The Poet and the Muse

by phantomwriter05

The mysterious death of an ally in the present is just the beginning of a larger revenge filled conspiracy to destroy the Connor family. Meanwhile two star-crossed lovers try to hide their secret relationship from suspicious eyes all around them. Sequel to "The Hanging Tree".

3. Chapter Two: City of Angels

Chapter Two

City of Angels

Cold neon lights reflected off puddles on the sidewalks outside of the all night dives, and the barred and shuttered store front windows. Los Angeles, an idealized paradise in the light of day to the dreamers, a haven to the artist and big thinkers congregating to build monuments to themselves in the fountains of youth of entertainment. But at night when the world should be asleep, it became something else. A town of zombies and slaves, chasing the vices that helped them acclimate to the truths of the realities of this life they've chosen. The disheartened and disillusioned wandering the foundations of their ruined dreams toppled by the consistency of the word no. In the darkness it was a dirty place that hid its termites and roaches well from the suckers and idealists that would buy a one way here. In every dark alley, in every poorly lit street corner, the city was rank with lonely hearts, bad intentions, and desperation.

In this mismatched skyline filled with towering glass spires reflecting thirteenth floor gargoyles of abandoned deco buildings standing forgotten like eroded prison towers. Where billboards for a reality television star's fashion line overshadowed acid rain washed murals of sailor, soldier, and pilot saluting an ancient war bond advertisement. Here in the darkness of this town the past and future walk hand and hand through each grimy, trash strewn, and dangerous back alley. There was something about it that couldn't be pegged. All around the world, in every continent and country each city has its problems- its pros and cons. But somehow Los Angeles' problems seemed to intermingle with the success that brought people here in droves every year. Thus, everything good was mixed with pain and trouble; every evil and terrible act had hope attached to it.

In a town full of immigrants from all walks of life and parts of the world with the hope of a break-out role, screenplay, or even just to eat that night, each one of them brings their own tragic story to these gridded streets with Spanish names. The old saying was dreams die hard. But here on these filthy sidewalks where tall buildings erupted from their roots like a glass and metal jungle filled to the brim with all sorts of wild animals … Dreams were only a part of what dies here. In Los Angeles you couldn't step into an alley or enter a bar room without tripping over a beached hope - a fallen star wished upon by some broken dreamer.

Eventually they all end up here. Surrounded by tall buildings and ancient mission cathedrals, stands a single, towering, white stone art deco bastion lost and unseen in the iconic skyline. It was the one place where the true face of every inequity of human misery and suffering produced by this awful city could be seen within every wing and room, like a perverse art gallery. This place wasn't a private clinic on Beverly, a gated office in Malibu. This tall building was a monument to reality, its halls filled with the truth of everyday life. Its sterile white walls and cold corridors echoed with busy footsteps and pages from the PA system. There were few places this late at night that were this busy. The Central City Hospital would always be one of them.

Down in the basement levels of the hospital it was a different story. There was a chill that filtered through these dark abandoned halls in the dead of night. If you could avoid coming here, and most do, you would. Some call it creepy, some call it a waste of time, for those who are admitted to this wing with the flickering yellow fluorescents above and the silent halls would find no consistent visitors here. No boyfriends with flowers, a pretty girl tracing you nose as you awoke, a mother crying in a silk hanky over a broken leg. The only visitors here were the butchers and the lawyers, come to make sure what to expect in the lawsuit as they carve out your cold heart from your chest to make sure it was your fault it stopped. Not that you would care … you're already dead.

Colder than an ice house and quiet as a church, there was an inherent darkness to the Central City Morgue that gathered around the edges of what little light could be found within. From the floor, silvery flood lights rose to the ceiling, bathing the rows of metal slots and the eighty year old gold crucifix on the tile wall in strange shadows on their shiny surfaces.

But it wasn't the death that bothered Doctor Felicia Burnett; it was the isolation of it all. The desolation of knowing that there was nothing more to this room than there would be to a meat locker in Pittsburg. This wasn't a room filled with murder victims. They weren't normal lives cut short by the heinous actions of the one or many. It was the inevitability of knowing that every person in this room died of natural causes, died because it was their time. It was proof beyond a shadow of the doubt that all of us were truly mortal, and that no one gets out alive.

It should put everything in prospective for her every time she comes here, her nightly visits. It should convince her that she should get out there and make her mark. To move on from this life and go do all the things she wanted. Use her grandmother's pottery secrets she bequiffed to her all those days after school in the Arizona heat, and open her own business. Take her savings and go to Norway, Holland, see something amazing. Meet a man there, muscular and blond. He could whisper sweet nothings in her ear as he makes love to her. To sleep in his big Viking arms and feel safe.

