Disclaimer: To all who may still be interested… Okay, here is the next chapter. It goes without saying, but I will anyway. Original characters are mine. I have no interest, ownership or claim to anything having to do with the Terminator characters, movies, franchise, and so on and so on and shoobee doobee doobee… Let's move on with the story.
The Human Condition-Chapter 5
… It's What You're Doing When You're Doing What You Look Like You're Doing
Year 2019
The engine noise washing over him, Marcus shook his head to clear it. He'd caught himself going over the details of the job (mission?) again. He knew from experience that obsessing over a heist already in progress would just make him crazy. The whole thing was planned to the best of his and the rest of the resistance's abilities. Any adjustments would have to be made on the fly. He knew that from experience too.
To ease the jitters, he took a walk back thru the big 'copter to where Billy Soames rested, eyes closed but awake. As he sat, Wright noticed Jacob Peterson's baleful frown. Never one to resist an opening, Marcus decided to have a little fun.
"G'day, Colonel. Having a pleasant flight so far?" he asked as the two transport birds grew closer to the Skynet facility on the California/Arizona border. Fighter and bomber aircraft from other resistance groups streaked ahead of them, hopefully to soften the target with a harsh pounding. Others served as protective escort. Peterson, eyes narrowed in disgust, refused to answer. The Colonel stood and moved two seats further away, disrupting others to do so. Marcus gave him the wiseass smirk that had driven so many others nuts in the past. Peterson ground his teeth together and tried to glare a hole thru the metal floor.
"Was it something I said?" he questioned Soames, who was now regarding him the same way a parent looks at a naughty child.
Soames huffed a laugh. "Why you want to go yank the man's chain like that? You still got a genuine talent for pissing people off when you want to, don't ya?"
"We all contribute to the war effort in our own way" Marcus replied modestly. "Think he's any relation to Principal Sheridan?"
Billy laughed again. "Shut up Marcus. You have any idea how much that man wants to stick a power drill up your dark side?"
"Of course I do" Marcus answered. "He's got plenty company. So?"
"So?" Billy drew back to stare at Wright as if the other had lost his mind. "So, why is he on team two? If he sees a chance to take you out and figures he can get away with it, he'll do it. You know that, and you're still giving him your back? I don't get that."
"Get this then, Billy, ok? As much as he hates me, he hates Skynet more. He won't let his feeling about me get in the way of giving it a high hard one. That much I'm sure of."
"But, Marcus, he-" Soames sputtered
"Billy" Wright sought to clarify things for his friend. "Peterson's on team two because he'd like nothing better than to blow my cyber jewels off. If things go wrong, badly wrong, I'm going to need somebody close by who won't have a problem turning this" he tapped the side of his head, "into oatmeal so Skynet can't resurrect me again. Our pal Jake there" Marcus pointed with his chin at Peterson, "I'd say he fits that bill, wouldn't you?"
"And who's going to keep him from making up an opportunity?" Billy asked, still concerned.
Marcus clapped his once upon a time foster brother on the shoulder. "Why, Bill, old buddy, why do you think you're here?" He grinned and rose, walking forward to check on the transport's location.
Year 1996
BOOOOOOMMMMM! The Benilli M4 sounded thunder within the confines of the small bank.
"Ladies and gentlemen!" Marcus Wright's rough tenor bellowed in a no nonsense tone. "This is a robbery! Everybody down on the floor!" He punctuated his demand with another left handed blast from the powerful shotgun. With startled yelps and terrified screams patrons and employees of the bank dropped to the floor.
The bank's electronic security had already been neutralized thanks to Manny Serrano's expertise. The rest of the crew, with more than two dozen robberies under their belt by now, spread out with practiced ease to carry out their respective assignments.
"Five minutes!" one of the anonymously masked group called out. Swinging around to help cover the frightened civilians Marcus took note of his crew's efficiency. There was zero wasted motion. The First Federal Southwest Savings Bank was relieved of its funds in very short order.
"Three minutes!" the timekeeper shouted. The wail of far off sirens said the cops had dropped their doughnuts and were showing some hustle for a change. They were nearly finished here, Marcus could see. He sensed motion to his right. He looked that way in time to see one of the banks security personnel, probably a retired cop, rise up slightly. Coolly, he sighted on the man with the Beretta 92F in his right hand, shooting the uniformed guard in the shoulder. An agonized cry and splash of blood told Wright his shot had gone where he'd wanted it to.
If you point a gun at someone, you'd better be ready to pull the trigger, the lesson went. So be it.
"You get one warning , old man. That's all" he told the guard coldly, death in his voice. He meant it.
"Time!" With that pronouncement the gang made their planned exit, long before police could appear on the scene.
If you're in the bank long enough for the cops to get there, you deserve to get caught. Do your homework and know your moves before you go in or don't go in. Lesson two, well learned.
The seven member robbery crew was well away from the bank before Marcus relaxed enough to disencumber himself from the M4's custom sling, sliding his wrist free and going thru the necessary motions to disarm the gun.
"Wooooooo Hoooooo! Yeah! Now that's what I'm talkin' about!" Sam yelled, pounding the stolen truck's roof with a fist. The adrenaline dissipating, the younger Wright looked at his brother relieved.
