Corporal Derek Reese frowned and took his eyes from the rifle sight, long enough to glance at the watch on his wrist. A full two hours since the initial intruder alarm and his tangle with an infiltrating Skinjob, and almost an hour and a half spent dug-in outside the main pressure door which marked the only way to the power generators for Serenity Point. Despite reflexes honed through brutal training and brutal live-action, he would be amongst the first to admit that sitting and waiting for the enemy to come to him was an almost alien concept.
Sitting and waiting for over two hours for the enemy to come to him was beyond his understanding, and for the first time since he had felt Razak haul him out of the mud face-first, Derek felt nervousness begin to gnaw at the pit of his stomach.
"Twenty-three hundred hours check in - no enemy contact in front trenches," Came the report and the burst of static that forced the corporal to wince at his earpiece. Blowing out his breath with a puff of his cheeks he allowed his thoughts to drift to Allison - Ally - manning the infirmary and helping with the evacuation.
Even if moonshine and rations had conspired to muddle his brain slightly he knew he'd very much like to see her again. She was bubbly, beautiful and put him at ease in a way Derek thought no longer possible. Nerves shredded by sentient machines that could attack by land, sea and air did not make it easy to enjoy a good (military) meal or a quiet drink with a stunning woman.
He gave a silent thanks that whenever the machines struck Serenity Point, it would be through here and the Infirmary, shielded by its location in the rear, would be well placed until the evacuation was completed.
The shrill burst of static that indicated an opening channel pulled Derek's attention back to the present. He narrowed his eyes expecting another status report, instead hearing the loud thud-thud-thud of a pulse rifle firing on full automatic. Several moments of scratchy silence followed before the same thud-thud-thud was permeated by a scream of blind panic, and agony.
"How the fuck? How the fuck? Where's the alarms? The alarms! How the fuck did they get in?--"
Derek did not need any more information and was across to the nearest alarm box a short walk from his impromptu barricade. Plunging his fist against the wide pad, the corporal was rewarded by the wailing of the alert siren which still pulsed loudly even through his sealed helmet. Warning lights cast ruddy red glows through grilles and baffles against the corridor walls.
Setting off in a sprint with his weapon armed and ready, Derek suppressed the fear which rose inside the claustrophobic confines of the armour, which itself made it difficult to pass two-abreast in the corridors - not that he could see a single soul as he made his way through the maze which linked this section to the Front Trenches.
He frowned as he watched a group of six soldiers emerge from an intersection leading towards the Trenches and move away deeper into the complex at running pace. Pausing at the same junction he caught sight of a straggler making up ground and brought him to a halt with a hand on the shoulder. "What's going on?"
"Metal in the Infirmary," The older man snarled, gesturing with his weapon towards a generic corridor. "Motherfucking toasters flanked us - moving in through the Medical Wing."
Derek was already running before the other man had gotten as far as the insult - the pounding of his boots on the deck and the pounding of his heart in his chest merging into one powerful beat which urged him onwards, urged him forwards as quickly as he could move.
The chattering of pulse rifles discharging wildly mingled with the screams of dying men, and Derek came to miss the piercing wail of the alarm which for whatever reason, or malfunction, had stopped screaming minutes before. Absent-mindedly rubbing his gauntlets on his thigh as if it would somehow rub the sweat underneath his armour off, he stalked forwards purposefully.
A shadow following across the corner ahead of him brought the muzzle of his weapon up instantly and a finger lightly pressed against the trigger. Derek sighed in relief as the bedraggled, painfully thin arms of an old woman rose upwards as if to placate his aim as she shuffled into view. He opened his mouth but got no further than forming the words on his tongue when a young girl - barely five years old - fixed her blue eyes on him, from the comfort of her mother's chest as the pair sprinted past the old woman and screeched to a halt.
