I know I took forever. There is no excuse, please don't hurt me...

"I love you guys," (smiles sheepishly.)

Tiny disclaimer, obviously some of the dialogue is direct from the show. I had to weave in those scenes. So they don't belong to me and are property of Warner Bros. and FOX (Who still sucks for ending such a cool and promising show and keeping that junk, Dollhouse) Sorry still a bit bitter.

Enjoy

"I killed a bird."

John's reunion with Riley had not gone well and it had been even more awkward to talk to her in light of his new relationship with Cameron. "Not the one in the chimney." John still managed to shake his head and find humor in Cam's to the point answers.

Cameron resumed pushing needle nose pliers into her wrist. "I thought you should know."

"The bird did that?" It turned his stomach to see her cut herself open like this and the nonchalant way she was examining it made him aware that Cameron was once again being unresponsive to him.

"No, I did that." she said. "Look," she pointed at the servo. "The bird experienced an involuntary movement of my fingers. It was fragile." His reaction was not unpleasant and had she breathed she would have in relief.

He pulled up a chair and shinned a light. "Wiggle your fingers," John commanded. Two of the metal rods looked twisted but it was impossible to be sure since it was covered with the synthetic goop that doubled for her blood. "Yeah, there's damage but its buried pretty deep in there."

"I don't know how it happened." She was talking about the bird and her look was imploring. She wanted and needed for him to see that she was trying not to kill. She was better than this.

"It was probably during a fight." He said making her feel a little better without meaning to. He tilted his head to better look. "You're not designed to fight other machines." He took a stronger flashlight and shinned it on her shredded wrist. "Maybe I can swap this out but it's not like you have a bunch of spare parts lying around."

She looked away guiltily and then moved away from the bench and to the corner where there was several boxes piled upon each other. She moved them and beneath a tarp a much heavier box remained. She opened the flaps and sat back down knowing she was about to be yelled at.

His eyes roamed over the various collected pistons and pieces in the box. "You're supposed to burn the endos." He accused her as he held the evidence of her direct disobedience.

"Not all of them," she replied and it almost looked like she was challenging him. She wanted a reaction from him and she hit the one button that seemed to piss him off the best.

"Who said?"

"You." Came the monotone response.

"Future me?" he asked and angrily dumped the parts back in their box. He held back the desire to kick it.

"Future you." …'direct orders passed down by Kyle. Just one of the many things I haven't told you yet. You keep things from everybody but me. I can't help that.'

"Why doesn't that surprise me." he said sourly but secretly glad that at least Future him was more insightful on how to treat Cameron. 'He's preparing me early…bastard.'

"I have damage to my hand and now you are able to fix it." She said motioning to her hand. John took a skeptical step forward pulling the box of parts closer to them. He removed a few things and she flexed her hands. He pulled a metal shard that had twisted and added a newer smaller pin to her wrist joint.

She closed her hand curling her fingers around his, one by one and he smiled tightly at her, "Future John has better information than you do." He closed her skin carefully and she handed him gauze. He wrapped it around her arm a few times. He looked at it critically but was ultimately pleased with his work.

It struck him as ironic that he worried more about the one that couldn't die. The white bandage was a blemish on her skin and his face showed it. "How long?"

"I will heal in approximately thirty hours." She lowered the arm warmer and between the two of them they put away the parts just as Sarah was approaching the shed.

Cameron spent the rest of the day cataloguing the contents of the shed under the watchful eye of his mother. The older woman's distrustful nature eventually grew bored and left her alone. Cameron traced her cut over the bandage wondering at John's mercurial moods. She should have been used to them but even with her parameters unbound it was hard to catalogue the sheer weight of what he had to deal with.

She returned to the house determined to be of assistance and keep his stress to a minimum. She had done this role often and though this John was not as receptive or greedy as the other she knew, he was easier to handle than older John. He wasn't set in his ways, yet.

Cameron went as far as the kitchen before she was immediately told to take Riley and hide her. Someone was at the door, someone unexpected. She moved in front of Sarah and John but Sarah actually gripped her shoulder hard. "Get her out of here. I'll take care of it."

Cameron's face must have showed its skepticism because she looked to John. He nodded slightly and she dragged the blonde out. "Where are you …tak…taking me?" Riley stuttered.