His own rush slowly leaving, Marcus returned the look. "Yeah, little brother. That's how we want it to go, simple and quick." He closed his eyes, fading off towards sleep as Sam followed Manny , Alex and Nelson in the car ahead of them to the gang's rendezvous location. Les and Sean, in the car a mile or two behind the one driven by Sam, kept an eye on the group's getaway trail. They were the first line of defense against any pursuit. The robbery had been nearly bloodless, except for the guard. His own fault, Marcus scoffed, shoulda kept sucking that marble floor. If his early mental tally was close, the take from the small bank would be disproportionately well worth the effort. All in all, not a bad day's work. Dale would have been pleased.
Maybe, I can still find a way to get thru to him, Marcus reflected. It was too bad, Dale ending up the way he had, Wright thought. With the kind of life Dale had lived, he deserved to go out with style, not gasping for breath and gagging on his own phlegm in the geezer equivalent of the Peebles Children's Home. Marcus was sure the nurse's aides and attendants changing the old man's diapers and wiping his chin had no idea of Dale's incredible history. A former bank robber, Carpenter had once rubbed elbows with people like the legendary Willie Sutton. His many and varied associations had once upon a time afforded the stroke and emphysema afflicted elderly man with what amounted to a college education in crime. Knowledge he passed on to two young brothers on the run by the names of Marcus and Sam Wright.
Initially landing in Dallas after leaving Brownsville, Marcus and his brother hadn't been long for the big D. Instead, their path took them south again, past their former home and across the border into Mexico. The rough towns that hugged the border Texas shared with its' southern neighbor exposed sixteen year old Marcus to a life he'd only dimly been aware of before. Outlaw bikers, smugglers of every stripe and the drug cartels filled his every day world. The denizens surrounding him and Sam made him acutely aware of the need to shield Sam as much as possible. Gravitating to their air of lethal ruthlessness he realized instantly that having these people see him as useful to them was the difference between life and death for him and Sam, now thirteen.
Audacious and willing, Marcus's youthful appearance made him a natural choice for border runs. His new mentors took full advantage. Trusting him at first with small deliveries, the scope of his responsibilities quickly grew. When payment for his services for safe delivery of a particularly important shipment came in the form of an opportunity for Sam to live at and attend a school run by the church, Marcus jumped at it. Sam didn't speak to him for almost a month, but knowing his younger sibling was at least out of the line of fire was worth a few weeks of sulky silence.
It was a wild and savage year, with a perilously steep learning curve. Sam's school taught math, languages and science. At his older brother's stubborn insistence, Sam did well, studying and keeping his grades far above the average. Marcus's lessons, of another variety, were brutally pass/fail. Pass and live. Fail and die. Simple enough concept to grasp. Introduced to a myriad of weapons, he became proficient in both the how and when of their usage. The time came that he could field strip almost any gun of any caliber, blindfolded, in under a minute. It was his one percenter biker teachers that taught him how to hit what he aimed for every time, without fail, under any conditions. They taught him to shoot with either hand. He got stomped like a cockroach if they were dissatisfied with his progress. That kind of encouragement made him get good real fast. Any squeamishness about pulling the trigger on another human being also vanished under their icy tutelage. From a towering three hundred eighty pound sixfoot eight road warrior known only as "D" he learned to fashion a sling so his weapon could not be snatched from his hands. They schooled him on bladed weapons, too. After amassing a fairly impressive collection of scars, Marcus could soon handle a knife with the best of his instructors. Over time, word got around about the young blue-eyed gringo and the wealth of cutlery and firearms the boy carried about his person. As Marcus learned to handle himself hand to hand, with or without arms of one kind or another, he gained both reputation and respect.
He gained reputation in another area, also. His dark haired good looks and cobalt gaze drew women to him in a steady stream. Most of them were fascinated by this silent, dangerous man-child who seemed to know no boundaries. Marcus was fascinated by them in return. They enticed with a sensuous mix of previously unknown delights that bore no resemblance to the chaste kisses stolen from Sherri Carter a different lifetime ago. He cut a wide swath thru the females of his acquaintance, bedding them lustily while holding himself back mentally and emotionally. Though many tried, none managed to penetrate that barrier. None would until years later, upon his chance meeting with a certain downed resistance pilot.
Year 1997
Most of the work Marcus did was for his biker mentors, including border crossings. Sometimes, he brazenly gutted it out in broad daylight, getting whatever type of delivery he was charged with past some of the toughest, savviest, border guards in the world on the Gateway International Bridge. Other times, on moonless nights, he waded up to his chin, and sometimes underneath, in the chill, dark waters of the Rio Grande to avoid detection. On more than one occasion, thorns from the thick, bruising scrub tore strips of skin away as he sought refuge from the border cops. He celebrated his seventeenth birthday on his hands and knees, feverishly puking up everything just shy of his nuts after startling a venomous spider living in one of his hastily chosen hiding places. Not only did he have to dodge the border patrol, but murderous members of rival gangs, and territorial 'coyotes', pissed at his incursion, without permission, onto their turf. His refusal to pay what they determined to be their rightful tribute soon earned him a position of enmity with the people smugglers. And there was another enemy. One more potentially deadly than all of the others combined. His first solo run thru the Chihuahuan desert was nearly his last when he ran out of water. Only the sheer dumb luck of stumbling across a small spring saved his life. After that, he always made sure he had enough water to last even if he got into trouble. Armed to the teeth and growing more sage by the day, he took whatever steps were necessary to protect himself and not disappoint his sponsors. He was dead if he got caught. Sam too, so, he didn't fail.