The corporal barely had the time to register the new arrival when more came into view - the young and the old, the sick and the lame and the panicked and calm. Families huddled together and those that had lost everything beginning to pack the corridor with their numbers, shouts rising from around the corner interrupted by the occasional thud-thud-thud of a weapon discharge.
Unable to see the armed soldier from their vantage point further back the throng began to push forwards against those at the front who were still unwilling to take a step towards the weapon readied, but not aimed in their direction.
"Move through!" Derek bellowed as he saw the crush that was in danger of forming, gesturing with a free hand and lowering his rifle to his side. As if the starter's gun had sounded the burgeoning crowd burst forwards, forcing him to fling himself against the wall to avoid being swept forward with the panic. The first few evacuees made a conscious effort to round him, but soon he was forced to grab the steam pipes running above his head to keep a stable footing.
The thud-thud-thud booming over the crowd did a fine job of motivating the chase and almost as quickly as they had appeared, Derek was left alone in a corridor littered with abandoned personal possessions, forgotten trinkets and the occasional teddy bear or stuffed animal that continued to offer a stitched smile.
The winding sections of corridor ahead were misleading - only the odd piece of clothing, or slipped shoe indicated anything was amiss and if Derek had not already seen the carnage for himself he might almost have thought this was a false alarm, not the life-or-death struggle of man against machine. The sound of gunfire grew louder and almost continuous but the screams and shouts died - the hum of the strip lighting overhead the only accompaniment to the death being dished out.
Derek's eyes did not catch the flash of silver until his fingers had squeezed around the trigger and unleashed a stream of cobalt pulses, which super-heated the air and filled the corridor with a tremendous roar that rolled against the walls and the target. The Terminator's endoskeleton glowed to a burning white for the briefest of seconds, before bending out of shape and ultimately spilling out of its structure like treacle from a pot's lip. The machine's silver skull lolled to the side in spasm, its sensitive innards turned to molten goo and dribbled to the floor so that Derek could see straight through the machine's chest.
Not satisfied Derek stepped forward and drove the butt of his rifle up under the Terminator's chin, causing the head to snap back and the machine to tip backwards and down to the floor with a clatter. Giving the twitching body a swift kick, the corporal glanced at the weapon magazine and rounded the corner a little too quickly, so that not even his fingers were fast enough to react to the hand which drove itself against his breastbone.
His lungs were emptied by a combination of the blow and the wall he was driven against, pain radiating through his arms and legs to fingertips and toes, as gravity pulled his heavy body to the floor with a thud. Derek forced his eyes open to watch his pulse rifle clatter to the ground from his numb hand, and the bare endoskeleton - with teeth twisted into a permanent, maniacal grin and burning red eyes - walk towards him as if it had all the time in the world to kill. Literally.
As a thick fog of confusion settling over his mind, the corporal absent-mindedly tried to focus on the corpses lining both sides of the corridor ahead, noting the dark green armour - torn in some places, shattered in others or simply missing - identified them as belonging to the service, and fellow soldiers. His vision threatened to blur totally and he could not see their faces, although most were obscured behind shattered helmet visors painted red from the inside.
"Fuck you …" He managed to choke out as the Terminator stooped to pick up his weapon. Derek gritted his teeth in sudden pain, as a blinding flash barely a foot away spilled tiny shards of burning metal against his flesh - motivating his heavy arms to brush the red-hot embers away. Peering through narrowed eyes, he saw that the Terminator now stood on a single leg - the other blown off below the knee and leaving only a blackened, twisted mess of burnt wiring and shredded actuators. Already stooped over to pick up his weapon the machine was unbalanced and crashed to the floor, even as Derek instinctively rolled to the side and grabbed the butt of the pulse rifle. A strong hand took a hold of the back of his neck - a vice-like grip from which there could be no escape and agony tore through him as pressure built on his vertebrae.
