, then it'll be ours, as long as we're together, I don't care." He took her chin and forced her to look at him.

"Charlie … the waitress Sarah Reese, the life we knew and wanted back in Nebraska, it was an illusion, a nice dream, that won't come true." She spoke harshly, wrenching out of his grip.

"That's bullshit!" He gave chase after her when she moved farther into the kitchen. "You're holding back on me …" He accused her crossing his arms in defiance. Sarah stopped and began leaning on the refrigerator, when he smelled her out.

"Please … let it die." She begged him not make her say it.

"You owe me the truth!" he yelled at her.

"Goddamnit …!" She turned and pushed him away from her. "I DON"T FEEL THE SAME WAY ANYMORE!" Sarah roared at the man, a hail storm of emotions denting her self-control.

Charlie was expecting excuses, reasons that it wasn't okay for them to be together. Sarah's dangerous life, John's safety, but what she just screamed at him was something that he wasn't ready for at all. At first he was more than willing to think it was just a ploy to get him to leave her for good, but the sincerity in her eyes was worst than being shot.

"It's been only a year to you since we we're going to get married …" he trailed off in a sort of dazed shock.

"Damn you, Charlie!" She growled at the hurt that Sarah had tried with all her heart to avoid that now engulfed the man that at one time she thought she would spend her life with.

"Is it someone else …?" He asked. Sarah let her tell do the talking, averting her eyes from the question. Charlie nodded bitterly and walked several steps away. "Who?" The older man asked, putting his hands behind his head like a winded runner. Sarah bit her lip and folded her arms across her chest.

"Damn, it's cold out there." Derek limped in with small grunts as his cane clicked on the tiled floor.

The flicker of fire when Sarah exchanged looks with the soldier made it clear as a cloudless March sky to Dixon who had taken the love of his life from him.

"Him!" Charlie shouted involuntarily when it hit him.

"What's going on in here?" Derek spotted the emotionally drained look on Sarah's face and the look of growing aggression from rejection on Charlie's.

"Nothing" Sarah turned away, emotion evident in her voice. Derek's eyes searched the situation out with some of the facts evident by the looks on the people's faces.

"Out of all the people in this world, why did it have to be him?" Charlie shook his head.

"I …" Sarah couldn't find the words to explain what she felt for Derek at least not without saying that it was deeper than anything she had felt for the EMT.

"He's not him, Sarah!" Dixon lost himself in the moment. "If that's what this is, then you're fooling yourself, because that's not John's father!" he pointed at Derek viciously.

"Get out Charlie …" Sarah had murder in her eyes at the mention of Kyle.

There was a silence in the room as Dixon struggled to find something to say, to apologize for his angry out burst, not wanting the final conversation to end that way.

"Get out!" Sarah snapped, startling everyone in the room.

As Charlie finally lurched toward the doorway of the kitchen, The older man paused in front of Sarah, he reached out a hand to touch Sarah's soft raven hair and kiss her good bye, and despite what had been said she was willing to let him have that as he was once someone she loved, but there was a large crack and Charlie recoiled his hand painfully when the wooden end of Derek's cane bruised the man's wrist.

"The door is that way." The Lieutenant said coldly, pain behind his gritted teeth from standing on both legs.

When Sarah made no protest Charlie walked out of the room, both occupants didn't stir till the sound of the front door opened and closed. A beat afterward the soldier wheezed at the throbbing and put his weight on the cane, leaning back on the island and shoving his hand in his green army trench coat.

Sarah couldn't find anywhere to place her eyes but the floor, not sure what to say or do at the moment, it was out in the open now, for Derek to see how she felt. Sarah could sit there and deny it, to tell him that she didn't love him one bit and the only reason she let Charlie go was because she just didn't feel that way about him, but Derek wasn't easily fooled and if anything what she said to him on the mall bench was more truth than she had told anyone in her life, but in a way it was fitting, because for some reason the man across the kitchen from her knew more about her than anyone had in her entire life, even more than John.

"He's not wrong …" Derek said looking up at Sarah. "I'm not Kyle and I won't be his substitute when it comes to you." His concentrated unwavering gaze was a double bladed sword for Sarah, because on one hand it made you feel like the only thing in his universe while on the other it made Sarah feel naked under a spotlight.

"Derek … not now, please." She shook her head fighting tears that threatened to spill out of her from the stress and confusion of what turned out of the night's events.

"Alright …" Derek nodded sympathizing and limped with distinctive clinks.

"Derek" Sarah called to him, her voice breaking slightly.

The soldier's face softened when he heard his name and when he turned he didn't think he had ever saw Sarah so young before or vulnerable. It made him uncomfortable, because that wasn't the woman he fell in love with, this was Kyle's frail and spoiled debutant standing behind him, but even so it didn't stop him from waiting on her to ask something of him.

"Please … don't leave." She didn't beg, but the sadness and frailty was projected in her low tone.