He was mostly successful at avoiding any direct dealings with the various Mexican drug gangs. Sadistic and merciless the drug lords garnered a healthy dose of fear and respect from him. As he passed from seventeen to eighteen, Marcus dealt with the bloody cartel members only second or third hand, taking his orders instead from the tattooed, leather clad riders he hung around with. He preferred it that way and so gave the drug lords and their business as wide a berth as possible, especially the Asesinos de Bebés and their boss, Osvaldo Serrano. The teen decided it would probably be a good idea not to get on the bad side of someone who'd had his own cousin publicly beheaded as repayment for a suspected betrayal, then raped the widow in the limo on the drive home from the cemetery. Serrano's vengeance even extended to his late cousin's children, a boy and girl. Eight and nine respectively, the youngsters were sold to a ring that trafficked in child prostitutes. The kingpin of the AdeB's had a brother, Manuel, called Manny, who was allegedly some kind of techno wizard and was away at university. His older brother was inordinately proud of his studious and academically gifted sibling. He was slightly older than Marcus and the young Wright did not ever imagine his path crossing that of Manny Serrano's. Marcus was about to discover how much trouble he could get into by assuming.
Year 2019
The infant's cries pierced the blackness surrounding him, forcing Marcus Wright to halt his progress long enough to quiet the child. Shushing the baby into silence, he picked up his weapon and continued, making his way further into the viscera of the machines. John Connor's enraged growl played a constant note coming thru the earpiece in his left ear.
"Wright! You traitorous mongrel! When I finally get my hands on you, I'm going to rip you apart! If anything happens to my son, I'll tear that diseased brain right out of your head myself! Do you hear me? Wright? Wright? You hear me? I'll gut you? Wright? WRIGHT!"
Good, Marcus smiled, coldly satisfied. Connor's normal gruffness was filled with choler. The man sounded unhinged, off balance. Excellent, Wright considered. Just what we want. You go right ahead and scream your head off, Connor. Tell me all the nasty little things you're going to do to me to get your kid back! Keep it up! Bet you're sorry you woke Mad Marcus up now, huh? "What's the matter, Connor? Never saw this coming, did you? Did I forget to mention this part of the plan? Well, come and get me, O Great Savior of Humankind. Follow me right on in, just like last time! Only this time, things 'll turn out a little different won't they?"
"Hey Connor" he taunted, "I think this little mutt needs his nappie changed. He's pretty ripe! Better come and get me before the smell does! Damn, your kid stinks!"
"Wright! You son of a-!" What Marcus was a son of went unheeded by him, although he could probably take a pretty good guess. He tuned out his pursuer's wrathful tirade in order to concentrate on the path ahead. He had more than little baby Connor's frantic, furious father and the resistance to contend with. Somewhere within all the twisted wreckage of this metal and wire infested mess, T-6 and 800's also hunted him, and his frail, feebly keening cargo. He wasn't sure which Skynet wanted most, him, the baby or its preeminent enemy, John Connor. He grinned manically. Did supercomputers salivate? No. But right now Skynet was probably doing the machine equivalent. Whatever the case, he wasn't ready to be found just yet, by anyone, human or inhuman. Not yet, so, gotta keep moving. The little bundle in his arms became inconveniently noisy once more. This kid was becoming as much a blathering pain as his old man.
"Time to shut you up, Junior" he told the wailing kid. He did what he had to do and kept moving.
Year 1993
Taking a sip of water from his dwindling supply, Marcus rinsed and spat, clearing his mouth of the accumulating grit. He noted the sun's position. It looked to be getting on towards late afternoon. Outstanding. He'd get to trade brain boiling heat for freezing his balls off. Better than ending up with Blood Dog's size ten grinding them into paste, he decided. He felt around for the small but very important package he'd been entrusted with for this run. He brushed the 4" x 6" bundle with the fingertips of his right hand. He had no idea what it contained. Drugs or maybe stones, of the diamond kind. Maybe something else. Marcus didn't know and didn't want to. Blood Dog and the others, they never told him and he never asked. It was better that way. He never opened any of the shipments. If he didn't know what they contained, he couldn't be tempted to do something stupid, and in the process, be cutting his and Sammy's throats.
He waited a while longer. The sun was almost completely gone now, hues of bronze and deep russet mixed with charcoal gray coloring the wispy clouds. The rapidly cooling air stirred. A faint breeze would be his journey's companion tonight. Time to move. These goods, whatever they were, needed to reach their destination by nine tomorrow morning. Checking his environment as he emerged from his bivouac, he could see nothing around him but rock, sandy dirt and thick scrub. His ears caught the sound of rustling in the nearby brush as the desert's nocturnal hunters began their nightly rounds. He made it a point to head away from the sound. Whatever creature making it mostly likely used venom to immobilize its meal. Bon freakin' appetite, he told it silently, moving off. He remembered the phrase from one of Sam's school books, which he occasionally borrowed. He sometimes stole a moment or two in the church school's library. Just because he'd dropped out of school didn't mean he had to be ignorant. Abstractedly he hoped Carl and Val would've been at least a little comforted by that fact.