Multi-coloured spots began to swim across his vision as he felt his neck and head become numb. Desperately he pulled the weapon forward, feeling the tingling beginning to spread down his arms so that even with the rifle under his chest, the corporal struggled to lift it up from the ground. With a final grunt of effort Derek wheeled the muzzle over his own head and groped for the trigger, satisfied at the pain of the close-range blasts as they seared his armoured back.
An electronic two-tone chime sounded as he continued to push the trigger down, indicating an exhausted magazine. Strength spent he allowed the weapon to tumble free from his grip and was rewarded with his vision clearing, and his head drooping forwards to fall upon his arms spread out on the ground. He took several shuddering breaths.
"I thought I told you to man the power generator …" A weak voice rasped from amongst the corpses. Shaking his head as if to clear the confusion, Derek struggled to his knees, and then gingerly to his feet. Stumbling forwards as he examined each of the corpses and found no signs of life he was more than halfway towards the bulkhead when a cough pulled his attention back. Quietening his own breathing as best he could, Derek followed the wheezing and pulling at the clasps which secured a cracked helmet to the armour below.
"I thought I gave you an order Rookie," Razak repeated, his eyes glassy and unable to focus. He coughed loudly, a thin trickle of red leaking from the corner of his mouth. "Not that it matters I suppose … You can't ever predict them. Sly bastards …"
Derek fumbled for the medical kit still held in the hands of a corpse laying face-down beside the pair, before a weak gauntleted hand batted the box away. "They came in through Medical … Never saw that coming. We managed to hold them long enough. Stipe and the patients are gone. Everyone should be gone …"
He laid a hand on the young man's shoulder and nodded. "You need to lead them back to Serrano, Rookie. They're civilians, not soldiers … Not fighters. I even saw one girl with hair straighteners …"
A chuckle from the older man's lips quickly degenerated into body-racking coughs. "You've got to get out of here and back up the line before they end up walking straight to Skynet's gates. Civilians are stupid enough when they're not terrified …"
"I'm just a corporal," Derek replied with a mutter, shaking his head. Razak managed a second chuckle-turned-cough and gestured around the corridor.
"Take a look around you rookie," He said with sarcasm. "The entire command squad is dead - most of the grunts that are left with the civvies are the enlisted - knuckle draggers like yourself."
Razak reached a hand across his chest and groped for the rank insignia attached by Velcro to his shoulder armour. Tearing it free, the veteran offered his charge a weak smile and slapped the symbol haphazardly over the corporal's bare pad. "By the authority vested in me in times of war …"
His words descended into painful coughs and gasps for breath before a look of intense concentration hardened his features. "By the authority vested in me by the great John Connor and a bunch of articles of war nobody can remember, I award you a battlefield promotion to the rank of Captain with all the shit and stress therein.
"Congratulations sir," Razak added with a weak salute. His eyes followed the direction of Derek's to the bulkhead marked INFIRMARY and with a concerted grunt of effort he sat forward, placing both hands on the younger man's shoulders.
"They took her," He said with a sorrowful sigh. "She was doping up the Intensive Care patients - the ones who were too ill or too slow to move out with us when they broke straight through the wall, like it was made of paper and not steel. They didn't stop to take anyone else - they killed everyone they could find."
Derek nodded and with a glance at the twisted door made off to leave, the hands on his shoulders tightening his grip and keeping him still. "Don't be a fool, rookie. If they were still here do you think you'd have gotten anywhere near the door and only met two of the bastards for the price?
"I didn't give you this promotion so you could charge off through a hole in the wall and take on an invasion force. I didn't make you a Captain so you could secure a grander military funeral with whatever personnel affects you left in your locker at Serrano. You're going to lead the civvies back to base and then you're going to carry on doing what you do best - surviving."
Razak could see by the tightening of Derek's jaw and the narrowing of his pained eyes that the former corporal was only paying lip service to his words. Taking a hand from his shoulder the old man clamped it down on Derek's head and pushed it forwards so they were only a few inches apart nose-to-nose.