It took Derek a second to realize that she didn't just mean not to leave her alone in the kitchen, but asking him not to leave her like her father, like the right kind of love her mother should have had for her, like Kyle, the first person who ever truly loved her, and like John will someday. When the war was over, she wanted Derek to be there, to one day hold her till old age took her, or the cancer she feared killed her.

The man gave her a shit eating grin that had become his trade mark. "It would take nothing less then a bullet in the head to get rid of me."

A soft smile replaced the stressed confusion and in that kitchen they had reached the accord that they would silently hold each other too forever.

"You sick bitch!"

There was a thunder of noise from the upstairs before the stomping of feet came from the stairs. Sarah and Derek traded looks and walked into the living room where Riley's arm was being yanked back by John at the foot of the stairs while Cameron watched on the landing in a dress that Sarah didn't recognize and Derek immediately became creeped out by when he did.

"Riley, look I can explain what was going on …" John didn't seem to sound confident about that promise. The blond pulled out of the grip aggressively and took a step back.

"You were kissing her!" She shouted in John's face, and then shot daggers at a passive Cameron who was watching with innocent eyes that made Riley sick to the core.

"What!" Derek and Sarah both shouted in outrage at once.

The children turned, noticing for the first time that the "Parents" had been watching from in front of the sofa.

"It's not human!"

The words that rang from the girls angry lips sounded suspicious to John, though the statement might be linked to the incest the girl thought she was witnessing, there was more than a part of John that made him think that it was more of a statement labeled for Cameron, making him think that maybe Riley knew what Cameron was.

"What do you think you're doing with her …?" Riley poured the pressure on John, who was beginning to feel like he had walked into an ambush without any means of escape or surrender. "She's dangerous, she's a …" the girl stopped and caught herself from saying something she shouldn't. "She's a soul stealing whore." She spat at Cameron who glared back with a menacing tilt of her head.

"That's enough!" John grabbed Riley and unknowingly shook her in anger.

"It's not nearly enough!" the girl yelled in out of control rage that was now directed at John and no one else. "You have a full real life girl in front of you, someone who will keep secrets for you and sit through the shit that your crazy mother puts her through, who is willing to go all the way for and with you, yet you throw it all away for what … to pump the cunt of some soulless slut !" She jammed a finger at Cameron while still looking John in the eye.

SMACK

"John!" Sarah yelled in shock.

The teenage girl was on the ground with a flaring red welt where the future leader of the Resistance's hand slapped her. Cameron descended the steps quicker then it was thought possible and encircled John with her arms from the last step just in case he looked to press the attack. Riley didn't look fazed from the strike as if it was old news to be hit for mouthing off and it made John feel as horrible as the bruise on the girl's face will be in the morning.

Sarah went to help Riley to her feet, feeling the need to make up for the action that put her to the floor in the first place. But when she grabbed the girls arm gently she was shoved into the back of the couch by the blond who began to stumble to her feet.

"Don't you touch me! You're just as much of gutter trash as that piece of ass!" she yelled at the green eyed woman with pure hate that surprised her target.

"Excuse me!" Sarah was shrill at the deeply disrespectful tone and name she was just called by a girl she didn't much care for.

"You heard me, you boyfriend stealing tramp!"

If Derek hadn't gotten a hold of Sarah's slender waist as she lunged at the camisole clad girl, Riley would've ended up on the rug again.

Suddenly the front door flew open with a large bang that startled the toxic room, letting the situation air out for the moment.

Ryan rushed inside, cell phone in hand and open. The officer darted for the table and fumbled with the remote turning the channel from Ralphie beating a red headed bully to one of the million public access stations that littered the Los Angeles television networks.

On the screen a familiar Asian woman sat on the cold floor of a storage space. Her slender body was completely naked, bruised and horrifically gashed in bloody carved designs of pure sadism, as if she had been tortured, her breasts and crouch blurred by sensors. The woman was whimpering as what looked and sounded like a handheld Camera zooming in and out of her face.

"So, we'll start with the basics … what's your name?" A deep and gruff Slavic hinted accent asked as if this was amusing.

"Jessie …" The Asian woman replied with an Australian accent. The Camera man sighed at her response.

"That's not what they taught you to say when captured "Jesse" is it?" the camera got closer as Jessie's captor walked up to her kneeling form and sent a steel toed boot into her rib, to which she cried out in pain.

"Oh God!" a voice off camera screamed in sobs of fear. The camera whipped to a pale red headed girl in pink underwear in the fetal position.

"Shut up!" the voice behind the camcorder sounded demonic. The red headed teen covered her face in fear and trembled alone. The man switched it back to Jesse who was on her side, her lips parched and cracked.

"Now …" the voice was suddenly back to calm and amused. "What's your name?" He asked again.

"Jesse Flores … Tech-Com Commander, USS Jimmy Cater, SNNB 187663" She responded shakily, her body twitching.

"Now was that hard?" The man had a gravely chuckle. "Now, did John Connor send you?" He asked the woman.

