NOTES: This is the sequel to my previous story "Only Lonely". I'd recommended reading that one first. This story takes place during "Strange Things Happen at the One Two Point".
SUMMARY: The truth of John and Cameron's relationship spreads to those willing to go to any lengths to undermine it.
DISCLAIMER: All characters herein are the property of someone other than me. No profit has been earned.
"Fuzzy Dice"
Chapter 9
T.R. Samuels
The hollow echo of the gunshot boomed outward through the house, the sulphur and potassium flash like a bolt of summer thunder or the crack of a whip, tearing through Cameron's flesh and John Connor's soul. As he stared down the barrel of the smoking gun time slowed down to an agonising crawl, the bullet a singularity that altered space and time, tearing into her stomach and shattering his existence as the world he had created was torn apart.
"Cam?! CAM?!" He wrapped his arms around her as she stumbled back, lifting her hand from her abdomen, the palm bloodied and red, her face rigid with catatonic terror. John fumbled to hold her as his hands began to shake, panic dying to a harried despair as he felt the life he and Cameron had created slipping away.
When she spoke her voice was a petrified whisper, fear gripping her soul in jagged talons.
"John…"
From the centre of the room smoke plumed from the barrel of Jesse's gun, her damaged leg bandaged in an impromptu tunicate soaked with dry blood. Her mouth was a sickening sneer, watching with vile satisfaction as Cameron stumbled backward into John.
"Bye-bye, baby."
Somewhere deep down, at the bottom of his soul, the last fibres of John's humanity snapped. The world around him opened up so that nothing felt real, everything happening far away, fear and morality melting in an instant as the jagged eyes of an inhuman monster snapped open in the depths of his mind.
He shoved Cameron aside and lunged at Jesse, flinging himself in a suicidal charge. He crashed into her full force, lifting her off her feet, kicking over furniture as he went before smashing her body into the bookshelf. A stray shot from the gun fired wide from the impact, obliterating the shade of a ceramic lamp as the two combatants collapsed into a heap of splintered timber and torn books.
"RUN!!"
Cameron stood motionless, too stunned to move, rooted in the doorway like a statue.
Jesse clawed at John's face as they struggled for the gun, its barrel waving in all directions.
"Cam, get out!! NOW!!"
A second gunshot rung out, turning the pillow of the couch into a plume of feathers and snapping Cameron from her trance.
Her processes unlocked for the fraction of a second long enough for her quantum network to act, raw facts and statistics crunched in an instant to the inevitable calculation. Every protocol and programming commanded her to intercede, fling herself into the centre of the fray and bear the contents of an entire magazine to protect John Connor, her existence meaningless and a cheep expense.
Her eyes met his for the briefest instant; a spark of clarity exploding in her mind before Cameron turned and bolted out the door, slamming it behind her and leaving John to his fate.
Jesse wailed as he drove his fist into her wounded leg, smacking him across the face and drawing blood from his stitching as they wrestled across to the rug, the fight a vicious and undignified mêlée fuelled by the furnace of mutual hate.
The gun clattered away across the timber floor, chemical explosions giving way to wet and blunt impacts, the combatants drooling saliva and blood as John punched harder and faster and gained the upper hand.
Glass shattered, furniture broke, turning the living room into a war zone before Jesse suddenly struggled out of his grip, John's hand slipping from her arm through bloodied palms and she scrambled away across the floor.
Grasping her hands around the gun, Jesse swung around and levelled it at his head as he loomed over her with the heavy iron stoker from the fireplace, ready to swing it with all his strength and bury it into her head.
"DROP IT!!"
John froze mid swing, fury boiling as he breathed hard and deep, eyes feral as Jesse scuffled to her feet.
"Drop it now!"
His eyes blazed into her, wild with murderous intent before the ersatz weapon fell from his fingers and clattered nosily on the floor.
"I'm going kill you! I'm going fucking kill you, you bitch!"
Jesse huffed past bloodied teeth. "Shame you didn't show that kind of passion when it mattered," She spat cherry saliva on the floor in disgust. "I should've known the only way you'd show any feeling is when one of your precious machines was broken, you bastard traitor!"