"Listen to me rookie," He whispered harshly. "If they've taken her then they haven't killed her. If they haven't killed her then that means she's still alive, and that means one day, maybe - just maybe - if you avoid any superhero last stands or martyrdom you might just live long enough to see her again. Hell you might be the one that rescues her …
"But that day isn't today. She'll be on a Hunter-Killer Transport, and those HKTs never operate alone. Dozens of the metal bastards, tanks, Skinjobs and a few artillery pieces against you and your trusty pulse rifle. Grant an old man his dying wish and follow your orders for once in your life.
"You will escort the civilians to Serrano Point," Razak repeats in as firm and formal a military tone as he can muster. "You will report to Major Reizeger for debriefing. You will complete your mission, do you get me, Captain?"
Derek studied the intensity in Razak's gaze which he knew only reflected the same level of commitment in his own eyes. The logic was clear - Allison was long gone; chained like an animal, herded aboard an armoured transport bristling with devastating weaponry and guarded by mobile, swift Hunter-Killers and an entire brigade of metal murderers on foot. All he could offer her now was his own death in her name.
He almost felt it would be worth it. He almost felt that the sacrifice would still mean something - anything, to someone.
But the words of his former superior officer rang true, and he could not help but be reminded that dozens of lives now hung perilously in the balance on the long, gruelling trek back to Serrano Point. Without his input, without his gun and his wits, they might never live to see the twin cooling towers of a nuclear home.
Derek could see that the trickle of blood from the older man's mouth had become a river, overflowing the lip and spilling down the chin. Razak grunted in pain, and shifted to his side as his eyelids began to grow heavy, and his eyes dilated and glassy. The strong grip of the fingers on Derek's shoulder lessened as the hand slid off and down to his side.
"What are you waiting for Captain?" Razak asked with a bare whisper, his chest labouring to rise with each passing second. "You have your orders. On the bounce …"
His eyes fluttered closed for a moment, which stretched to a second, and then a minute. They did not open again.
Derek climbed to his feet, taking Razak's rifle to replace his own. Sucking in a lungful of air and casting a final glance at the doorway which would remain closed to him, the Captain clenched his free hand together in a fist. He would see her again, one day. Until he knew otherwise and until he stared at her lifeless eyes and pale, clammy skin he would never stop believing she survived. Whatever it would take, for however long it would take - he would see her again.
He channelled his fury into a single kick at the remains of the silver skull of the Terminator he had dispatched earlier - tearing the lower jaw and not much else from the neck to clatter against the far wall and spin like a top.
He swore that every single one of their kind would pay for this moment of helplessness.
…
…
Derek's eyes snapped open, before his mind had even returned from the waking dream that had haunted him relentlessly whenever he slept. His fingers curled around the barrel of the shotgun held in his lap reflexively, the muzzle swinging upwards as he acted purely on an instinct honed from years of battle, his conscious mind still in the process of waking.
The walls of Serenity Point were no more - gone was the harsh white paint, bundles of piping and wiring held by gantries bolted to the steel beams supporting the ceiling and the hundred of tons of earth above. Instead wallpapered walls marked by a rail of polished oak ran around the room, dominated by a television as black as the night which twinkled through the single bay window and a wooden table topped with a number of empty beer bottles, flanked by a chair opposite the one he sat in.
His eyes travelled down to the floor, and the beautiful face which stared back up at him. "Ally?"
Cameron's HUD flashed constantly with circuit diagrams and system pathways being rerouted and tested for functionality, so that just to look up at the glassy stare of Derek Reese took a conscious effort and energy. As advanced a computer as she was, the Terminator still had a limit to the number of operations per second her Chip could perform and now that precious runtime was being consumed by self-repair and diagnostic systems.
Despite her best efforts there was no response from any of her actuators or motivators below the waist, limiting her to crawling forward with nothing more than her own arms.