"Hmm …" she moaned out unintelligibly. The camera walked up to her again, reaching down a prison inked hand, the man pulled her by her hair making her scream out in sudden pain.

"It's a simple question!" he tugged. "Yes!" He nodded her head ruthlessly. "Or no!" He twisted her head with even less remorse from side to side.

"No!" she screamed as blood ran down her scalp from a reopened wound.

"Then why are you here?" he yanked again.

"Revenge!" Jesse screamed at first. "I'm here for payback …" she whimpered loud enough for the camera to pick it up.

"On who?" The captor had a mocked surprised voice as if this was the first time he had heard of this.

"Ca … Cameron, CONNOR'S PET METAL!" She raised her voice to a yell when he tugged for her to be louder.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk, Commander Flores, don't you know who the deepest circles of hell are reserved for?" He asked now outright laughing at her answer to his previous question.

Jesse gave no response, she just flicked her look to the camera with conquered dark eyes that were resigned to their fate.

"I guess I'll let you find out …" the glimmer of a machete appeared on screen, held by tattooed hands. The man set down the camera on the floor out of sight, yet off screen the sound grunting and gurgling filled the warehouse. A shrill scream of terror came from the teenage girl as blood spatter stained the camera and Jesse's severed head rolled in front of it.

Derek who had been watching intently stood stiff and unmoving in shock, while Riley fell to her knees silent tears running down her face. Sarah turned away from the sight of the head. John stood in Cameron's arms not sure what just happened, while Cameron watched stone faced. Ryan however was seething with a dangerous silent rage, his arms now crossed as he watched on, knowing full well who was on camera and what was about to be challenged.

The screen cut out and returned to the girl lying in a protective ball shaking while she hid her face.

"You see what it costs you when you fall in love with the wrong woman … if you can call her that?" the growled voice laughed demonically and kicked Jesse' severed head at the girl who broke down crying after blood sprayed her half naked body.

"Your men have turned on you and in the future, the name Connor is no longer a prayer, but a curse … metal lover, murder, traitor, and mother fucker. That's what your men call you. Your child, a renegade forced to live down a tarnished deity's legacy of lies and deceit." He laughed as he zoomed in on the crying girl. "But, just maybe, if you come to save this sweet innocent girl, your destiny wouldn't be reduced to a man who ends up in love with the ghost of a woman long dead."

The screen went to color bars for a moment before a bulletin of community events returned to the screen with Kenny G's Christmas album playing over it.

The living room was quiet, filled with sudden shock and mental tardiness to the situation, it seemed like years ago, that Riley had went on a mental brake down, lashing out at the entire family, now she was face down on the floor, hands behind her head sobbing silently into the rug at the foot of the stairs. Sarah watched Derek, she wasn't sure why, but somehow she knew just who that woman was to the soldier who looked dazed in confusion with uncertainty if he should cry or be angry.

Alone in the room John felt guilt, he had listened and heard what was said about him, about his future self and his love for Cameron, what it will do to him and the rest of his future family. He turned to look into brown eyes that seemed to be watching him for some sort of reaction. The problem was he wasn't sure what it should be.

The sound of the a phone viciously snapping shut cut the silence, Everyone except Derek and Riley turned back to Ryan who slapped his thigh in anger after several moments of listening to the other end of a phone line.

"Get me a map!" Ryan called to John or Cameron; maybe it was both of them, either way he was pissed. Cameron released John and walked into the kitchen. John watched her go, not knowing if the feelings fluttering around him as he watched her in the dress were worth the cost of the future.

John numbly watched Sarah kneel to the floor and pull an emotional Riley to her knees gently, the cruel words said to her forgotten in a cloud of maternal motivation. Sarah was whispering something in the girl's ear as her broken up face buried it's self into Sarah's chest like a small child.

"Hey!" Ryan shook Derek back into reality. "You here?" he asked with a stern voice.

"Yeah … Yeah, I'm here." He cleared his throat, fighting his pain back somewhere deep inside himself, placing it where he stored Kyle's death and his parents.

"We need to take Steel out now, before he gets away again …" Hatred seeped out Ryan's being at the mention of the name.

"Agreed" Derek nodded with a crazed glare of dislike of his own.

Cameron strutted in with a city map and removed the food and laid it out on the table. Both men walked over to the dinning room table, as Ryan passed John he stopped a moment.

"Is what he said true … about me and Cameron?" the boy asked sobering himself. "Is this what it leads to?" he looked into pools of brown.

Ryan looked troubled and unsure about what he wanted to say to him. "Look" he cleared his throat. "A lot of bad things happened in the future, events that won't happen again … I promise you that." The man gave an encouraging slap to the young man's arm and started for the dinning room.

"Who is she?" John called after him.

"Who?" Ryan didn't turn to face John when he stopped dead in the tracks.

"He said I end up falling in love with a dead woman? Is it that girl the monster has captive?" He asked unsure if he wanted to know what the answer was.

