Disclaimer:

I do not own the terminator universe, this story is written purely for the enjoyment of me, the dog next door and whoever is mad enough to read this.

I hope you enjoy reading this just as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

Chapter 2

George sped trough the gathering gloom of the afternoon. Storm clouds where gathering in the distance. As he got closer to the city, he noticed that there was a lot of traffic coming from the city and hardly any going in. He decided to go directly to the nearest police station. In the distance he could see several black pillars of smoke rising to greet the dark storm clouds which where forming. He guessed that the terrorists had struck elsewhere as well. Indeed as he got to the police station all hell appeared to have broken loose. Officers with automatic rifles and riot gear where milling about. When he asked for directions and officer pointed him towards the desk. The desk sergeant was a big African American. "I want to report something!" Yelled George above the din "It might sound like I'm a crackpot but you've got to believe me." The sergeant laughed, it was tired kind of laugh. Then the sergeant said, "Man, right now it doesn't make any difference. It can't get any crazier than this." "What do you mean? What's been happening?" George asked. "Haven't you heard, where you been, in a hole in the ground? World War three has started! Half the cities in the United States are gone! Just to make things worse terrorists have hit nearly every petrol station, bridge, power plant and police station in the city they could. They failed here but it was a close one, we got the guy in the cooler now." George was stunned. This was a major assault! "Well maybe what I've got to tell won't sound so strange after all." George said. He told the sergeant what had happened at the plant. Before the sergeant could reply, thunder roared in the sky.

It started to rain, but this wasn't an ordinary rain storm. A lieutenant who had served in the army rightly guessed what it was. "Quickly, everybody get inside!" He yelled. "It's fallout, radioactive rain!" The station became crowded. The lieutenant walked up to the desk and told the sergeant to try and get through to the patrol cars. The sergeant held up his hands in an apology to George and turned to the radio set. The officers where told to use their loud speakers to warn people to get of the street and to stay indoors. The crowd inside the station gradually settled down as time went by. George realized that whatever was to be done had to wait. Suddenly an officer who had been watching outside said "Hey there are a couple of trucks pulling up outside, with some sort of machines in the back." Suddenly George went cold as his mind connected the trucks to the transports he had seen at the plant. He now knew what they where for and where they where meant to go. He realized that the machines had come to town.

Two cops had dragged Ibrahim down a flight of stairs pas an elevator through a dimly lit corridor and threw him into a cell, slamming it shut and leaving him cuffed. The two cops then sat down at a desk in the hallway leading to the cells, softly talking together. Lying on the cold ground in his cell he listened to sounds which seemed to come from the earth. He heard and felt several tremors as if large explosions shook the earth. At first he smiled, thinking these where the explosions his brethren had set of. But the rumbling seemed wrong, instead of short punctuated events the seemed to last a long time, as if they came from further away and where much heavier than they should be. He could also sense a change in mood in the station noises from upstairs became different, he could hear horrified hoarse shouts, curses and people sobbing. After he had scrambled up onto his feet and onto the cot that stood in the cell he noticed that sky had turned dark, lightning flashed in the ever darkening sky and thunder crackled in the distance. The gathering clouds sometimes reflected with bright flashes and he realized something far different than what he thought was going on. As a soft rain started to fall he sat down on his bunk and he reflected on what had happened.

His thoughts where interrupted by the sound of gunfire coming from above. And then several explosions reverberated through the building and people started screaming mixed with the rattling of automatic fire. The cops at the desk scrambled up the stairways. Two short bursts of machine gun fire reverberated through the cell block followed by the sound of bodies tumbling down the stairways. Smoke drifted down from above and filled the block with a thin smokey haze. The sounds from above seemed to last a long time. After a while the sounds became less intense the gunfire died down to be replaced by sobbing and moaning punctuated by short bursts of fire as if someone was shooting the wounded. Suddenly he could hear the elevator doors opening. A metallic rattling of treads on concrete came from the corridor. An unreasonable fear gripped Ibrahim heart. He couldn't think of what to do, was he going to be killed just the same as the unbelievers upstairs?

