Summary: He needs her to live, to be able to fight and to protect, and she needs to be able to do that no matter what. Whatever it takes. Originally posted to livejournal 2.27.12
Version 1.5
When she says cancer, it throws her off balance enough for the hardened mask to slip and fall to smash on the silent floor, lost to trembling fingers. She is no cyborg slayer then on that porch, no mother of the future, no warrior woman. Just human in all its infinite weakness and vulnerability. Cameron leaves her there and goes into the house to John.
Cancer. She imagines it eating at her, growing inside, turning her body against her. It lingers, a sickening fear at the back of her mind, a hard knot at the pit of her stomach - and oh god, was that a lump? - even as the test come back clear. There are scars: nuclear exposure and a conversation that makes her think that for one clear, terrifying second she understands Cameron. ("Am I just a bomb waiting to go off?" "I don't know. Am I?") The moment stays with her.
"You're sick," she says and Sarah believes her because she can feel it, real this time. "I can help you," she says and Sarah believes that too because the cyborg's message reminds her of another carried across time for her. Sarah says yes because the other John asks her to and because her John needs her. He needs her to live, to be able to fight and to protect, and she needs to be able to do that no matter what. Whatever it takes.
Whatever it takes. It joins her list of personal mantras, magic words that keep her sane. (There's a tiny truth she will never admit and it's that she doesn't want to die.)
It starts with cancer but it doesn't end there. A broken femur is mended and reinforced with coltan alloy Cameron forges in the shed. A shattered hand is designed a replacement, synthetic nerves and conductors weaving and connecting with her own. A vengeful knife slides past ribs and into lung; the procedure is long and delicate and Sarah doesn't ask when the artificial organ was grown. She doesn't ask how. Cameron still heals faster than she does, but she heals faster than she should, faster than John.
She asks Cameron to do the same for her son, to give it to John too but she refuses and says it isn't time.
Sometimes she wonders what John thinks. He never says anything but he doesn't stop her, doesn't stop either of them - but she sees the way he looks at Cameron, the way he touches her - and she thinks that maybe he loves her a little better this way. He must, because she is stronger now, she will live now, she can fight now. She can protect him, protect the world.
Except she can't. Judgment Day is coming and they cannot stop it but she will survive, Cameron assures her. This is what John wanted. They are her mission.
The last one takes the longest. She doesn't need any convincing because the wound is deep and long and there is no other choice. Cameron cuts into hair and skin and bone and brain. The interface is clean and seamless: perfect.
Sarah wakes up different but doesn't know it until Cameron says "You're ready now" and John takes her hand and she can't quite read the truth in his eyes the way she used to. It feels like a loss, a pang somewhere deep in her heart, but sacrifice is the nature of motherhood and Sarah's truth is that John needs her. Her son needs her and she will not fail in this; whatever it takes.
Machines, Sarah, machines.