Suddenly Ryan was standing on a snow drenched mountain standing toe to toe with his father, both in layers, both of their breakfast plates spilled on the snow while they yelled at each other, three years of crawling coming out on that freezing morning.

"Look where we are … on top of a damn mountain pass in CHILE!"

"That's were she says the tracks are going."

"SHE'S NOT REAL!"

"That's enough of this …"

"Dad … she's been dead for fourteen years, she's not here, she doesn't tuck me in at night, you don't snuggle with her to keep her warm … and you don't have sex with her! You talk to yourself at night and during the day. Back at that village you came close to trading all our navigational equipment for a female coat that we don't need!"

"Shut up!"

"Damnit dad! I know you love mom and you miss her terribly, but this is insane, the woman in the jungle, that wasn't Sarah Connor! That was that liquid bitch playing with your head.

"What the hell would you know about it?"

"I watch you! It kills me every time you start carrying on conversations with a rock, or when you can't even tell the difference between being in love and being loved. Weaver has lured you away from Mom with a shadow of a woman that didn't love you like that! She's destroying this family little by little … and you don't even see it!"

"She's helping us find your mother … she wouldn't lie to me, she's going to lead us to Cameron and then we'll all be a family again!"

"Listen to yourself, don't you hear how crazy you sound. Sarah Connor is dead! and the more these delusions lead us off course the more Weaver keeps mom in her … mom needs us now and some woman in your head isn't going to help us find her!"

"All she's ever done is love you with all her heart and you treat her like some damn slave that we …"

CRACK

"… Break Camp, there is a long way to go today."

"Damn it I just punched you and you still won't listen to me!"

"Saddle up, Cowboy."

He could still see his father walking away his arm draped around an imaginary slender waste whispering comfort to a woman that wasn't there.

Ryan looked at the face of his young and hopeful father as he waited on pins and needles for an answer to his question.

"No … that isn't her."

One day Cameron Connor will leave her family to protective them, one day after three years of searching, John Connor will learn that his wife left him and was not kidnapped and on that day the great hero will give his love to the ghost of Sarah Connor, because in his soul destroying sorrow he believed that she was the only person in whole cursed life that ever truly loved him. While Ryan, once the embodiment of a great love, now was an everlasting reminder to John of one of the greatest deceptions that not even Skynet could've pulled off.

As the officer walked away he caught a glimpse of Sarah watching him and for a moment he hated her with all his soul, he hated her for sharing a deep bond with his father that one day will be exploited into something that would twist John Connor to the gates of insanity.

In the dinning room Derek drew a square with a sharpie covering the downtown area and at the edge where Pescadero stood.

"This is the Cage." The soldier announced dropping his index finger in the center of the perimeter and tapped it thoughtfully.

Ryan found the nickname for the National Guard quarantined area of the city where the state's psychopaths have set up shop quite fitting.

"Yeah well that's going to be a problem because Steel was broadcasting here …" Ryan took the sharpie and X'd a building toward the middle of the no man's land area of L.A. that was fenced off.

John watched silently for a moment thoughts rushing through his head like overhead lights rushing by on a night's highway.

"Then it's a good bet that's where she's at." Sarah walked up without warning, placing a discreet hand on John's shoulder, wanting a just as silent answer to her question of if he was alright. John turned from the map, giving her intense green eyes a look while his matching pair was still a storm with plans. He gave the map one last good look.

"I need to go upstairs a moment …" He announced to everyone, though only Sarah and Cameron seemed to hear him.

"Take as much time as you need." Sarah figured the events had finally caught up with him, she ran a hand through his hair maternally, he moved his head from her touch with irritation that only a teenager could get for a parents nostalgia and old habits.

Cameron moved to follow her charge up the stairs, but received a snap of fingers from the green eyed woman who pointed to the spot she had been standing a second ago. "Stay!" she snapped the news that she had been kissing her son still fresh on her mind despite all that happened. The girl glared, but obeyed the command returning to her sentry position over the map where Ryan and Derek were now arguing over the next move.

"It's never that easy!" Derek sounded on edge.

"It's always that easy, but nothing is what it seems." Ryan countered.

Sarah wasn't sure what was going on, but it was clear that the two Tech-Com officers seemed to have more than a clue about who was behind what was going on. She was about to ask for answers when the sound of a car pulling out of the driveway. She figured that Riley left, which she counted as a blessing and was happy that the girl had taken her advice and was returning home.

"Bastard most likely will have something waiting and will be watching from someplace close." Derek grunted to Ryan who was leaning over the map.

"Who is he …?" Sarah asked loud enough to be heard.

"He was a small time slave trader and thief …" Derek answered her.

"More like a rapist and butcher." Ryan growled in correction. The older soldier seemed to pause at the facts he didn't want to remember in order to keep Jesse's memory as she was in his mind and not as he imagined her last hours had been.

"But … it looks like he entered Skynet's service of late."

"You think he's working for Skynet?" Cameron asked.

"The Resistance sure as hell isn't signing his paychecks." Derek shot at the girl in response, Sarah not being the only one to remember about John and Cameron kissing.