Derek shook his head as if the overindulgence of alcohol and sorrow could be dismissed with a shake. His face twisted from passive to frown as he came to fully realise that the woman at his feet was both exactly who she appeared to be, and as alien to him as was possible. He cocked the shotgun and stooped down, pressing the double-barrel against Cameron's temple.
"I really thought I'd seen the last of you," He said with a hint of sadness quickly overridden by the temper beginning to build. "I thought you'd finally done something half-decent and given us the time we need to move on. John, Sarah and me - move somewhere else and start all this again."
He pushed the muzzle further against the skin, his teeth baring in a menacing scowl. "I suppose deep down I knew you'd be back. Metal always comes back unless you break it into tiny pieces or you burn it into nothing. Not like us, when we die, it's over.
"I want you to tell me something," he said after a moment's silence. "When did you first see my face?"
Cameron struggled to understand the question as even Derek's voice was scratchy, and faded. Her normally lightning-fast reaction times slowed to a virtual crawl and her "mind" almost entirely preoccupied on the mere task of remaining functional so that only a very small percentage of her intellect could be spared for a question and answer session.
"Escape and Evasion," Cameron replied in a tinny, echoing voice which was obviously mechanical in origin. "Sarah took you from prison … You almost died. You were a security risk …"
Her left eye winced in spasm, pushing her entire face left then right. "I told Sarah it was not the right thing to do. She said the wrong thing was sometimes the right thing to do. I did not understand …"
The Terminator pushed herself up slightly. "I understand now."
"You don't remember me in the future? Before you were reprogrammed?" Derek's tone was inquisitive but lost none of the anger as he pushed the host gun harder against Cameron's flesh so that circular depressions formed in the skin. "I swear I'll blow your fucking chip into orbit if you lie to me …"
Cameron's delicate balance was lost and the Terminator abruptly fell back to the floor, the fingers of her hand forming a fist and splaying outwards alternately. Still her gaze never left the man who stood poised to destroy her, in a moment of total weakness on her part. With some effort she directed enough of her runtime to form the words that were not only the truth, but the only way to avoid destruction.
"No."
For a moment this did not seem to be the only way to avoid destruction as Derek's finger began to press against the trigger, and his left hand came up to support the barrel as he steadied the gun's aim. Teeth gritted together, a mad dance seemed to play out in his eyes between what he wanted more than anything in the world, and what the world wanted more than anything from him.
With a loud snap he opened the shotgun's breech and emptied the shells out onto the floor. A look which summed up all of the utter contempt, hatred and fury he held for Skynet and its agents creasing his brow and setting his jaw, Derek dropped the impotent weapon to the ground and snatched the last bottle that contained a trace of liquid from the tabletop.
"Skynet got it wrong," He hissed bitterly, swigging the last of the fiery amber drink and relishing the burning sensation that washed down to his stomach. "You don't look anything like her."
…
…
Sarah's eyes flickered open expecting to squint against the bright sun but instead finding the curtains as dark as the twilight hour would expect. Rolling over to glance at the beside clock, she sighed, sweeping the crumpled sheets of paper that had slipped from her hands when she had slipped into dreams and dragging herself out of bed.
Tugging at the back of her jogging trousers that had settled awkwardly, yawning widely and rubbing at the sleep crusted between her eyelids Sarah plodded down the staircase with heavy feet, a hand pushing against the banister as she stopped sharply at the sight of John's uncle - and her long since lost love's brother - cradling a shotgun and a virtually unblinking stare which seemed to bore through the wall.
Sarah followed his eyes - dark bags underneath suggesting he'd slept even more poorly than her - and settled on the figure resting on the floor up against the wall. "Cameron?"
The lithe machine made no movements, and as the older woman stepped forward to see through the shadows falling across the Terminators face, she could see that the piercing blue eyes that so defined her deceivingly delicate features stared ahead blankly, without focus.
Climbing down to her knees as if investigating a hole in a door, Sarah shuffled forwards and examined the Terminator. Aside from the scuffing which marked her clothing, only a few scratches across a cheek and a temple gave any indication that the diminutive machine had been flung against reinforced concrete walls and back.