She marched forward and shoved him in the shoulder, the cold barrel of the berretta looming in his face as she pushed him backward to the centre of the room, driving a boot into his calf and putting down on his knees.
John grimaced as the muscle tore and she forced his hands on his head.
"You're from the future."
"Good call." She threw over her shoulder as she strode to the window by the front door, clicking on the lock. "Listen up metal! If you want Connor to live you better come in with your hands above your head! You've got two minutes!"
"She's not coming in."
"She will if she wants you alive. She has to. It's what they're programmed to do." The words tore angrily from her mouth as she moved back toward him. "I guess you find it difficult to remember what they are."
John stared up at her in exasperation, serenity tinting his eyes, settling his weight against his ankles like a condemned man waiting for execution; a morbid smile forming across his face in the cold and frivolous certainty of a man with nothing left to lose.
"Is this the way it's always going to be? Just you verses the world and the machine? When are you going to get with the program, Jesse?"
The angry retort died on her tongue, impotent as his words swept over her with dizzying effect, feeling like the cartoon coyote after the ground had disappeared beneath its feet. Cold sunk through her as she stared at him through widening eyes, the paranoid feeling growing inside her of trickery and deception she had only felt once before; the last time she had dealings with Connor.
"How do you know my name?"
She was rattled and he knew how and why, the digital recorder sliding in the pocket beneath his coat. "It doesn't matter… I know."
"What do you think you know?"
"I know you and Derek were together in the future. Probably are now," He leaned back she began to squirm, weight shifting on uneven legs as she held him at gunpoint. "I know I sent your battalion on a suicide mission, got all your buddies killed and you were the only one to come back."
"Shut up! Don't talk about them! You never get to say that!"
Tears welled up, hands shaking as her finger tightened over the trigger, an evil bullet lodged in its dark nest.
"I get it, you're angry. You want revenge. I understand that. But you have to understand something too… it had to be done."
The thought of Cameron bleeding outside put John into a crazy mood, wanting nothing more than to get this over with as a calm and confidence welled from an untapped resource that dwelt deep within, the words of General Connor flowing effortlessly out of his mouth.
"The HELL it did!!" She wailed, voice cracking in sadness before she shoved the gun right in his face. "We fought for you! Did anything you asked! Then you sent us all out to die just to hide your little secret!"
As much as he hated and despised, as much as he wanted to kill her, the burden of guilt and responsibility encumbered the better angels of his nature. The cross he seemed destined to bear. What seed of compassion and accountability he could still feel sprouted up through the hate like an unwanted weed; thorny and hard to eradicate.
"I won't defend myself over something I haven't yet done, and I wont speak for future-me," He spoke firmly but from the heart. "I know he had his reasons."
"Bastard! What reason is there to kill innocent people?!"
"I don't know!" His voice broke as he thought of Cameron's stomach. "You tell me!"
"She's NOT a person and neither was that thing inside her!" All her bile erupted out, a sum of the rage a hate, screaming at him in a death knell. "It's sick and it's perverted! It can't be allowed to exist!"
John didn't reply, struggling with a growing madness that threatened to derail him, robbing the air from his lungs.
He was going to kill this bitch. He was never more certain of anything. Get her so mad she couldn't think straight. Get the gun away from her somehow and move in for the kill; wrap his hands around her neck and choke the life from her. A paternal vengeance justifiable on any moral scales.
"Look at yourself! JUST LOOK!" She shoved the gun against his temple, grabbing by the collar and yanking him to his feet, thrusting him before the patio door where his ghostly reflection staring back at him in the glass. "What happened to you?! You even care more about them than yourself! How could you, of all people?!"
The response cut off in John's throat as he caught sight of something in the reflection, past his shoulder and out onto the driveway, salvation less than a minute away.
"Yeah that's right, Jesse. I'm the traitor," A grin formed behind his broken lips as he turned around to face her. "I love the machines. I can't get enough of them." The words dripped sarcasm as he twisted the knife, keeping her focussed on nothing but him. "And Cameron? I can't get enough of her. She's all I think about, day and night."
Jesse's eyes blazed into him, eyes flinty and unyielding, the thing before her less than human.