"And the girl?" Sarah crossed her arms.

Ryan and Derek shared a look as if neither wanted to answer the question.

"Kate Brewster, she was … might be John's second wife." Derek sighed rubbing his soul patch with a hurt look in his eye as if fighting off an unpleasant memory.

"What about his first?" Sarah asked. Ryan looked up from the map and set the beautiful woman with a cold and hard glare that made Sarah dip her head a little, after a moment Ryan went back to the map.

"Did he love Kate?"

There was something strange about the way Cameron asked the question that seemed fragile and almost a little hurt sounding, as if the knowledge that John remarried pained her emotionally.

"He liked her well enough." Derek spat at the girl dulling a little sadistic pleasure out of the machine's sorrowful sounding voice.

"She was convenient …" There was a hard grit to Ryan's tone that somehow contradicted Derek while at the same time made Sarah sad to hear that John hadn't married out of love, only adding to the belief that one day her son will be sitting in a room alone till his life wastes away.

"But he said …" Cameron started.

"I think he would be on the highest point of the street." Ryan cut off Cameron, drawing a circle around the X on the map with is finger. "Doesn't Da … John have a 3D map of the city on his computer?" He looked up at Sarah.

"Yeah …" She responded turning on to the steps to see Riley sitting on the stairs sniffling, cradling the small cup of alcohol that Sarah had given her to calm the girl. Then it hit Sarah after opening her mouth to call her son.

Sarah rushed to the window and threw open the curtains to find her blue jeep gone from the gravel driveway. Wordlessly she turned to the group around the dinning room table.

"Damnit!" Ryan turned and went into the kitchen.

"What's he thinking …" Derek joined Sarah at the window needing to see the empty spot for self confirmation.

"John does these things sometimes." Cameron stated stiffly.

"We know!" Sarah and Derek retorted in unison turning to face the girl together, looking the part of a married couple and parents.

Ryan walked back into the room, placing his helmet on the table. "He's rushing into a trap." he said snapping his gun belt on and checking the magazine to his Colt.

"We got to stop him …" Sarah followed the soldier into the living room, Riley who had been whimpering in misery a second ago now tensed silently at the sight of the fire arm.

"Reese keep them here!" Ryan called as he reached for the door.

"He will, will he?" Sarah grabbed him back.

"We don't have time for this."

"I couldn't agree more!"

"Listen to me!"

It was that voice, the desperate seriousness that caused Sarah to go numb and listen to the man that was clearly Kyle's blood.

"He knows what you and Cameron look like … alright, John's going to wander in there and the more of us Steel sees the more likely it will paint a bigger target on this house!" He shook Sarah. "For once in your life let me do this my way!" he shoved her aside and left with the slam of the door.

---

The sound of the wind howling through the ruined buildings of downtown Los Angeles was like a grieving widow or mother for a dead loved one newly killed. The moonlight was barely enough to light the way through the no man's land of shot up businesses and charred remains of a post office.

In the silent street a bullet pummeled tan humvee cruised smoothly through the dead section of the metropolis, no headlights, just the keen eyes of a teenage boy in stolen California National Guard gear a size to big for him.

John couldn't help but wonder if this was some sort of walking dream into his future. All around him was shattered glass and scorch marks of riot produced pyrotechnics on an abandoned Police precinct. He scanned the area for any criminals that might be wandering through the streets, looking for an easy kill. He knew that there would be a hard enough time rescuing the girl without taking fire from California's most wanted.

His mind even concentrating on his self imposed mission to rescue this stranger who supposedly will be important to his future he couldn't help but ponder on Cameron and the consequences of a relationship with her.

He wasn't sure what to believe anymore, his mother, his uncle, Charlie, even his men in the future. Everyone tells him that being in love with a machine is a mistake, that she doesn't have feelings or the capabilities to love him, yet they didn't see her at the night of the fall formal dance, paralyzed in the truck and even tonight, there was no denying that she was something different, something more than what his family thinks or even his men.

"Who else is there?"

John Connor knew there was no turning back now; Cameron was the only girl he had ever loved discounting when he was five and was dead set on marrying his mom. It simply was impossible to sit and think of a future ten or twenty years down the road, good or bad without his protector sitting next to him, calling pitches at baseball games before the pitcher even throws the ball, or the devious excitement on her face at the blood sport that was College Football.

Then why was he out there? Why was he on the road driving through a part of L.A. that was now considered one of the most dangerous places in the world looking for "the little red head girl"? He felt a twinge of guilt, because the only word that came to mind was one that he hated to hear from anyone.

"Obligation"

Yes, John knew the reason he was off to save this girl from the invisible mercenary; it was because he felt an obligation to her life, a debt to her future self who obviously was important at some point to General John Connor's life.

As he approached the street X'd on the map he could see an aluminum looking building in the distance that had been sprayed by a few thousand bullets and resembled a warehouse.