George struggled to get to a window. When he reached the window he saw that it where indeed the same machines he had seen at the plant. As he watched the trucks one turned its back to the police station and its loading ramp came down. The evil red eyes of the Johnny Five glinted as it began to move down the ramp. "What the hell is that?" The cop yelled out. George shouted "Run, get out of here they're here to kill us!' Wasting no time he turned and started to struggle to the rear of the station. The cop who stood at the door looked at him as if he was crazy, and started to open the door to challenge the machine as the Gatling guns opened up. They literally cut him in half as well as completely blasting the door open.

All of a sudden George found the going much faster as more people started to run for the back of the station. However, several cops pulled guns from their holsters and started to move to the windows. The Johnny Five reached the door and opened up on the people packed inside. Several cops started shooting at it but most where killed before they could really do any damage. George survived as through a miracle. A big policeman who had been standing next to him was hit several times and fell heavily to the ground. But instead of swinging through on its arc the guns which had been aiming in Georges direction swivelled away to shoot at some cops who where shooting at it with guns. At the back of the front office the glass doors which led deeper into the station where shattered. As the guns where swinging once more in his direction it's progress marked by screams and the sound of bullets hitting people and objects George dove through the opening into the relative safety of the corridor behind the doors.

Meanwhile several cops had managed to break out some shotguns and assault rifles. By hitting the machine from every side they managed to get a few good hits of and slow the robot down. One of them managed to sneak up beside the machine to shove a stun grenade between its body armour and neck. This stopped it cold; the cop however was shot by a second Johnny Five which tried to get into the station. The remnants of its comrade blocked the entry, limiting its field of fire and access into the station. This gave the impromptu defenders a moment's respite in which more people managed to get out and gave them a change to bring up more weapons. Unfortunately, the machines didn't give them much time. With a sudden crash, a missile blew in part of the wall next to the door. Another missile came through the windows to explode against the far wall stunning the defenders. Two of the machines rolled trough the hole in wall. After that it was all over for the defenders in a heartbeat and a sigh.

George in the meantime had made his way deeper into the station. He met several police officers running to the sound of the battle going on in the front. They where so focused on the sounds of the gun battle that nobody challenged him as he fled. Problem was; he didn't know where he was going. Turning another corner he stopped dead in his tracks. A Johnny five was standing further down the hallway. Fortunately its back was turned to him. The body of a cop was lying in front of him. As George watched he saw that the cop wasn't dead. His left hand was scrabbling at his holster. His right arm was outstretched and obviously injured. With a quick wave George caught his attention. Motioning him to be still, George looked around. He spotted an emergency axe in the corridor he was in. Quickly he took it from its hold. Cautiously he snuck up behind the robot. It was only a few yards but they where the longest he had ever walked. Remembering where he had struck the one at the factory he hit it with a ferocious blow, sparks flew up from the machine and its head lolled to a side.

George went to check the police officer lying on the ground. The officer had been wearing a flack jacket which had saved his live. Two bullets had hit his right arm but through a miracle, it hadn't been broken. The officer was winded but with Georges help managed to get upright. As they limped away the cop started talking. "Who are they, where did they come from?" The cop asked. "I don't know who they are or rather who controls them; I do know where they come from." As they lurched through the hallways George told him about his earlier misadventures. Together they finally managed to stagger out the back of the station. None of the machines where visible here and slowly they made their way across the parking lot to the officers patrol car.

As Ibrahim lay there shivering with fear the treads stopped. Ibrahim could feel a malevolent presence in the corridor. Apparently it was blocked by the thick doorframe which held the heavy door to the cellblock in place. Piercing suddenly through the smoke a beam of red light quickly scanned the cells. A drunk left to sober up in another cell got to his feet, mumbling a drunken exclamation. As the light beam quickly passed over the drunks body, he stumbled backwards. A red dot rested of the mans forehead for a blink of an eye and then a burst of gun fire killed the drunk.

Ibrahim quickly scrambled to a corner where he hoped he wouldn't be spotted, clumsily pulling the thin matrass over him. The light beam continued its search. Quickly it found the other inmates in the cells and shot them. There was no hiding from the relentless light. Only Ibrahim hidden by the angle the wall made with the door seemed to be safe. After the other inmates had been killed, the light tried to reach the corner where Ibrahim was hiding. The sound of servo motors and treads on concrete sounded as something tried to negate the angle, it knew Ibrahim was there! Finally settling on an optimum angle its guns started rattling away. Armoured piercing rounds ripped through the cell block damaging and even destroying some of the bars. In fear Ibrahim cried out and cowered away in his corner, dying for Allah was one thing, getting shot at by a mysterious something he couldn't see spooked him badly. He whimpered and finally fainted as a ricochet slammed into the matrass and hit the wall next to his head. At that the guns stopped, the light briefly returned to scan the remainder of the cells and then winked out. Apparently satisfied the Johnny Five who had been shooting turned on its tracks and headed for the elevator.