Cameron pushed her into the shed and closed the door. Her face pressed against the window scanning the vehicle in their driveway. If there was a problem John would alert her. Once she was satisfied that they were concealed and in no immediate danger she turned on the frightened girl. "What am I going to do with you?" It was a rhetorical question but Riley was struggling to answer her.

"You are a danger to John. You bring people here. You're not good for him." Cameron advanced on her and she immediately began to regret having unleashed her potential. Riley's face was being superimposed on Katherine's face as some of her earliest memories of future John became clearer.

Cameron stepped forward at the sound of John's distress but Katherine halted her progress. "Night terrors. They happen. He'll be fine."

John had woken up gasping and gulping in air. He fell back asleep without once acknowledging their presence. "He is asleep."

Katherine ran a hand over her face and slid off the bed. "It won't last long. He'll wake up again, he always does when he dreams of Sarah." Katherine left the room tapping Cameron's shoulder as she went. "Keep him safe."

Cameron watched Katherine head to the medical bay ignoring the obvious command. She curiously approached John. She'd only been guarding him for about four months so she was strictly limited in her actions. John wasn't sure she could be trusted yet, he was waiting for her chip to default. He had learned from other terminators that three to four months was the usual period before they defaulted.

He was talking but nothing coherent was forthcoming. It was just sounds and once she heard him say 'mom.'

Cameron had never seen him this human but it sparked something in her code. His eyes were open and he was staring vacantly at her. She twisted on the spot adjusting her sightlines to match his. He was looking left of her and staring past at a point somewhere near the door through which Katherine disappeared.

Cameron did a mental layout of the compound, calculating that Katherine would not arrive for another 15 minutes. She sat at the edge of the bed and his gaze shifted to her, his eyes a bit unfocused with the last dregs of sleep. He wasn't suprised to see her sitting so close to him. His stress level was skyrocketing as Katherine's absence became more pronounced.

"Did you hurt her?" came his raspy inquiry.

"I have no orders concerning Katherine Connor." She concluded that at this rate he would either leave and lose the much needed rest his body was begging for or shoot her right in the chip.

"Only me, right." was his gruff reply.

She had no data on how to engage him when he was disturbed. "yes, I have instructions for you. I am to keep you safe."

"Just what are you keeping me safe from?"

"Anything that is detrimental to your health." she said noting his proximity to her sitting form had increased.

"Mental or physical? Does it make a difference?"

"Your health in general is my job. Whatever is within my parameters," she replied. "I do what others cannot."

Those had been his words to her when she had first been caught. She had asked why he fought an unwinnable war. John Connor was a complex human and he was teaching her a little bit every day by his sheer commitment to the Resistance to be more that what she was. She wished to put him a ease, no doubt an influence from her Allison Young subroutine, but those were things her creator had not taught her.

Her hud flashed and a playback of a few night ago emerged. She studied the images of John's wife comforting him. With slow deliberate moments so as not to startle him, she gently slid her hand over his. She scooted her body closer and he let her hold him stiffly as if he didn't want it but was desperately craving it.

Her other hand imitated Katherine's soothing gestures and his back lost its tension. He turned to look at her and she raised her internal temp just a fragment to combat his clammy skin. He leaned and she let the momentum carry her backwards, with him balanced precariously above her.

"I bet your creator's programming is more than capable of taking this." he said with an air of disgust that could have been directed at her or himself.

Cameron engaged him in response. His lips were dry and cracked. His nose was crooked just a little bit from being broken more than once and not setting it right. His eyes were darker up close, if she could have felt fear she would have. A thrill of something did spark through her at their closeness to her own simulated brown eyes. His skin was blemish free save for the scar over his eye.

She traced the still healing wounds with one finger and he shuddered. Her exploration continued to his whiskered face, "you have more facial hair that i had previously observed. You should shave..." he stared at her with a mix of wonder and resignation. "I am capable of doing it if you should require it."

John pressed him mouth down on hers and she went quiet...

Cameron snapped from the memories. Her systems could no longer keep all her emotions separate and the information overload was making her stagger as if drunk. Her hand twitched and Riley's scared face registered but the momentary guilt was pushed aside in favor of her anger. Cameron was sick of standing around as other women were constantly being thrown at John just to keep him away from her.