"I'll bet…"
"I used to wonder why kissing Riley was so dull and boring. It was because she wasn't enough for me." He talked straight over her, rolling with it, all the forbidden things that had dwelt inside him liberating off his tongue in blessed release.
"I needed a real woman, one that can handle a 12-gauge, not some little girl that freaks out over everything." The expression on her face was priceless, making him laugh. "The first time I kissed Cameron was like getting struck by lightening, I thought she was going to blow my head off!"
Jesse clicked back the hammer on her gun. "There's more ways than one to blow a man's head off."
"You're not kidding, how could I forget about the sex?!" He laughed openly in her face, buying every last grain of sand for his hourglass. "You can't begin to imagine what it's like with a terminator unless you actually try it!" He exhaled a whistle. "I mean… between you and me… she can do things that'd make Clinton blush!"
Jesse glared through his levity, rage finally coming to boil, his voice an intolerable water torture that she could no longer abide, and still he kept nailing the coffin.
"Fantastic sex! Apocalyptic sex!" He leaned forward, right in her space, the look on his face more genuine than ever. "Truth be told… I'm gonna make a hundred babies with her!"
"I SAID SHUT THE FU…!"
The front door of the house burst open in shotgun blast of shredded timber, the handle blown clear out as Derek and Sarah stormed into the living room, the latter wielding a carbonized 12-gauge that had blown the door from its frame, dangling limply on the remnants of a twisted hinge.
Sarah jacked another round into the angry weapon, the empty shell casing springing free as Jesse swung behind John, using him as human shield as she thrust her gun under his chin.
"It's over Jess!" Derek stepped forward, hand raised in diplomacy as Sarah glared down her sights, just waiting for a single mistake. "Put it down!"
Jesse's eyes flitted between them, glistening pools filled with treachery and disbelief.
"Derek…" Her voice was small as she peaked out past her hostage, rigid in her arms as the barrel burnt against his skin.
"I mean it Jess! Drop the gun!"
"What are you doing?!"
The look on Derek's face was the wide-eyed dismay of a man caught with another woman; guilt and desperation mollifying any attempt at smooth resistance as he tried to defuse the situation like a nuclear bomb.
"What I should have done from the start." He stepped toward her. "I'm sorry Jess, but you're not thinking straight."
She thrust her gun hard into John. "One more step and I'll blow his head off!"
"Hurt my boy, and it'll be the last thing you ever do!"
Derek darted a look at Sarah, raising his hand in a futile effort to block her shot. "No one's killing anybody!"
"Stay back! I'll kill him! I swear to God!"
Dread gripped Derek's heart like a crippling vice, feeling it all teeter at the edge, squeezing the life from him as he felt Jesse slipping from his grasp, the woman to his right a vengeful angel that at any second would cast him aside.
"Jess…" His voice was a gravely murmur, lungs failing him as he pleaded her with his eyes. "If you kill him… then we're dead. We are ALL dead!"
The desperate soldier renewed her hold around John, anger deepening as she came to terms with Derek's betrayal, struggling to close her heart against him and embrace the bitter truth of reality. But somewhere beneath the wrath the vestigial ounce of decency that still remained gnawed at her and dared to hope.
"We're all dead anyway, Derek." She nodded toward Sarah. "And I don't think she'll just let me walk away."
Sarah inched forward before Derek stepped past her. "We can go away."
Her brow scrunched as John swallowed his fear, frozen in place as Derek took his life in his hands.
"We can go far away from here… start a life somewhere else. We don't ever have to look back."
The moment he said it, Jesse felt the ambers of flickering hope, a way out that she had always wanted.
"Jess… baby… I love you," His voice broke as he lay down the last card he had. "If you do this, I'm gonna lose you!"
Hope sprung inside her into a life sustaining blaze, smiling at him as she began to cry, her head nodding of its own accord. She thought of taking Derek away, to the mountains or some distant shore, white sand in all directions and water as clear as glass. Somewhere far away that had no memory.
Her hand loosened around John and she lowered the gun, moving from behind him with every intension in her soul to take Derek in her arms and never let go.
"I love…"
The deafening roar of a gunshot tore through the air, lifting the hair around John Connor's ear before it hit Jesse square in the head.
