Title — Terminator: Prey Drive
Description — If you want Terminator FanFic, click here to read about what happens when survivors hiding in the northern wilderness are hunted by a new breed of machine.
Terminator: Prey Drive
Part 3: Inside the belly of the beast
By Dave Trifunov
Inside Skynet, a wireless transmission detailed possible human contact in sector NACA-5.22, what was once called northern Saskatchewan. A routine aerial drone had recorded what was believed to be human activity, and it sent a Mototerminator to investigate.
The machine sent images back to the drone of an animal, but also of a small gas tank before a fiery explosion ended communication. It wasn't uncommon for drones and machines to be destroyed in the field. Leaking gas lines, collapsing buildings, and sudden storms all played havoc with the machines used to hunt, kill and trap human survivors.
Once Skynet became self-aware, its mission had been to ensure its survival, and humans were the primary threat to that plan. To eliminate its No. 1 adversary, Skynet began designing and producing Terminators of all variation, many that would adapt to the environments where humans were hiding. Skynet anticipated a one percent survival rate one year after Judgement Day, or about 60 million people worldwide. In North America, that equated to about five million people from Panama to Alaska.
As soon as Judgement Day arrived, the machines began hacking into factory mainframes and networks, reprogramming the primitive robots that humans had developed to build better machines, so those machines could build bigger factories which would then, in turn, produce more deadly weapons and effective tools. Skynet didn't want human survivors to multiple.
It concluded it would require a vast network of surveillance to root out survivors that would invariably retreat below ground, into caves, underwater, or high into the mountains where it would be easy to watch for oncoming attacks. To achieve that goal, Skynet was experimenting with cybernetic organisms, or cyborgs, by placing living tissue over strong metal-alloy frames. But that wasn't the only strategy.
Human skin was problematic. The human face had too many details, and it was too expressive and open. Manufacturing eyes and giving the electronic assassins a voice that didn't sound ridiculous was nearly impossible for a machine.
Four-legged animals, however, were much easier. Humans were apprehensive of animals, too, especially those that could easily kill them. That's why Skynet decided on the T-C, Terminator Canis, and T-U, or Terminator Ursus. You didn't have to perfect the accent of a wolf howl or teach a bear slang. Humans kept their distance from these animals, meaning they didn't see the flaws Skynet would invariably include in the hair and eyes. Furthermore, the anatomy of a wolf was built to easily traverse forests, and bears were powerful enough to move boulders or trees that might act as barriers to human prey.
Granted, there were fewer animals after Judgement Day, but life on earth continued regardless, and Skynet needed a machine to gain access to wilderness enclosures, relay information should they find it, and kill if they had to.
So that's why, from a fledgling factory in San Francisco, did the first Terminator Wolf Pack appear. Had there been any humans around to witness it, they would've seen a dozen gray wolves, staring ahead and stiff, appear from the mist of the factory floor on conveyor belts transporting them to HK-Aerials. In packs of three, they would be dropped where Skynet had reason to believe humans were thriving in the wilderness: Alaska, northern Michigan, Washington State, and northern Alberta. From there they could migrate to where they were needed. No sleep and no food were required, and they moved quickly and effectively over broken highways, flooded riverbanks and eroding prairie.
That's why when the Mototerminator in Good Soil went dead, and the last reports were of a dog and possible humans inside a building, did Wolf Pack 2 in Alberta receive its orders. They were carried 10 miles outside the town by an HK-Aerial, emerged from the belly of the great flying beast, and began a slow but determined run to the location of the last recorded contact.