Experience and a smart choice of footwear gave him the ability to move noiselessly up the slight slope he needed to traverse and north in the direction of El Paso, his ultimate destination for this trip. Stopping only to slake his thirst from the small canteen he carried, he made good progress. He'd been traveling for two nights now, mostly resting and staying out of sight during the day. It was good the trip was nearing completion. A hot shower, a hot meal, a hot woman and some sleep. Knowing those things, in that order, waited for him in Texas prodded him on.
Marcus slowed, and then stopped after walking for a couple of hours. The unmistakable sounds of a man being beaten wafted over the short bluff he hurriedly took refuge behind. With the greatest of care, he very slowly poked his head over the edge, careful to make no movement which would give his presence away.
Kneeling, hands bound behind him, a young Hispanic man Marcus judged to be around his own age was surrounded by four men. Each of the luckless victim's tormentors took turns delivering blows or kicks, laughing as the splattering blood from the man's nose and mouth splashed their clothing, hands and boots.
They keep this up, Marcus thought, that dude ain't gonna last too much longer. He didn't recognize the recipient of the brutal beating, but the ones doing it, he knew who they were right enough. Pepe Aguilar and his brother Jose, and a couple of the mouth breathers they kept around to help with the grunt work. The Aguilar brothers were coyote's, among other things. Their main source of income was smuggling human contraband across the border for a price. Way too high a price if you asked him, the teenager snorted derisively. The Aguilar's, it was whispered, confiscated the panties of their female clients, informing them after escape was no longer possible, that the garments would be unnecessary. The women, especially the pretty ones, and probably some of the young girls too, and maybe even the boys, arrived to their destinations used up in every horrible way. If, that was, they arrived at all. Some did not survive the unforgiving savagery of the trip. The casualties, their corpses left to decompose or be otherwise disposed of by the dwellers of this terrain, served as sign posts to those who followed.
"Alto!" Pepe Aguilar yelled, grabbing the foot of one of his henchmen as the goon moved in for another kick to his target's face. Without regard to his "employee's" position, Aguilar shoved the thug backwards by the leg he gripped, grunting with crude laughter as the man landed too close to the camp's fire and had to roll away, slapping out flames from the blaze as his clothing caught.
"We're not trying to kill him, pendejo!" He hissed. Turning back to the groaning man on the ground, he knelt, seizing a fistful of the young man's black hair. "Well, hijo de puta, how much does your brother love you, eh? We're going to find out, ain't we? We're going to find out if he wants you back in one piece or if we send you back to him one piece at a time."
Better hope this brother of yours thinks you're worth the coin, amigo, Marcus thought, surveying the bloody, battered object of what was now, apparently a kidnapping. In any case, it wasn't his problem. He had business of his own to tend to. His payday, some nice warm poontang and a ribeye with a beer chaser beckoned. He'd maneuvered himself back from the edge and was about to leave the scene altogether when Jose Aguilar spoke up.
"What you want to do with him for now?" Jose questioned his brother. "We got to keep him somewhere while we deal with Osvaldo."
Osvaldo. The bleeder lying in the dirt at Pepe and Jose's feet had a brother named Osvaldo. Marcus froze. He only knew of one man with that first name. Only one with enough scratch to pay the kind of ransom the Aguilar's were likely to demand. That made the unfortunate man they'd captured and hogtied… the coyote's new chew toy had to be Osvaldo Serrano's pampered college boy brother Manny. But that didn't make any sense. The kid was supposed to be off cracking the books at some high end university in the States. So how'd he end up here, at the mercy of two of his brother's enemies, with his brains half bashed in?
Marcus found himself on the horns of an unexpected dilemma. On the one hand, his delivery absolutely had to be completed on time. He wasn't that far away. He could just back out of here and be on his way. It was the smart thing to do. On the other hand, here was a golden opportunity to do a little bit to the Aguilar brothers what they done to so many others, like the younger sister of one of his friends. Desperate for the opportunities she believed waited north of the border the girl had placed her fate in Pepe's hands. Her body had been discovered by U.S. Border patrol agents, so busted up internally from the abuse that she'd hemorrhaged to death. Out of his head with grief, Marcus's buddy had challenged the Aguilar's and, not too long after, disappeared without a trace. A measure of payback would feel real good.
He spent maybe a minute or two trying to talk himself out of the crazy scheme before deciding to go for it. Problem was he was way outnumbered, outmuscled and outgunned. Hidden in his clothing right now he had four guns and a couple of really nasty knives. Jose, Pepe and their hired muscle could still swat him like a bloated housefly without blinking. Taking them on in a straight up fight was so not going to happen. He'd have to think this one thru quickly. Then Pepe Aguilar solved part of the problem for him.
"We'll take him with us to El Paso. I know where we can keep him. Get him into the truck. We need to be going anyway. Rapidamente!" Pepe said to his waiting men, gesturing at the nearly unconscious Manuel Serrano.