George and the cop meanwhile had made it to the car. Quickly they got in. The cop started the engine just as a J5 appeared from the police stations garage. The cop gunned the engine and they sped away as the rear of the car was peppered with shots. The J5 didn't have enough speed to track the car so it didn't pursue them. Now that they where away from the station the cop decided to see if he could get anyone on his CB. Several officers on patrol responded. Quickly the cop told them what was happening. They didn't believe him until another cop reported seeing a J5 standing on a main street. Despite warnings he approached the machine. His report was cut short by a burst of machinegun fire. An ominous hissing of static was all that they could raise on that channel after that, now everyone was willing to listen.

Slowly more reports on the movements of the machines started coming in. It appeared the J5's where trying to isolate the city and the separate city blocks by guarding the main city exits and the major crossroads. The police stations that had escaped the terrorist attacks had also been attacked in force. The National Guard depot was being guarded by several J5's as well. They had also been seen near the one remaining power plant that had escaped the initial assaults. As if on cue, the last remaining lights went dead. The cops decided to use their loudspeakers to alert the public of the machines and meet at the home of one of the senior members. George and the cop, who introduced himself as Sam made their way to the meeting point straight away so they could get their story straight. Several cops from Sam's precinct where patrolling the streets so there were no reasons for them to help warn the public.

As they drove up to the house where the meeting was going to take place they saw several patrol cars standing out front and a few officers brandishing shotguns on guard. Sam pulled over at the house and as they got out George noticed a vehicle trundling into the street. George recognized it with alarm. It was one of the modified factory transport carrying a number of J5's. George shouted a warning to the cops on guard; startled they turned to the vehicle. Fortunately one of them understood its significance and started shooting at it. As they where shooting at the cabin nothing much happened, as the controls where to well protected. George yelled at Sam to start shooting at the tires. As Sam did so the other cops followed suit. Suddenly one of the big tires gave way and deflated just as the vehicle was turning. The momentum combined with the flat tilted the truck over. For a moment it teetered at a maximum angle then with a loud crash it fell over. The five J5's it was carrying smashed onto the street. It seemed obvious they weren't going to move anymore.

Carefully the cops advanced on the wreck. All of a sudden one of the J5's became active again, struggling to bring its guns to bear on the cops it managed to get one gun aimed in their general direction. Its first blast cut down two cops but the others dove for cover keeping the casualties down to those two. George looked the situation over. He motioned to one of the cops to circle round while the others kept shooting at the machine. The machine was trying to upright itself, pushing its gun mounts into the paving and its treads spinning madly trying to gain enough purchase to upright itself. As the cop had circled around the machine he started shooting the machine, to no avail. George realized that he was the only one who knew the weak spot of the J5. Drawing the cop's attention he mimicked a headshot. Cautiously the cop approached the downed and still struggling machine. He got as close as he could and fired his shotgun into the space between the back of the machines head and its neck. With a final quiver the machine ceased moving, and the light faded out of its eyes.

The cop who had destroyed the machine moved to the other machines and repeated the killing shot. Cautiously the other cops got to there feet and approached the wreckage. Stunned they looked at the evidence of the killing machines. George in the meantime clambered onto the wreck of the transport drawn by a strange sound. It sounded like an old fashioned modem or the loading of a program via an audio tape. As he peered into the smashed cabin he saw several lights winking on and off on something that looked like radio transmitter. Realizing that the machine had probably sent a status report to its controller he motioned for one of the cops to hand him over a shotgun. When he got the gun he quickly shot the equipment he saw to bits.

The cops looked surprised at his actions. He got down from the machine wreck and explained what he had seen. "It was transmitting, it wasn't just a fluke it turning up here. It was looking for us whoever controls them must have monitored our radio traffic and send them to kill us. I think it's save to assume their controller now realize they have failed and will be sending backup." One of the cops spoke up; "We killed these fuckers, we can handle whatever the send." George thought for a second and then spoke quickly; "Yes we can destroy them, but we need to organize ourselves. You saw how tough they where head on. We got lucky and we can't expect ourselves to be lucky all the time. We need better weapons than what we've got and a place to stay so we can take care of our wounded and recuperate."