The gun fell from her hand and clattered on the floor, her body collapsing with in an undignified heap, sprawling onto the floor right behind it before ushering in a deafening silence.
Sarah stood stunned, the shotgun drooping in her arms as the smoking barrel of Derek's berretta lowered downward to his side, his eyes dazzled ovals that stayed rigid and glazed as he turned away and staggered off toward the kitchen.
Sarah hurried to John, wrapping her arms around him and kissing his cheek, crushing her son against her as the terror drained from her soul.
For a while John stood motionless, arms lying limp at his sides as he tried to comprehend what had happened.
"John!" His mother called, taking his face in her hands and staring into his eyes. "John! Can you hear me?!"
He stared back like a man with concussion, dizzy and confused, the world around him a distant echo that without warning suddenly snapped back into focus.
"Cameron!" He pulled out of her grip and rushed to the door, bursting outside onto the front porch where his lover sat silently on the step.
John felt his world fall down, her solitary form a devastating portent for the worst of all his nightmares.
He stepped toward her slowly, hands shaking as his eyes brimmed with the imminent torrent of immeasurable grief.
"Cam…?"
She didn't respond and his fear grew as he carefully moved around in front of her, treating her like a motion sensor as he descended the steps as though they were a minefield.
As he looked into her eyes there was a flicker of recognition, her blank expression turning to him and confirming the hateful inevitable.
"It's alright, John. It's alright," She reached up to stroke his cheek and John died inside, his whole world ripped apart in matter of minutes.
"The bullet impacted against my second abdominal plate, lodging two-point-one centimetres from my perimetrium."
He sat stupefied before her, shaking his head with incomprehension, at the ragged edge of bursting into tears until, like the rising sun, Cameron's face spread wide with her perfect smile.
"The baby's going to be fine."
In the breadth of a single second John's soul burst from the depths of despair and out into the stratosphere, choking him up as a crippling relief spread through him. His knees buckled and he fell forward into her embrace, pushing her backward on the floor of the porch where his awkward frame gathered next to her, arms clinging desperately as he clenched his teeth.
"I'm sorry I seemed preoccupied. I had to manually divert cellular regeneration to…"
She was silenced by his mouth, kissing her in a long and drawn out caress that infused her with every grain of love and adoration he had, weakening her with its intensity before it descended into fleeting pecks that he dappled all over her face, cradling her belly with the palm of his hand like the most fragile and precious artefact man had ever known to exist.
"I failed you," She suddenly spoke, sounding meek and despondent as she struggled up to her feet. "I'm sorry, John."
He held onto her tightly, forcing her back down next to him on the step. "What are you talking about?"
"She could have killed you and I left you behind. I shouldn't have done that."
John shook his head, cheeks lined with tears. "You did the right thing," He took her hands in his own and brought them to his mouth, kissing each knuckle individually. "You were protecting something much more important."
"I can't protect you anymore. Not like this."
Cameron looked ready to tear herself apart, turmoil and ambivalence pulling her in every direction as tears began to roll down her cheeks, her face a contrasting mask as she frowned in thrifty confusion.
"I'm alright. Everything's alright and we're alive. That's all that matters."
"But it's my mission to protect you!" She closed her eyes and shook her head, wrestling with a thousand conflicts. "I abandoned you! I left you behind!"
John got down on his knees, moving in front of her to take her face in his hands as she struggled for simulated breath, looking as though she were in the midst of a panic attack.
He'd never seen her so upset.
"You did the right thing, Cam." He reassured. "It's what parent's do. They put themselves and each other aside for their children." He smiled into her as she stared back, body calming in his strong and confident embrace. "What you did was normal. It was natural.
"You're more human than you think."
The conflict inside her began to lessen and ease, reassured by John's certainty as she shut down the programs that had crashed, emotion and programming like oil and water.
After a few minutes she began to process normally again, holding off more conflicts with the certainty and unquestionable truth that John was always right about such things. His heart was big enough for the world and all that dwelt within, but when the time had come to use it, he'd given it to her.
A proud smile began curling her lips, remembering how he had dived into danger.
"You're more terminator than you think."