El Paso. Yeah, baby, yeah. The sicko brothers were headed the same place he was. How perfect was that? It was like some kind of sign. He had to get down there unseen before they took off and left him.
Pepe, Jose and the two others, after dumping the younger Serrano in the back of their large SUV, moved to the other vehicle they had with them. Tonight's cargo was electronics, not humans. While the Aguilar's and their hired help were attending to the other truck, Marcus made his move, with his sphincter doing a belly crawl into his throat the entire time.
Finally, they were ready. "Vamanos!" Pepe yelled, climbing into the SUV's passenger seat. Jose was to be the driver. The caravan departed, unwittingly bearing an extra passenger along for more than just the ride.
Year 2019
Marcus arched backward, sucking in a sharp breath as the shot from the T-800's plasma rifle scorched his cheek, leaving an ugly streak. Close, way too close, that time. Withering fire from Marcus's specially (and personally) modified weapon brought the machine down, but it took an enormous effort before the thing's glowing red eyes faded to black. He gingerly poked the stinging burn, wincing in pain. The kid was bawling again. Being targeted by killer robots didn't seem to agree with the Connor scion. Imagine that. He quieted the boy again. How did women manage this whole nurturing every day without going nuts? Yeesh!
He chuckled soundlessly. "You think Skynet's pissed?" he asked the baby. He certainly hoped that was the case. El Machine Jefe was having a sucky night. Monitoring the action over his earpiece, he knew that team one's objective had been achieved. Under cover of the aerial grief visited upon it by the resistance bombers, the freq genies were able to slip past Skynet's defenses and breech the under defended vault. They had Skynet's dress over its head, its bloomers off and two fingers in. Hearing the news, Marcus felt a familiar tingle working up his spine. Even Skynet hadn't been able to eliminate that.
The supercomputer couldn't pin down John Connor, either, as the resistance chief desperately followed Marcus in pursuit of his helpless offspring. And the AI couldn't seem to lay a hyper-alloy glove on the ex-con turned prototype turned resistance fighter turned…what. Hmm. Marcus pondered for a second or two. What was he now? Kidnapper? Monster? Turncoat? All of the above as far as the murderously angry Connor was concerned. Sometimes you should let sleeping death row criminals lie, General. He thumbed the tiny transmit switch on the modified communicator in his ear.
"Hey daddy , think Skynet will go grease monkey on your brat right way or pop him into cold storage for a few years? Maybe it'll do both, huh? Get the computer chip in right away and then put the little rug rat on ice until its ready to start attaching parts. Don't you just hate brain teasers? Oops! My bad! Poor choice of words there!" he apologized mockingly.
"Wright! If any harm comes to my son…! You're a dead thing! You hear me! You think what we planned to do to you before was bad! This will be worse, much worse! I promise you that! I'll dismember you so slow you'll scream to be put out of your misery, you bastard!" John Connors raw fury seemed capable of finishing Marcus off all by itself.
"Blah, blah, blah" Marcus sneered, tuning Connor out once more. He braced against the steel polished wall with one hand and tucked the infant in closer to his body with the other as he heard a dull, sullen roar. Team one. That roar told him they had the chips in their possession and had blown the charges they'd brought with them. It was nearly time to wrap up his part in the festivities. But he had to admit, if only to himself, and way, way deep down inside, this was still the best ride in the park. Temporary though it was, it felt, as Alex Cordell would have put it, "better than much fine sex." Took your advice Serena. I remembered what I am. How do you like me now?
He straightened and turned, just in time to see a pair of HK-drones taking aim at him. Spinning around, he cradled the infant, protecting the little one from harm with his engineered body as he was knocked off his feet by the twin blasts. Hell, busted. Well, they hadn't expected to stay ahead of Skynet's programmed forces for too much longer any way.
"AAAAAUUUUGGGHHHH! He screamed in agony as the searing pain traveled across his back. He struggled to bring his own weapon to bear, but didn't quite succeed and another hit from one of the drones clipped his left arm. The AA-12 dropped from suddenly numbed fingers. Grunting with effort, he lunged for the weapon. Taking exquisite care, he kept himself between the boy and the machines. He scooped up the baby and, half ran, half crawled along the recessed lighted hallway, dodging more shots from the floating hunters. He only needed to keep Skynet's attention for a few more moments. Long enough for… His earpiece abruptly crackled to life, giving off five clicks. That was it, nothing more, but it was what he'd been waiting for. Those innocuous clicks meant team one was now on the way home. Just what he wanted to hear. Time to bring down the curtain on his little production and ditch this warped funhouse.
"Well, Junior, it's been real, but I think this is where we part company" he told his small charge. "Time for you to spread your wings and leave the nest." He placed the blanket wrapped baby in a corner and spun around, finally able to take out both his flying nemeses with his enhanced reflexes. Before he had chance to heave a sigh of relief, a pair of T-800's appeared in the wake of the H-K's bearing down on him with predatory speed. Two of them. Oh, no. One was hard enough to survive. I love you Blair, he thought, readying the AA-12, knowing it was a useless action.
The 8's were nearly on top of him when an RPG blast from behind the Terminators took off the head off of one. The metal skull separated completely from the body, whistling over Marcus's head to embed in the wall above him. The other 8 turned to meet the unexpected threat and was greeted by a brace of rocket propelled grenades, expertly placed by the arriving remaining members of team two, led by Billy Soames and Jacob Peterson. Smoking metal littered the corridor. Resistance fighters made sure the machines were out of commission with temple shots.