"Cameron?" She tried again, with more firmness in her voice.
The Terminator's head cocked jerkily to the left, eyes slowly tracking around until they met Sarah's gaze. Her mouth opened and closed, jaw lowering and raising as if a fish pulled from the water and left to gulp uselessly. From over her shoulder Sarah could hear Derek scoff and storm up and out of the room towards the kitchen, shotgun still held in a single hand as if he might have cause to use it at any moment.
Cameron could see a shape in front of her, from the size and colour she deduced it to be another person but the image was so pixilated, so disrupted and scrambled that the Terminator had no hope of identifying who it was except to deduce that she had spoken to Derek - or more accurately he had spoken to her at the end of a gun - and so she must be "home".
"Sarah …" She said finally, the syllables stretched unnaturally. "You shouldn't be here. It's not safe."
The raven-haired woman resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Where is safe?" She replied sarcastically, with the textbook response that declaring anything to be safe was a ridiculous concept, when on the run from time-travelling mechanical agents of a sentient super-computer. "We're moving out in a few hours, probably to the Lighthouse on the coast … How did you put Cromartie away?"
"He disabled me," Cameron replied awkwardly, her head jerking to the right. "I'm not designed to fight other machines."
Sarah frowned, pushing backwards to sit on the floor and brush a lock of hair behind her ear. She was never one to mince her words and the burning question she felt had to be asked demanded an answer. "Why didn't he kill you - take you down permanently?"
Cameron's eyes narrowed as her Chip completed a series of re-routes and restored some more detail to her vision - Sarah now recognisable as Sarah, though still grainy and choppy as if a computer screen watched from a recording. "His mission is to kill John - he knows he is stronger, bigger than me."
"He doesn't see you as a threat," Sarah added with a pursing of her lips. "Or at least not a big enough threat to do more than knock you down if you interfere."
A series of red lines drew themselves on her HUD, indicating circuit failures and broken pathways, and causing her head to crane upwards towards the ceiling before jutting downwards to stare towards the floor. "He knocks hard," She dead panned.
"You've looked better," Sarah admitted with a hint of cheekiness. "How long before you're fighting fit?"
As if to illustrate the answer, the image of Sarah disappeared to be replaced by numerous warning messages scrolling software codes that would take a mere human - even an experienced programmer - months to decipher. To Cameron the meaning was clear and in the impeccable logic of the machine, there was only one course of action to take, only one possible solution.
"I can't be fixed; I'm broken like the clock," She summarised, seeing the look of confusion at the oblique reference. "I broke the clock in the hall … I was trying to fix it. You always check it in the morning."
"John's pretty handy with a screwdriver," Sarah half-joked, half-reassured. From a purely logical point of view and from the point of the mission to keep her beloved son alive, the loss of Cameron would be devastating. For all her determination and cunning, and for all Derek's experience and grit they were still human - mortal and frail. Cameron could withstand devastating impacts and attacks and stride through the fire or dust they kicked up. Without her durability and toughness, the weight on the end of the single strand of fate that gave John a chance of growing up crept to breaking point.
But logic was the sole motivation of the machines, not humankind and Sarah relied on gut feeling as much as the bare facts. While her head maintained that Cameron's survival was vital for the mission, her gut generated a number of feelings all of which made her extremely uncomfortable. Her gut maintained that there was more to her survival than the mission alone - that as part of their "family" Cameron had endured the highs of simply surviving and the lows of losing the Turk. Quite apart from the fact that Cameron had directly and undeniably saved her life. She didn't like owing favours.
Sarah had watched a machine that had initially seemed no more "Human" than the T-101 of years now decades passed, experiment with slang, fashion and hobbies. More than once she had even almost forgotten that the Terminator was anything but a young, attractive girl with a bright future ahead.