John threaded his arms around her and lifted them both to their feet, smiling and kissing her before he whispered close to her ear.
"I told you I'd protect you."
####
The dying rays of amber sunlight arced low across the Los Angeles skyline, the golden disc of the setting sun dipping slowly over the horizon as the day embraced twilight. The air was filled with the sweet smell of summer; freshly mowed lawns and the distant hint of barbecue, the cavernous echo of the city as its lights began flickering on and the sound of children playing.
If this wasn't heaven, Derek didn't know what was.
The weary soldier sat on the back steps of the patio, gazing out across the garden and the azure vista beyond, his expression one of serene meditation as he pondered life, the cosmos, and the meaning of existence, pausing only to lift his beer. The frothy beverage bubbled as he took a long and leisurely swig, the amber liquid cool and crisp as it washed the craggy dust from his throat.
"She had this thing about sunshine," He muttered as the shroud of a feminine shadow looming next to him. "I guess because she missed it so much."
Sarah Connor sunk down beside him on the step, sharing the view as they spent several moments in companionable silence.
"Are you okay?"
His mouth curled in a sad smile before he shook his head. "Not really."
Silence began again as she struggled for the right words, not certain how to describe it. She had never released just how ruthless he could be, the cool precision of it echoing the stark indignation of a protective father.
She was never more surprised when he had called her outside the Alistair Grand, confessing everything she already knew before meeting her a few blocks away; pledging his loyalty again before she'd almost broken his nose.
"Derek… what you did… well it was unbelievable."
Shame sprung inside him, feeling the weight of his brother's ghost looking down on him. "I know. I'm sorry. I should never have hit John. It was unacceptable."
"Yes, it was." Sarah's anger simmered but there was something else there too, a grudging sense of leniency that tempered what once burnt as fury. "But I was talking about how you killed your girlfriend."
The beer lowered from Derek's mouth before it reached it, caught flat footed as the memory jolted through his brain.
"Right…"
"She was backing down, y'know." She turned her head toward him. "You could have been happy."
"No we wouldn't," He placed the bottle down between his feet on the lower step. "I knew her too well… she'd never have let it go."
His mind filled with memories of the good old days; him and Jesse out under the stars, playing catch with his brother, a hundred other things that would never come again. Not in this life anyway.
"Did you love her?"
He wrapped his hands around his frayed nerves, fortified by the beer, turning to face John's mother, his brother's lover, the guardian of the future whose wrath he had incurred.
"I loved a Jesse… once… a long time ago. She was different then." He felt microscopic under her silent judgment
"Yes… I loved her."
Putting his heart on his sleeve felt like a stroll into no-man's-land, just waiting for his head to be blown off or to trigger a mine. The cruel fact of emotion being just that, you could have your heart torn out a thousand times and still carry on, but every time you did you lost something, a piece of your soul you could never go back for.
"I'll never be his father, but I promise," He looked straight in her eyes, the emerald orbs looking right down into him. "I'll never let anything ever happen to John… no matter the cost."
Sarah stared at him for a long and pensive moment, deciding his fate from the topmost step like an emperor of a coliseum or dour-faced burgomeister.
"You need to go," She finally decreed. "Away from here. Away from John. At least for a while."
He nodded, feeling like he'd gotten off lightly. "I know."
"John will forgive you."
He couldn't suppress a gloomy smile. "I've still got to deal with Cameron. If she wants me dead, I'm dead."
"Machines don't do revenge… maybe that makes them a little better than us." Sarah surprised herself, smiling at the feeling that came with it, the words of a techno-sympathizer so alien as they rolled off her tongue. "Does it make me a traitor for saying that? Or even thinking it?"
The question was rhetorical, but Derek felt compelled to dig deeper. "No." He glanced upward to the window of John's bedroom as shadows moved about. "Perhaps we're as bad as each other for different reasons."
Following his gaze Sarah tried to rid herself of the mind-bending implications of her son and the machine, the two probably cavorting already.
"I still can't believe they're having a baby. They're just kids and it feels… weird."
As she spoke, something equally strange happened in Derek, a clarity of perception that defied his character and beliefs, paving the way for him to be aberrantly profound.