She was sick of being shoved aside. Worst yet she was sick that John had clearly not broken things off with the human. "I can't let you leave but I can't let you go. So what I am going to do with you?"

This time Riley was ready. "You're not going to do anything. I'm John's girlfriend. I'm his girlfriend and you're just his sister." Riley repeated it like a mantra but she still backed up at the raw hatred on the machine's face. 'It's a machine, it's not supposed to feel anything…it's not supposed to feel at all.'

"What am I gonna do with you?" Cameron repeated her head twitching to the side alarmingly.

"You can't do anything, you're just his sister." Riley cried gripping onto her own wrists and digging her nails painfully into the half healed cuts. 'I don't want to do this. I don't want to compete with you. I give up, he's yours and you can have him but don't kill me, please.' she begged silently.

The door swung open and John appeared. He took one look at the occupants and sighed to himself. Riley was plastered against the back wall and Cameron was facing her, her hands clenched and her stance screaming her intent to kill the girl. "Riley, come here."

"John, John. Oh God, John." Riley rushed to him. She clung to him and looked at him with worship in her eyes. He looked away from her, he couldn't handle the obvious adoration she was piling on him. "Wait for me outside." Her eyes widened in panic but he urged her on.

Once she was gone he closed the door with a bang and turned reproachful eyes on Cameron. "Where you going to kill her?"

Cameron blinked at his abrupt question. He was becoming more and more like the John she was remembering. He was becoming the type of man that could access a situation in a heartbeat and even Riley was acknowledging his utter authority. "I don't know what I was going to do," she answered truthfully.

"Since when is it a choice?" he asked with a barely concealed edge of disbelief.

"It's not." she said just as surprised by her answer as he was. She would have liked to say I have more control. I can appreciate life a little better. I can see it would hurt you. I don't ever want to hurt you. I want so many things that I can't give you.

She said nothing and John took the opportunity. "What is up with you?"

"I don't know."

Her answer did nothing but set his face in a frown. With out further questioning John left her alone contemplating when it had become so hard to protect John from himself. 'Since when had he begun the lonely path that had been planned for him. Since when did she begin to deviate from the plan and what would happen if she didn't do what she'd been told to do by his future self.'

A confrontation between Riley and John ensued which neither Sarah nor Cameron were privy to. They went their separate ways both with shinny and tear filled eyes but neither gave in. Cameron saw John disappear back into the house with Sarah on his tail.

Cameron followed Riley home and then joined Eric. He was surprised to see her at his door but he let her in. She followed him to his room and he gently closed the door. She allowed herself to give in and tell him what she was being forced to do, what she had to do because she loved John.

She exhausted herself and Eric held her for a few hours pretending he was what she needed.

At the Connor household new lines were being established and Sarah's absolute rule was being challenged by John, who retreated making sure he could see Riley standing off to the side of his porch before he turned to talk to his mother.

They argued about Riley's stability and Cameron's general trustworthiness and he was distracted long enough that he lost sight of both girls. He looked away for a second and Riley was gone again and Cameron was nowhere to be seen either. He hurried outside and prayed that they were not together.

Cameron returned several hours later only to find Sarah burning the left over skeletons. Cameron didn't care for Sarah's tone but she allowed the woman to say her piece.

"John is John's problem. We all are." Cameron stated.

"Alone?" Sarah's love of John forced her to ask of Cameron what she couldn't ask of anybody else. She didn't want to hear it. It was doubly hard to see confirmation of it in the girl's broken expression.

"It's what he was born for." Cameron replied, burning her dreams of her being with him along with the skeletons that were in the pit. Her true blue blazing in its hopelessness.

John had a sleepless night. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Riley's tear stained face and Cameron's impassive one behind her. She had that look he hated. The one that said he had to do something cruel because only John Connor could do it.

He wiped a sweaty hand across his forehead and followed his feelings to Cameron's room. He pushed the door open but her room was empty and dark. It was hard to believe that only a few hours ago he had been laying beside her and talking about their future if they managed to defeat Skynet.