Her gut went further, suggesting feelings that passed even beyond this. Sarah swiftly and brutally suppressed them.
"John might be able to help," She offered weakly, knowing full well that if Cameron felt she could contribute to protecting John, they would not be having this discussion. The Terminator allowed her head to rest against the wall and for the briefest moment the older woman would have sworn Cameron looked tired.
"Don't tell John I came home," She urged, lifting her head back up from the wall. "If he finds out I am broken he will try to fix me. He won't be able to and it will affect him. It is better if he thinks Cromartie killed me and I never came home."
Sarah opened her mouth to argue, to rebuke the Terminator and to stand and call her son down from his precious sleep with his tool kit in hand. The words were devastatingly true, and she knew her son's intense loyalty to those around him would drive him to try and repair the unrepairable and fix the impossibly broken. A vicious circle that would only hurt him, and by proxy the entire future of the Human Race.
She nodded slowly, hating the logic but accepting the truth. Tilting her head slightly she found the face of Derek staring back, weapon still in hand. His face an unreadable mask of pain, anger and other swirling emotions. Somehow Sarah knew there to be a story she had not read between them, and at the same time knew it would never be known.
"Take my Chip out," Cameron ordered, her eyes fixed on the double-barrel of the shotgun. "Quickly - before John wakes up. He will sleep in today because we don't have any Pop Tarts."
"He doesn't like chocolate," She clarified as Sarah climbed to her feet and moved over to the table and the tool kit, which was more often used for weapon maintenance than surgery. Roughly opening the case and almost unwilling to look at the blades, she snatched up a pointed knife and reluctantly returned to the floor in front of Cameron.
The Terminator nodded as best she could, her hands jerkily moving upwards to sweep her hair away from the thin covering of flesh that hid access to her CPU beneath. Sarah held the knife at the very end of the handle, blade tipped upwards as if the tool itself was somehow offensive. The older woman glanced up at Derek, a questioning look in her tired eyes.
"I can't," He said with a shake of his head. "Don't ask me to explain, Sarah … I can't cut her open."
Sighing and running a hand through his hair, he placed the shotgun on the tabletop and leaned against the counter, his eyes fixed on the weapon and nothing else. Shoulders slumping Derek snatched his coat from the hook opposite the door and pulled the thick jacket over his shoulders. "I'll start loading the truck."
With a click the door closed behind him and Sarah was left alone, blade in hand.
"Make an incision two inches above my right ear in line with my hairline," Cameron said helpfully. Sarah reluctantly leaned forward, cradling the Terminator's head carefully in her hands. The took a firm hold of the handle of the knife, the blade pointing downwards towards the dark brown curls and tangles which spilled over on to Cameron's shoulders. Her eyes moved away from aiming to the sheen of sweat that covered the machine's forehead and temples.
Almost subconsciously Sarah moved her left hand down slightly, her fingers pressing gently against Cameron's temple so she could feel the slickness of the perspiration. Her mind attempting to keep her on track and focused, marvelled at just how much trouble Skynet had gone in mimicking Humanity. Her gut refused to be ignored and desperately screamed that machines don't sweat.
Feeling her own eyes begin to sting with beads of sweat travelling down from her forehead, Sarah rubbed the base of her palm across her face and exhaled slowly as she brought the tip of the blade downwards, through Cameron's hair. Watching the contrast of pale flesh with sharp silver and feeling her resolve beginning to waiver, Sarah pushed the knife into the skin.
A sharp gasp from below and a slight jerk of the head saw Sarah pull the knife free and cast it to the floor as if the handle were molten and burning hot. Cupping Cameron's chin the older woman firmly so they both saw eye-to-eye. "You felt pain, didn't you?"
Cameron was at a loss to explain. The interface between her biological tissue and her cybernetic systems included a feedback sensor - not pain, but an appropriate way for her to be aware of damage to her flesh and act to stop it, or repair it. When her flesh had been cut by the blade the feedback sensor had worked as it was designed to do, but instead of merely alerting her, it replicated the pain of a wound like any man, woman or child on any of the Earth's continents might experience.