"Took your time" he growled with mock indignation at Soames.
"Up yours, Marcus. It was your idea to split up" Billy snapped back. "Let's make it look good. Really give Skynet a reason to chase me! Well, it worked genius. You got chased. Ya happy now? Get up and let's go, okay?" Soames extended a hand, straining, even with his own considerable heft, to pull Marcus's bulk off the cold floor. The former U.S. Marshal needed help from Steve Hamil, one of the other team two members.
"Gladly!" Marcus replied, issuing a shaking sigh of unadulterated relief.
"What about little Connor?" Billy asked, indicating the swaddled bundle in the corner. Shrill cries issued from within the blanket folds.
"Leave it" Marcus responded shortly. "We don't need it anymore. Let Skynet figure out what to make of it. Come on! I'm more than ready to see the last of this place." He touched a finger to the reddish black oozing plasma burn on his cheek, still tender but already beginning to heal. Team two headed for the extraction point, leaving mangled terminators and the wails of the defenseless infant echoing off the metal walls. As he ran, Wright flashed back to the planning session in the command bunker.
"Now let me give you the rest of it…." He was saying to John Connor. "You're right" he told Barnes. "No way Skynet is gonna buy that I'm gonna walk back in there begging for forgiveness, no matter how much I piss and moan about being crapped on by the resistance. And" he told Connor, " it's not gonna go for me being able to get past all the security you have around you so I can drag you back in with me. What it will buy is you following me in, like last time. It used me to lure you within reach once. Why not let it think it's going to work again?"
"I won't be there, remember" Connor countered.
"Skynet's going to think you are. And it's going to believe you want to flay my miserable hide down to the metal skeleton one millimeter of laboratory manufactured skin at a time."
"Why would it believe that?" John questioned.
"Because" Wright answered, a sliver of his mind remembering his first night among the resistance. The night John Connor had bloodlessly ordered him to be hunted down and eliminated. Marcus tried to feel guilty about enjoying what he was about to say, but couldn't quite get there.
"Because, I'll have your son" he told the Connors, crooked smile manifesting. He clinically relished the fusion bomb effect his words had on Connor and his flame haired wife.
Only the iron control John had spent his entire life developing kept him from pulling his ever present side arm and killing Marcus Wright where he stood. Kate, teeth bared and fists clinched, was halfway to Marcus before her husband managed to restrain her.
"You know, the both of you are way too easy" Marcus laughed, breaking into a feral grin. "Settle down. Your little bundle of joy is safe" he told the parents. "He's not joining the resistance just yet."
He explained. "Back when the earth was new, before running water and electricity, I was in high school for a couple of minutes. One of the more bizarre experiences of my all too brief academic career was a 'parenting class.' It was supposed to teach us what we had to look forward to if we didn't wear a rubber and knocked up the girlfriend. We had to pair up with a classmate and pretend to be parents. They even gave us a fake baby. Thing had a computer inside. Ask me if that doesn't feel weird now, under the circumstances. Anyway, it was programmed to cry and wet and generally be as much of a pain as a real kid."
He grinned at Star as he said this last. She'd somehow wormed her way into the tent and to his side. She stuck her tongue out at him. He winked at her. Star giggled silently.
"Came with a key we had to insert when it was feeding or changing time, or if the thing was just demanding attention. We had to take turns taking the little darling home every night. I hated that class. The other day, for some reason, one of your scavenging parties brought back a half dozen of the things they found in an underground warehouse somewhere. At the time, I figured it was one of the more asinine things I'd ever seen any of your people do." Marcus turned to look at Dave Shields, who'd been a member of the scavenging party in question.
"I owe you an apology" he said to Shields, "cause now I think one of the little plastic buggers is about to come in handy. Oh, and, uh, one more thing, Connor." He moved a little apart from Blair. She hadn't heard this yet. "I kind of need you to let Tim Hutchins out of the stockade"
"Hutchins is one of the two men who tried to kill you a few weeks ago. He fired that RPG!" Blair objected.
"Yes, baby, I know " Marcus soothed her. "But he also bears an uncanny resemblance to a certain General in the resistance. 'Specially with a cap pulled down far enough so Skynet can't face rec 'im. Kinda sounds a lot like you too" he finished up talking to John. "His get out of jail card isn't free. Let him earn it".
"He almost killed Star too, Marcus!" Blair continued.
"Do you think I've forgotten that?" Marcus asked. "If we're going to pull this off, we need him. After it's done, if he makes it back alive, Connor can ship him to the moon for all I care, but right now we need Skynet to think Connor's chasing me to get his kid back, and Hutchins is the best chance we have of doing that!"
He glanced down at the little girl. Star looked up, pressed her lips together and nodded firmly, just once. He looked back at Blair.
She subsided against their united front, still visibly upset at the thought of Marcus and Star's would be assassin walking free.
"What team's he on?" Barnes put in guardedly.