John killed the engine and pulled out a AR 15 with a night scope and exited the vehicle and ducked and ran to a position several yards away and knelt, using the corner of a old brick building for cover. He observed the warehouse with his night scope on his rifle.

He knew immediately that it was the building when he saw a large broadcasting dish and a long antenna with a blinking red light at its tip.

The hero took several minutes scoping the building, it was surrounded by a short fence with a layer of barbwire, and there was a pair of loading docks next to a heavy painted door that served as an entrance. He flicked up to the roof tops surrounding the aluminum warehouse, he saw nothing.

He took a deep breath and darted across the street at a sprint. Once he reached the fence he slid to the ground just in case someone had a beat on him. After pushing his helmet back up he removed his body armor and tossed it on top of the barbwire. With one last sweep of the roof tops, he jumped up and over the fence using the armor to shield his hands from the sharp barbs.

There was a heightened sense of his surroundings as he crawled on his stomach toward the white service door, once out of sight from the brittle windows John popped to his feet and crouched as he moved next to the door. He licked his lips nervously unslinging his rifle. He closed his eyes a moment and with a deep breath his green eyes turned hard and dangerous. With a swift kick the door swung open and John burst through.

He stopped abruptly once inside.

The girl he had came to save was tied to a wicker chair her face frozen in horror, her body mutilated and gutted like a butchered cow, blood pooled from between her thighs. In the back ground near the corner of the door the sound of "Sincerely" by the Afterglows played on a scratchy record player.

The shocked and sorrowful young man could do nothing but remove his helmet in some unknowing sense of respect for the dead girl he never knew.

John numbly walked to the body and reached out to close her eyes. That's when he heard the faint sound of beeping like a microwave timer. He followed the sound to the ceiling to where he found a timer in the middle of large bloody writing; it was attached to wires of explosives on top of barrels behind the dead girl.

As it clicked to the last seven seconds, the young man glanced at a saying that will never have the same meaning ever again to him.

NO FATE

---

Royce Stannis was a hard man to serve under. He was strict and cold, there were few mistakes that the commander of the National Guard battalion would let get pass with a warning, and even less patience for a man or woman's flaws.

So when the hook nosed balding man stood in his big poofy military jacket in front of an empty guard station at the main gate to the no man's land that needed be watched 24/7 or the chances that the criminal infestation would grow, to say he was angry was a sore understatement. In fact the heat coming off his face alone was hot enough to warm the barracks a mile down the road.

He cussed angrily at the desertion and at the sudden and almost forgotten snow fall that slowly drifted to the ground.

"What do you know, I guess it does snow in hell?"

Royce glared at his pretty petite Latina aid who was leaning on there humvee. She smiled anyway letting her commander turn back wordlessly to the empty post.

"Get on the wire, corporal. I want to know who is supposed to be here tonight." Stannis commanded.

"Yes sir"

The sight of a single head light appeared in the distance accompanied by the roar of a small, but a powerful engine. Squinting at the mismatch of pitch dark and bright headlight, both soldiers watched a motorcycle mounted by a man with a brown leather jacket and a black visor helmet with two blue streaks on top race toward the humvee in a collision course.

The young Latina soldier rushed out of the way as the rider got closer. Stannis drew his pistol in defense, but the rider didn't seem to notice or care about the two. The rider simply jumped the sleek racing vehicle on to the front of the military truck and rode on the back like a ramp, jumping the motorcycle off the tail and over the gate, landing on the other side on his back wheel, performing a wheelie before putting the front wheel on the ground and stormed off into the darkness.

Ryan pushed the bike through the ruins, feeling a rush of adrenaline and familiarity at maneuvering a motorcycle through a broken street at a reckless speed, always being chased by motor terminators, or chasing a monkey wagon through Pico, now it was his gallant fool of a teenage father who took off at the slightest pretense into danger to save a complete stranger. He now knew how his mother and father use to feel when Ryan would do the same in his youth.

He expertly avoided piles of stones and burnt tires and leapt over rode blocks, taking short cuts through ransacked businesses and looted restaurants. The rumble of the engine somehow made him on edge and anxious to get to where he was going.

As he drifted the bike to the corner, he saw a metal warehouse in the distance and the shadow of a figure bursting through the door. It didn't take Ryan long to get to the front of the metal gate.

"John!" He called

BOOM!

The entire warehouse erupted in an explosion, sending the soldier flying through a corner building window with a neglected sign that read "Tech Noir".

---

"This is your very own secret Santa, Pow Wow Peter with this Christmas Day evening headlines. Last night an explosion rocked a warehouse on Third and Pico were Police report the mystery broadcast of the now infamous Christmas Eve beheading took place. Sources report that it was set off by a Private in the Guard, but there is no comment from Colonel Stannis … in related news there is still no sign of kidnapped teen Katherine Brewster …"

A figure sitting in the brooding darkness of a family tool shed reached up and turned off the radio that sat on the work bench. The figure returned his hand to the arm rest of his chair and stared at the ground, hand twitching in pain a moment.