"I don't know …" She said finally. "It shouldn't work like that. I'm broken."
Sarah knew the moment she had cast the knife to the carpet that there would be no way to complete the grisly procedure, and that if Derek and herself could not do it then it would not be done. She did not trust anybody else bar John and it would be better for everyone concerned that he was not involved.
The thud of feet on the floor above broke her concentration.
"John is getting up early," Cameron observed. "Don't let him see me."
Sarah groaned, climbing up to her feet and taking a hurried glance around as if a trapdoor leading to a Terminator-sized holding cell might have been installed under her feet recently. Scratching her head and trying to ignore the padding of her son upstairs, she stooped down and hooked her arms underneath Cameron's legs at the knee, and around the back underneath her shoulders.
Her own legs threatened to buckle under the weight of the Terminator, as Sarah struggled to lift the unbelievably heavy weight that was somehow compressed to fit into Cameron's lithe frame. Taking one heavy step after another and narrowly missing the kitchen doorway with the head of the heavy girl, Sarah unsteadily made her slow way out of the house.
The short distance to the Garage seemed a marathon as she felt her hamstrings tremble and her forearms grow heavy and numb. Boasting a considerable amount of muscle and strength on her own athletic frame, Sarah nonetheless almost succeeded in dropping Cameron as she span to avoid a broken branch on the driveway.
Panting heavily, Sarah pushed open the Garage door and stumbled inside. Finding her knees unwilling to bend forwards, she nudged a mattress leaning up against the wall with her thigh and closed her eyes tightly at the thick cloud of choking dust that was kicked up as it tipped to the floor. In a soft fall rather than an any coordinated bend Sarah brought Cameron down to the mattress, rolling on to the floor to stare up at the timber roof beams and try to get her breath back.
Cameron cocked her head to the side to glance at Sarah. "I will wait here."
The older woman rolled her eyes and climbed back to her feet, stretching her legs and back to try and restore some feeling to the joints which had been pushed hard, carrying a girl that seemed to weigh as if she had been made out of metal. And was.
"Don't go anywhere," Sarah replied flippantly as she pulled the Garage door closed and quickly made her way back across the garden, into the kitchen and almost straight into her son. Still dressed in the same T-shirt from the night before and clutching an empty jar of peanut butter, he was locked in a life-or-death struggle to find enough on the end of the knife to spread on a piece of bread.
He glanced up, a faint smile on his lips. "Any sign of her?"
Sarah swiftly suppressed the urge to glance in any direction save the one in front, suddenly becoming keenly aware of how tired she looked and the sheen of sweat plastering her upper arms and face. She shook her head as casually as she could, crossing over to fill the kettle at the sink.
"Been in the Garage?" He asked, gesturing to the thick patterns of dust staining her clothes. He rolled up the bread and stuffed it into this mouth, turning to put the empty jar back in the fridge.
Using her motherly skills to her advantage to divert his attention, she snatched the jar out of his hand with a pointed glance and dropped it into the bin, shrugging her shoulders slightly. "Just checking through boxes - making sure we don't leave anything behind."
"There's still a lot of notes from the resistance," She added, instantly regretting the turn of phrase and hoping her explanation would be enough. "Derek's loading up the truck now - Get dressed and give him a hand."
John opened his mouth as if to argue despite it still being stuffed with peanut butter, before shrugging and wandering back through to the living room. Sarah followed closely behind, her eyes instantly fixing on the bloody knife abandoned on the carpet. Stretching a leg across she brought her foot down to cover the blade just as her son turned to face her. "She might still be alive …"
"I know," Sarah offered with a reassuring nod. Her senses prickled at the thought of such a bare-faced lie, told to the honest and slightly pained features of her son and she turned away - it was all she could do to keep her composure.