Several people had come out of their homes to look at the disturbance. The others now realized that George was right. They went to the house where they had meant to meet. Gathering the people who where already there they moved the meeting to a mall half a block away. Before they left, they spray painted "mall" and "danger" on the wall so that the other cops had a chance of finding them and warning them that it wasn't save at the house. When they got to the mall they found that several people had already gathered there. They had been caught by the fallout and on the direction of an officer had took shelter in the mall. With the arrival of the other officers they realized it was only one of the problems. Here they did a quick head count. There where about two dozen cops there, some with their family and in the mall there where another fifty people. The cops decided to hold a small meeting first in which they would make a plan on how to deal with the situation.

A police lieutenant named Jack Patrovski who had been out on patrol took charge. They discussed what had happened and George and Sam explained what had happened at the station. Then George told them about his flight from the factory. The others had grown increasingly silent as Sam and George told their stories, finally Jack asked George how many machines he had seen at the factory. George thought for a moment, he could remember seeing at least ten fully loaded transporters he assumed that each transports carried at least 6 J5's. Next to those there had been several moving around the factory and some just coming of the main assembly line. He hadn't seen how many J5's where on the reconstituted line but he judged that there would be several more there because that line had obviously been adopted to make them. All in all George figured that there where probably somewhere near a hundred J5's around.

Ibrahim was having a bad day. He woke up with a terrible headache and a feeling like he was being suffocated. He tried to get the blanket of him. Only it wasn't a blanket it was a matrass, a thin, cheap, filthy flea ridden prison style matrass. What in the name of the prophet was happening? Then it all came back to him, the botched attack on the station, his arrest, and the horrible events in the cell. He panicked. He started struggling with the matrass, then with a sharp metallic clang one of the broken bars slipped onto the ground. It wasn't a loud sound but it froze him up. The fear had an even greater grip on him now but it also forced him to think. Making a sound was bad; it might cause whatever was out there to come back. And he definitely did not want to see that red light again, searching for the next victim. To whit; him. Slowly he managed to calm down, the fear was still there but since there hadn't been an immediate reaction he figured whatever had done the shooting wasn't.

Carefully he untangled himself from the matrass and debris, freezing up every time he made or heard a sound. After a few awkward moments he got up. Getting up involved stiffly hanging on to the cell bars that where still in place as his legs where completely numb from lack of blood circulation. As he stood up he looked around him, he could see several bodies of inmates mutilated by blasts of heavy machine guns. An eerie light with a second hand quality to it came into the cells from a small window, which looked out onto the opening of the underground parking space. A broken light hung from a now loose cord from the ceiling, swingling gently in a cold draft. The walls where pockmarked and scarred form where bullets had hit and ricocheted of them. The bars that had made up his cell door lay in a broken jumble on the ground.

As the feeling tingling returned to his legs he made his way to the cell door, still holding onto the remaining bars. With exaggerated care he stepped over the rubble in the cell opening, ready to jump back to the safety of his corner. He kept his ears open for any sounds hearing nothing he stealthily crept forward to the exit of the cells. Very slowly he took a look around the corner of the exit. There was nothing there. Feeling a little relieved he stepped into the corridor a walked pas the elevators. All the sounds from upstairs had stopped; it was now eerily silent in the station. As he made his way to the stairwell he stumbled over the body of a dead cop, his service gun still held in a death grip. Ibrahim stooped over the body and pried the pistol from the bodies stiff fingers. Swiftly he pocketed the gun and the spare ammo from the body. Despite realizing that the gun wouldn't make much of a difference against whatever had killed the cop it made him feel a lot better. He climbed the stairs cautiously when he came to the top he found several bodies of policemen laying in the broken down doorway. The doorway where he now stood opened up onto the back of a hallway. Looking out through the broken doorway he saw more figures laying still on the floor of the hall.

All the doors opening up to the hall had been left open or had been blasted open by gunfire. The walls where streaked with ricochet marks and impact marks from bullets. Several of the bodies had been clearly shot up at close range. Ibrahim shuddered as he remembered the sounds he had heard before. Obviously someone had executed the wounded up close with a heavy machine gun. Ibrahim walked down the corridor, carefully checking every door as he passed them by. At the end of the hall he came to the partition between the entrance of the station and the hallway he was in. The bodies where packed much closer here and he saw what looked like tread marks on the corpses, as if several tracked vehicles had moved over the bodies.