"Neither" Wright told him. "I'm mad, not stupid. He's all yours. You can keep an eye on him. Billy's already gonna have his hands full." He didn't mention Jake Peterson's name. He didn't have to. "And anyway, by now, Skynet knows where Connor goes you usually follow. Hutchins will be more believable as Connor if you're shadowing him. Make sure he sticks to the script, screams and yells his intention to rip out my machine innards at regular intervals. That shouldn't be too hard for you. Besides, Hutchins wants me dead, you want me dead. You have a lot in common. You were made for each other."
Barnes mouth twisted, preparing an angry retort.
"That's enough, Marcus" John Connor intervened, heading off the rancorous exchange they didn't have time for. Connor turned to Barnes.
"Get Hutchins. Make sure he understands the conditions of his parole" he ordered.
Barnes nodded and left.
"Barnes is a ranking officer, Wright. "Don't disrespect him again. Understood?" John Connors' hazel eyes were granite hard.
"Yeah, sure, I got it" Marcus replied easily. Sit, stay, he ordered his long dormant teenaged hellion self.
After dismissing the strike force, once they were alone, Connor had a blunt warning for Marcus. "Don't make me regret trusting you with this."
"Why would I do that?" Marcus asked, dripping innocence as he walked away.
Just before takeoff, he studied the face of Tim Hutchins as the man boarded the team one chopper behind Barnes. The bald hostility in Hutchins gaze might have shaken someone else. Marcus Wright didn't even blink. Later, Timmy, he thought. Right now, we have work to do.
"Peterson, down!" Marcus shouted , mind returning to the present. Diving forward, he knocked Jake Peterson to the ground. A searing bolt from the T-800 lining for the Colonel's head instead struck Wright's flesh encased right shoulder. Melting the skin away, the exposed metal gleamed.
"HIISSSSAAAAAAAAAUUUHHH!" Marcus exclaimed painfully, fingers tightening reflexively around the AA-12. Shunting the white hot pain aside, he sighted and fired on the advancing terminator in one smooth motion. The powerful automatic shotgun belched repeatedly, joined by fire from the rest of team two.
"Get away from me you damn machine!" Peterson shouted, shrugging his way out from under Marcus's weight with difficulty. Bringing the primed bazooka to his shoulder, he fired at the 8, bringing it down at last.
Marcus rolled away, gaining his feet just in time to be greeted by several H-K drones and yet another T-800. A shot from a drone dropped him to one knee. Off balance, he swung around to take the thing out. CLICK! What? Unbelievable! He'd neglected to count his shots! He hadn't done that since his first solo robbery at eighteen! Breathlessly he forced himself up, fumbling for his backup with desperate haste. The drones met their end at the hands of Steve Hamil's RPG specialists. Good thing, since Marcus had a far more pressing problem.
The 800 was running, moving with blinding speed. Part of Wright's mind found a split second to observe that it seemed to be ignoring all of the other resistance fighters, coming straight for him. He'd have taken the time to appreciate how well his plan to draw Skynet's attention was succeeding, if he wasn't about to have his artificially cultured skin turned label side out by the AI's highly efficient killer.
"Runnin' low!" Hamil yelled, frantically trying to zero in on the terminator before it could close the distance to Wright. With no more rockets to fire, he was down to his BAR. The resistance fighter had only partial success, knocking the thing's plasma rifle from its hands.
Too late! The monstrous unman was on Marcus in a single leap, its skin wrapped hydraulic powered fingers contacting around the ex con's throat in a death grip. With all of his own not inconsiderable strength, Marcus struggled to break the 800's hold. He felt his trachea begin to collapse under the enormous pressure, as blackness danced at the edges of his vision. Fighting for his life, he kneed the creature with all his remaining ability. It bucked and reared above him like a bull rider, its glowing eyes boring into him malevolently.
Marcus rumbled at his opponent, fury taking over. I…will… NOT…leave…Blair…like…this! I won't let you take me! A purely human determination that he would not be kept from her seemed to channel added strength. Somehow, in his oxygen depleted state, he still managed to raise both legs, wrapping them around the 800's torso in a bizarre imitation of a lover's embrace. Running out of time and air, he rolled, flipping the killer 'bot, reversing their positions. Now above it, he found it no easier to break the thing's grip on him. If he didn't do it within the next ten to fifteen seconds, he never would.
Thunder and lightning smote him, robbing him of sight and hearing. The T-800's grip was suddenly broken, its head tilted at an impossible angle. Firing point blank into the metal monster's temple, Billy Soames killed the crimson glow once and for all.
Gasping and gagging, Marcus sagged against the wall, shuddering. He eyed Soames, conveying with his look what he was yet unable to say aloud.
"You're welcome" Billy responded solemnly. Together with Steve Hamil , they again hoisted Marcus to his feet.
"Let's move" Wright instructed.
Jake Peterson brushed past him. "This is my squad, machine. I give the orders!" Peterson bulled ahead.
Marcus was too bruised and battered for Peterson's words or attitude to bother him. They had what they came for. Now he only wanted to get to the extraction point, hop in the chopper and go home. The wind down had always been the part of any job he'd hated the most.
Skynet's pursuit lightened as they neared the exit of the underground tunnel. The team encountered no more T6 or 800's and only one H-K.
"Maybe even Skynet's only got so much it can throw at us at one time", Hamil speculated aloud.