The sound of a feet crunching over gravel echoed closer and closer to the door till the faint shadow appeared on the crack under the door.

Carefully the door opened only letting enough light to reach the tips of burned jump boots. Cameron was dressed in her sun dress, hair curled to perfection and the twilight behind her gave her an ethereal appearance as she tried to get more light into the shed unsuccessfully.

"John …" She called into the room holding a tray of medical supplies in hand.

The shadow sitting in the dark said nothing to her, not even blinked.

"I've come to redress your burns." She started to walk into the shed.

"Leave me alone, Cameron."

John's voice was gruff and growled; he didn't sound himself, at least not like the teen who had kissed the beauty in her room only hours ago.

"But it's been five hours and I haven't seen since you took off …"

John said nothing to her.

Cameron moved forward again.

"What did I just say?" There was a strained fierceness to his voice that would have made Cameron jump in fear if she had been human.

"But … what about your burns?" She tilted her head.

"Get out" John sighed with a sorrow that seemed to reach his very core.

"John, I have to …"

"GET OUT!"

A radio flew from the work bench and struck the base of the door near Cameron's head. She didn't flinch away from the loud crash, or the blood curding roar that she had become accustom to in the future.

But this time it was different, the John of the future often screamed at her and threw things, he cussed her out when she did something wrong or when she said things that were so technical that it reminded him that she was still a machine, but this was her John, the John that loved her like all the romance books she read at night, the John that might create life inside of her. Somehow in a night he was no longer the John that taught her how to use the DVD player, or ate lunch with her every day at school no matter how much people made fun of him for not being able to walk down the road without holding her hand. Now he was the John of the future who seemed to let his grief take the humanity from him, who lost a soul many years ago, who would hold her in his sleep, yet take nothing from her but her body heat and the softness of her belly as a pillow.

Before she knew it, her eyes were crying despite the stoic face. With the look of a kicked puppy she turned and left outside, leaving John to himself.

Yet when the door looked to be almost shut it swung open again revealing Sarah in a tight long sleeve white shirt and jeans. She held a tray of medical supplies that Cameron was carrying.

"You done throwing your tantrum?" she asked harshly, tilting her head.

"Mom … not now." He shook his head.

"Yes now …" She left no word for arguments as she waltzed into the shack and closed the door behind her, bathing both in darkness.

"How am I supposed to work if I can't see your injuries?" Sarah asked.

"I don't want you too …" John said sharply with a voice that his mother still couldn't recognize or put a face on.

"Since you got home, you've sat alone in this shed, with Ryan being the only one to see you, now you're hurt and you're going to show me your injuries do you understand me?"

Sarah felt like she had walked into her nightmares. Each night an adult John would sit alone in the dark, his life was a shell of nothingness that had consumed him. In her dreams her son was tall and handsome with an emptiness that you could feel in the great command room of the Resistance. She would apologize to him in tears; beg him for forgiveness for bringing him into this world so he could be alone. She would scream and hit him, for a reaction, for something that could replace the empty look of sorrow. At the end she would always curl herself in his lap and bury her head in his chest and wonder if hell was too good for a mother who left her son to die alone.

"Mom …" John's voice was almost pleading her not to go through with making him show her what had happened to him.

"John Connor, turn on the light!" She snapped strictly.

Slowly a hand reached for the light switch and after a moment of hesitation the light flicked on.

John sat in an arm chair, still wearing the charred tan fatigue pants of the National Guard, while a Black T-shirt replaced his fatigue button down and tan green T-shirt.

"What have they done to my baby?"

The skin on the entire back of her boy's neck, upper back and edges of his ears and lob was grotesquely blackened and crusty. Half the back of his head was burned mildly; his hair was synged off and was covered with heat blisters that oozed puss. On his right cheek was a discolored red burn with an angry welt in the middle. When John spotted the horrified Look on Sarah's face he turned away from his mother immediately and looked down at his thighs in defeat, a single tear fell into his lap.

She cleared her misty eyes and without hesitation Sarah walked to her boy and got on her knees in front of him, placing a comforting hand on his thigh and with the other she lifted John's chin with a feather touch till they were eye level.

"Mom …I couldn't save her … He raped her to death and … instead of rescuing her I was turned into a monster."

In that instant she heard her little boy again, he was ashamed and sad of his failure to save Kate and what the injuries that had been inflicted on him represented.

"John … you're not a monster" She shook her head as she stroking his cheek.

"Please, don't look at me." He begged her

She knew he was afraid, afraid that she wouldn't see him as her son anymore, but the freak that she didn't want. It was the same thing that she feared of what John would see her as when she escaped Pescadero and was in his life again.

The beautiful woman leaned in and lightly kissed the burn on her son's cheek and then cleared his tears away as hers came on.

"You think that I would see you any different because of this? The day I found out I was pregnant, even at seventeen years old, I swore I would love you no matter what happened, This won't change that, nothing will …" She sniffled. "You're still the most handsome boy I've ever seen." She smiled through tears.