As he stared into the entrance hall he saw more bodies by the red glow of the smouldering remains of the front desk, making the scene even more hellish. A sickening smell of roasted flesh greeted him, and he saw a skeletal hand with the flesh burned off sticking out of the smouldering piles of rubble. As he looked around he saw amidst the dead a shotgun lying on the floor partially covered with bodies. Some sort of machine, which reminded him of a bomb disposal robot only a bit more elaborate, stood motionless at the entrance to the station. The machine was partially concealed by debris hanging from the ceiling.

Carefully he bent over to retrieve the gun, thinking that he needed all the firepower he could get. He grunted as he pulled the weapon from underneath the bodies. As he grunted he immediately heard the sound of electro motors activating. Looking into the direction of the sound, he stared at the machine he had thought was a bomb disposal robot. A red laser light flickered into life on the machine and he could now clearly see two Gatling guns quickly following the laser beam. Just as the machine started to fire he scrambled out of the way. Bullets screamed overhead as he desperately clawed his way over the pile of dead bodies, dragging the shotgun with him. He quickly got to his feet in the relative safety of the corridor. Quickly he checked the shotgun and found that there where still several rounds in the gun. He heard the sound of the treads on the floor. Turning back to the entrance hall he quickly squeeze of a shot at the machine. He saw sparks where the shots hit it but it didn't even slow it down. Realizing this was futile he fled into one of the offices and hid behind a collapsed desk and filling cabinet.

It took the machine a few seconds to negotiate the bodies and debris but soon he heard the treads in the hall. As it came to each office it scanned them which its laser. It passed Ibrahim hiding place without spotting him. Ibrahim got up hoping to flee the building via the now deserted entranceway. The machine however had stopped in the corridor and hearing the slight noise of Ibrahims sneakers as he stealthily tried to make his way out of the office it started to turn. Desperately Ibrahim worked the pump action of the shotgun. It seemed as if everything had slowed down. The machine hit the side of the wall in its turn and its upper torso couldn't make the turn without the undercarriage moving. Ibrahim jammed the gun into the rear side of the machines neck and pulled the trigger. The gun leaped into his hands with such a force he thought he'd break them. Tiny metal fragments scraped his hands but the head of the machine tilted to the side and the evil looking red eyes turned dim. Ibrahim looked around if there where anymore of the machines but none where apparent. He leaned against a wall a left a long sigh, his hands where shaking and his legs felt as if they where made out of Jell-O. That had been close, to close.

When he had steadied himself a bit he inspected the machine. The blast from the shotgun had torn a flexible pipe made out of metal rings, presumably holding the power supply and connectors to its sensors. Most of the pipe was protected by armour but there was a small opening to allow movement. The machine which stood slightly higher than an average man, was armoured all round. Only at joints between, for lack of a better word, its limbs could any wiring been seen. And even those had a metallic tube around them to protect them from damage. The metal of the machine was shiny but from the faint scratches on it, which where the only signs of damage done by the gunfire from the policemen, it must be made out of an extremely tough alloy. On the front of the machine he saw the letters T-100.00345 and underneath that "CYBERDINE SYSTEMS INC." Ibrahim wondered if there where more machines around, he supposed so. Even this machine no matter how tough it was couldn't have done all the damage he saw.

At that moment he heard a loud crash from the rear of the building followed by the sound of treads on stone. Wasting no more time he ran for the main hall pausing only a moment to check if he could find anything useful he pulled the gun belt from a corpse. As he did so he noticed a unopened box of shotguns shell, probably brought along by one of the dead cops as extra ammo for his mates. Pocketing these as well he moved up to the damaged entrance. Willing himself to ignore the sounds coming from behind, it wouldn't do to panic and run into the sights of another machine, he checked the street. The front of the building had an ornamental set of double stairs; one side had been converted into a ramp for disabled people. With grim amusement Ibrahim realized that the invalid access had also given access to the machines. He saw several dead bodies in the street and a machine standing guard at the crossroads. It didn't appear to be looking in his direction so he carefully slipped down the stairs. Silently he disappeared into the gathering gloom of the night.