Still, it paid to keep on their toes. They weren't out of this yet. As he emerged from so long underground into the open, Marcus squinted, protecting his eyes from the brightness of mid-morning. The compound around him was a chaotic collage of death and destruction, most of it machine, but not all. Some of those still, broken forms were human. Whenever possible, the dead were gathered up for the return flight home. Not only would their loved ones appreciate the chance to say goodbye, but denying Skynet more subject matter was an important factor.
The punitive air assault which preceded the arrival of the resistance's ground forces was evident in the light opposition up top. Marcus could see the waiting helicopters a few hundred yards in the distance, blades whirling in expectation. Knowing Blair's welcome countenance was ahead gave him a fresh wind. He picked up the pace, but noticed an injured member of the group faltering. He doubled back, draped the man's arm around his neck and wrapped one of his arms around the other's waist. With his wounded teammate limping gamely, they struggled on.
The closer they got, the more uneasy Marcus grew. Always, in the past, the most dangerous part of any heist was at the end. "It's a lot trickier pulling out than slipping in" was Dale Carpenter's axiom. Wright had found that to be abundantly true. Usually with good reason. This time turned out to be no exception.
Fifty yards to go and he could make out Blair clearly now in the cockpit of the Blackhawk, monitoring the action. The attack ship's door gunner, covering their retreat, fired on anything moving that was not human. Suddenly the man opened up full blast, aiming immediately past the fast moving resistance fighters. Their sprint towards safety was halted briefly as more Terminators and H-K's appeared without notice. Two was pinned down under withering fire. Marcus needed both hands free and was forced to allow the man he'd been aiding to slip to the ground. He concentrated on the enemy above their heads, while those with the decreasing supply of RPG's looked to eliminating the Terminators. Skynet was a sore loser, but they already knew that.
Please Blair, Marcus begged in his mind, stay there. Don't try to come and get me. His hope was that she would be more protected by the armor plating of the gunship. With the workman like efficiency borne of experience, the AI's final gasp was slowly dispatched, albeit not without more human casualties. As their automated foes were done away with, team two began again to inch their way towards their ride home.
Bill Soames was first and started hauling the wounded aboard, prodigious strength allowing him to do so quickly. Jake Peterson and most of the remaining group was not far behind, with Marcus and his leg shot comrade bringing up the rear. Peterson hopped up and inside, soon joined by the rest.
That left only Marcus and Mike Evans, the injured man he was assisting. Screw it, Marcus thought, and slung the man over his shoulder. Evans wounds were severe enough, he made no sound in protest.
"Come on, Marcus! Let's go! Go, go, go, go! Come on!" Billy urged. What he saw appear behind Marcus lent urgency to his shouts. A T-800, massive mini-guns in hand, aiming directly for Marcus's unprotected back.
Fire from inside the 'copter slowed but did not stop the Terminator's advance.
"Colonel!" Soames shouted, "take that thing out!"
Jacob Peterson glared at his subordinate giving him orders. Readying one of the last remaining RPG's he raised the tube to fire. Then, a cruel slant to his mouth, he lowered the weapon.
"What are you doing? Fire! Kill it!" Billy yelled. He remembered his pre-mission conversation with Marcus. In a flash of horrified realization he realized this was Peterson's opportunity to kill Marcus and the man was taking it!
Marcus half twisted, saw the 8 and knew he was about to lose the race. He pulled Evans off his shoulder, cradled the now unconscious man in his arms and with a tremendous surge of effort, threw Evans the last ten feet. Startled team two members cleared the doorway, landing atop one another in a tangle of arms and legs as Wright's special delivery arrived. Medics dragged their patient back out of the fire zone and began treating his wounds.
Diving forward, Bill Soames grabbed for the RPG. Animal like snarls issued from Peterson as he tried to keep hold, but Soames elbowed his commander in the face savagely and wrenched the launcher from Jake's hands. Balancing on one knee, Marcus's erstwhile foster brother took aim at the T-800.
Billy and the Terminator fired at the same time, creating a cloud of death.
Jake Peterson broke free from the restraining hands and threw himself at Billy.
"Let that abomination die!" the Colonel screamed, clawing Soames mindlessly.
"Get him off of me!" Bill yelled.
Other hands grabbed Peterson, dragging him back and away from the lieutenant. Peterson, nearly incoherent, demanded to be freed, but Soames was not the only witness to Peterson's attempted murder by T-800. Any ambivalence over Marcus Wright's human or non status some of them might have could wait for another time. Right now, he was one of their fellow soldiers. They held on to Peterson tightly, eyeing him with anger and disgust.
Billy lost visual of Marcus thru the swirling smoke, flame and heat. He could not tell where Marcus was or if he lived. Behind him, Peterson spewed venom until someone grabbed a roll of bandages from the medics and fashioned a gag.
Soames threw down the useless launcher and was about to abandon the chopper to go aid Marcus, but before he could, Blair Williams devastated reaction told him what he needed to know.
"MARCUS!" Blair yelled. Ten feet from the helicopter's entrance, Marcus Wright laid sprawled, face down and unmoving.
Author's note: You know the drill. Constructive reviews are welcome. Flames need not apply. See ya next chapter. Thanks.