John's body shook suddenly as if surrendering with silent sobs at the comment and he lowered his head to rest on her shoulder. Sarah took him in her arms and buried her head in the top of his remaining hair as he cried.

---

The night was cold and distant as it was almost inhumanly still with the only movement being the heavy snowfall shadowing on the wall of the master bedroom of the Connor house.

Ryan sat on the large bed and counted the timing of how her chest rose and fell like clock work, it was the same breath pattern every night. He reached his hand out and brushed some hair out of her face.

When she was peaceful, like she was now, Ryan could see the cheerleader captain in the picture on his father's desk. Twenty five years later it still hurt him deeply to see her so heart broken and fragile looking, even in her slumber.

He reached out and lightly stroked the milky smooth skin of her back under her threadbare white tank top, feather tipped fingers soothing out the slight moan of a discomforting dream. She sighed dreamily and her eyes opened slowly and a confused look broke over her face.

"What are you doing here?" Sarah asked.

Ryan cleared his throat and looked away and removed his hand quickly.

"I don't know …" He seemed just as confused as she was. What was he doing in here and how did he even get inside? "I uh … I don't remember."

She sat up on her elbows and gave the confused and ever so tired soldier a gentle and loving smile as shadows of snow flakes fell across her face..

"What's troubling you?" She sat up a little more.

"Steel is here …" Ryan responded.

"I know …" She tilting her head running her hand through his hair.

He cradled his head in his hands tiredly.

"Ryan?" She called him.

"I can't …" Ryan said into his hands. He looked up at her and shook his head. "I don't know if I have enough in me to take him on." He searched her eyes.

Sarah got out of the bed and crawled up, the smooth material of her silk panties glimmering in the moon light. She sat across his lap on the edge of the bed.

"My enemies are surrounding me, and I don't have enough strength to break the siege." Ryan wrapped his arms around her slender waist. "Death is coming for me …" He looked into hardened emeralds that seemed to look in his soul.

"I know" She spoke solemnly touching his cheek, the man turned his head into the touch, trying to find some comfort from the fate he couldn't escape from.

Suddenly in a flash Ryan saw a familiar gothic dinning room lit by a soft glow of candle light. At the edge of the table a man with a gorilla like body mass sat at the end and next to him a raven haired beauty in a wedding gown collapsed in sorrow when she stared across the table at the figure of a man sitting in a place of honor at the wedding feast, he was wearing Ryan's leather jacket and clothes with many Resistance war metals pinned to the jacket as if to mock him, yet instead of a human head on his body one of a Coyote was sown in it's place.

Then as fast as he was there he was gone, Sarah still sat in his lap watching him her hand exploring the stubble on his jaw. Ryan felt the deep need of comfort and shelter from what he believed awaited him

He ran a hand down the length of the seams of her panties curiously, till it led his fingers to the warmth between her legs, the woman gave a coy Cheshire smile and leaned in and the two kissed deeply. She sighed erotically when there lips pressed together with little wet smacks.

Ryan lost himself in the moment as he laid her back on the bed and began to Savage her neck which caused her to hitch her breath harshly. His hands found the hem of her tank top and lifted it to Sarah's chest his hands lightly tracing over her belly, eliciting a whimpered moan that she tried to conceal with a bit to her lip.

But just as he began going down on her, Sarah began to laugh sadistically.

Ryan pulled off when he regained himself and looked down as Sarah Connor became a mold of liquid mercury.

---

"Never!"

Ryan shot up into a sitting position panting in panic and wild with a great and terrible fear.

It took him several beets before he realized he was no longer in Sarah Connor's bedroom, he was laying on top of the sheets of Cameron's bed in her room, his boots on the side of the bed, his head throbbing from the red eye flight from his bike to the window of Tech Noir.

The room was quiet and still as his dream had been. His hand rested on a warm spot where Cameron had been laying next to him as he drifted off to sleep.

He knew better than to doze off.

It was a different dream over and over, yet it always ended the same, He takes Sarah to bed in his fear and need of comfort from his impending doom due to the fact that she's all that matters to him and by the time he comes to his senses he has become his father.

These nightmares came almost every night and he feared to sleep.

Ryan swung his legs over and sat on the edge of the bed, now noticing Cameron standing in front of her window in her night gown, watching the full moon on the front yard. Ryan had fallen asleep with her lying next to him, as she told him about his father's actions and he consoled her till he drifted to sleep.

"I want Steel to pay for what he did to John."

Her voice was dark and murderous; the likes of Ryan had never heard his mother speak with before in his life.

"I'll kill him." Ryan stared at the moonlight shimmering off the satin of Cameron's slip.

"No"

She made no turn to face him.

"I will."

---

Author's Notes

So Like I said this chapter has a lot of backstory.

The whole John/Sarah relationship came from John going a little nuts from all Cameron put him through. The whole Ryan/Sarah sex scene is his fear of becoming like John … Also make note that a couple of chapters back Weaver laid out the things that came to fruition in the scene.