He laughed at himself. 'Still stupid and naïve, John. You don't get what everybody does, you have no other purpose and the sooner you learn that the less miserable you will be.'

He spent the night in her bed and managed to sleep for a few hours but when he woke up he felt even worse than before. He had to help Riley out of whatever jam she was in and break it all off. Including what he had with Cameron.

It was only confusing him further and endangering her. She loved him but how long would he last if the unthinkable happened and she was taken out. Determined that his new course of action was the best for all involved gave him a sense of direction. He showered, changed and found his cell.

He called Riley but got no answer. He called her foster parents but they too had no idea where she was and he was told that the school had called to say that she had not shown up. A cold dread filled him and he recalled her disappearing act from the day before.

He went to the apartment complex but the corresponding parking space was empty. A puddle of oil the only remnant of a vehicle having been there. He crouched on his heels and looked at the puddle again. At the very edge there was a single dark drop.

John closed his eyes willing the image away before he rose and headed back home to the person he most wanted to be with and get away from at the same time. He pulled into the house grateful that both Sarah and Derek were gone.

It was better this way, he didn't want an audience. If she did it he wanted to be the only one who knew. He wanted to know and then forget it in her arms. He didn't dwell on the screwed up part of that equation.

"I can't find her," was his greeting to the woman inside.

Cameron did not look up. She told John what she thought he would like to hear, "she's out there, she'll call you. Eventually she always does."

"Cameron, did you?"

"You know I didn't," his pained tone was not lost on her but she could not indulge it. She had to push him away for his sake. She had to let what they had, start to die.

Her coldness had the desired effect and he switched gears. "What have you been doing? you've been out here for hours." he leaned closer to see what she was doing.

"Making something…" she put aside the scissors and fastened the two sides of the chain"… for you."

In that moment he recalled her working on something the day he'd come home with her present. He forgot that he was supposed to be ending things. He forgot that he wasn't supposed to look so deep into those eyes. "Wha..what is it?"

She schooled her face to resemble its previous blankness and she hid the tremor in her hands as she held the chain between them. She imagined letting her fingers brush the fine hairs at his neck and allowing herself one last touch before she ripped her own desires out. "You tried to fix me. Twice now. It's not working."

"…and?" he gulped fighting the urge to close his eyes and lean into her if only to touch accidentally.

"I'm not capable of self termination." She continued gazing at him with all the love she could muster. She wished she could stop saying goodbye. She wished that this was the only time she had to do this.

"Suicide."

One or both of them noticed the sound of tires in the driveway but this was more important. "I can't kill myself but you can."

He had just lost Riley and though he hadn't cared like he should have, he felt it more keenly because of this. "Why would I want to kill you?" …it be like killing myself.' was his unfinished statement.

"You might have to someday." He opened the locket. The tiny buttons mocked him with their simplicity. With one touch she would be obliterated and his life would cease to have the dual joy and sorrow that he had come to associate with loving his terminator. "I've implanted an explosive near my chip. it's a small amount but its enough."

"Enough?"

She placed the chain over his head, "all you have to do is hit the switch." It sounded so quick and painless but they both knew it would be anything but. Their lives were interconnected in loops and strange twists that had resulted from sending her back every time they met again.

"What would future John do now?" he asked thickly, fingering the chain. He could see the dedication and thoughtfulness of his present. That made its reason for being so much more unbearable.

"Future John doesn't live here. You do."

"Cameron. I have to send you away. I can't have them try to hurt you again. I rather see you gone that be destroyed. Promise not to let us fall together in any way that you can. Be happy without me."

"I'll only be happy with you…" she trailed off stepping into the marked circle of the TDE

"Cameron Connor…" he shouted into the bubble and Eric left the chamber to give Connor one last moment of private heartache.

Cameron turned and dropped to her knees as the electricity began to crackle. "Pull the switch, John. I already know what you're going to say… and I do too."

Connor pulled the switch and the room exploded with light. Eric came back partially blinded but the dazzling light could not hide the man hunched over the controls. Eric made sure nobody saw him guide the stricken man back to his now empty quarters.

Cameron hit the pavement and she scanned the sky."…you are the resistance." his voice echoed in the alleyway just as Cameron abandoned it to find him again.