"Maybe it's for the best," He paused with incidental effect. "Maybe this way… man and machine can find a way to forgive one another."
She was surprised, daring to press. "For what?"
Derek stared at her long and hard, the unthinkable words almost dying before he finally delved deep and breathed them out.
"Being alive."
Whatever she thought he would have said, she wasn't quiet ready for that, flabbergasting her for well over a minute as the archetype that defined Derek Reese received brisk field promotion.
"You…" She got to her feet, looking down at him in startled revelation as a smile graced her lips. "Are not what I thought you were, Derek Reese."
He got up as well, standing before her and looking down, feeling as embarrassed as content. "Is that good or bad?"
"It's good," She smirked up at him before saying what she needed to say. "Thank you for coming back."
Emerald eyes mirrored back in one another in an infinite regress, forbidden fire burning in both, feeling the hand of fate wrap around them before Derek, feeling bold and nervous, leaned in and kissed her, pressing his mouth to hers and pulling her to him in a firm embrace.
Sarah went rigid in his powerful hands, his mouth and audacity stunning her silent before her brain finally caught on, realising what was happening with a livid flash of anger before promptly shutting down. Desire took over and she melted against him, crossing her arms behind his head as she surrendered to his touch.
When they broke apart Derek felt ecstatic, blown away by her touch before his eyes fell upon her furious gaze.
In a lightening strike, Sarah slapped him across the face, the nerves of his cheek exploding in searing pain.
That's it. I'm a dead man.
Sarah looked like she had just shot a dog, shaking with adrenaline and something else, colour bursting out in her cheeks as her whole body burnt bright red and turned her legs to jelly.
She hadn't been kissed like that since…
"You need to go."
Derek nodded vehemently, never more surprised or terrified.
"Goodnight."
Without another word he made tracks down the steps, leaving Sarah with her hand over her mouth, heart thumping as though it would leap out of her chest, watching as Derek jumped into the truck and pulled away into the night.
Dazed and confused, Sarah stumbled into the house, propping the small of her back against the dull rim of the kitchen worktop, her hand staying glued to her mouth. She almost jumped out of her skin when John appeared in the doorway.
"Hey," He greeted lightly, heading straight for the refrigerator. "Derek gone?"
"Nothing!" The word was out of her mouth before she could stop it, her voice a strangled squawk, kicking herself as she heard the way it sounded.
John glanced at her sideways as he carried a handful of yoghurts and placed them on the table. "Oh…kay."
"Who are all those for?" She nodded toward the assortment of dairy products, deftly changing the subject.
"Cameron likes them. We're pretty sure she needs to eat now," His cheeks began colouring. "Since she's… y'know."
He would be the future leader of humanity and the nemesis of Skynet, but still John Connor cringed at the thought of talking about sex when she was around.
Sarah pursed her lips, biting her cheek as she listened to his discomfort, his last word delivered in an inaudible whisper and she felt the jovial lure of spontaneous mischief.
"So…" She looked him squarely in the eye, crossing her arms over her chest. "A hundred babies, huh?"
John's face fell and he fumbled for words, his eyes broadening in the dazed expression of a startled deer. She'd heard that?! His cheeks burning red as his mouth opened and closed in mute interjection.
"Well… I had to say that to… to keep her distracted…"
She gave him a sceptical look, eyebrows lifting up her forehead.
"Mom… seriously!"
"Don't worry… we'll have a long and uncomfortable talk about it in the morning with Cameron right beside you," She assured, the promise a dark omen of things to come. "Specifically about condoms, stupidity, and pre-natal responsibilities."
John felt a shiver of dread sink through him, the thought of sitting between Sarah and Cameron as they discussed his sex life imbuing him with the enthusiasm of a man refusing Mike Tyson an overdraft.
"Umm… see you in the morning then." Without another word he collected the yoghurts and was on his way.
"Hey!"
John turned around in the doorway and she smiled at him, walking forward to rest her hands on his shoulders.
"You're going to be a great dad," She promised, brushing his cheek with the back of her fingers. "Just like your father would have been."
John's face split into a relieved and prideful grin, arms circling her in an awkward hug, her confidence and acceptance all the assurance he would need on the rocky road ahead.
To be concluded…
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