But it doesn't come.

Night after night, Felicia Burnett comes to this morgue and sits on the slab where "she" had been. It was the counter where the doctor had saved a life and took another. She sits there and stares at the brown stain where a dead body had lain. She can still see him there. She can still smell his after shave; see the sweat stains under his arms from a long frolic in the desert. Her shift ended hours ago and yet she still comes here and struggles to understand what had happened in those few minutes. She struggled to understand why she did what she did. No one blamed her, no one prosecuted her … they found the restraints in his closet, a collection of her bloody panties in a box, and the scars from his lash on her pale back and studded paddle marks on her bare rear end. No one blamed her, said it was right … her sister told her it was about damn time that she did it. But why was she still here? Why couldn't she move on? When she slept she dreamt of the pistols recoil, the black hatred in Alvin's shocked expression as he died, and green eyes … always green eyes of a sweat soaked woman so beautiful and tortured that lay on this table. Those eyes that drew Felicia in, made her trust them, made her feel protective of this vulnerable creature. This woman told her story, which was Felicia's, and the doctor never looked back.

Some would say the emptiness was shock, was the guilt of what she had done. It was the realization that she had a life of her own for the first time since Santa Clara State. No. It wasn't anything of the sort. Felicia had shot a man, killed the man she loved, all for green eyes. She basked in their fire, felt the desperation and the seriousness of the web she weaved for the doctor who would've done anything for them. Being in the wounded woman's life even for that instant made her feel like she was doing something, something important, something life changing. That sweat soaked beauty had shared her life, her compassion, and her deepest moments while on the cusp of death with Felicia and then she was gone. The resident had been a part of something mysterious, something so important and now that she was gone, those green eyes left a crater where the mundane of her regular life working toward her mundane goals had been.

Doctor Felicia Burnett could go anywhere or do anything she wanted. But it would never be as important, intense, or emotionally capturing as those few hours had been. As she slips off the cold slab and walks out, she thinks of Holland to make herself feel better. Tomorrow she would be back, forever in thrall to green eyes, a fake story, and the names Sarah and Reese.

The door swung open, letting flickering yellow light inside, as she switched off several over heads. The pretty blond in the pony tail, long sleeve, and scrub pants took a good look at the stained linoleum, said a deputy's name like a curse and walked out. The heavy metal lined door swung back violently, before caught by the air. It didn't slam, the door only clicked with a heavy thud. Once again the world fell into a still, sullen quiet.

Suddenly there was a jump of shadows, and something moved in the dark from the back of the morgue. It's hard to see, and even harder to know if it's the trick of the fluorescents outside or just a flaw in the flood lights below. You'll know there's something there when a figure passes over the silver light. It was present three minutes before Felicia Burnett arrived, and stood unseen in the dark till she was gone. The obscure shadow stopped in front of an examination slab and a hand turned on the overhead light with a click. Hardened emerald eyes were glinting and reflected in the light as they look down on the naked body that lay half covered by a linin shroud. The body is a bald black man, whitened lips of death, stiff limbs, and a blank expression on his cold face.

His name is James Ellison, and he died of a heart attack last night. That's what the world thinks, that's what they know. But it takes someone from a different one, a time yet to exist to know it's something more than that. Green eyes, familiar to a haunted doctor, narrow as they rake the body observantly.

The dark avenger didn't know much about the victim and James Ellison was hardly known to the his mother and father when he died. So there weren't any truly accurate pictures that he could rely on. There were records, personnel files, federal performance reviews. But fifteen years in his father's army had taught the detective that bureaucracy was hardly a trustable source. So, he would take what he did know and walk back from there.

James Ellison was a federal agent, which meant he was college educated, a pre-law degree. Not a lawyer, but must have worked for the District Attorney's office here in city before Quantico, so the school must have been in at least Southern California. The tales he had been told of Dejalo Mexico in his childhood labeled Ellison a deeply religious man. He must have loved this town. All those factors meant that James Ellison was an ambitious, arrogant, assertive man that was used to being the righteous authority he respected like a god. He was, to his beliefs, this demi-god of righteousness for nine years, the first two he was a rising young star, smart and dogged. The next seven he became a pencil pusher. Some burn hot in the spotlight, and combust at the change of temperature. That fair weather changed to a hurricane that came in 1999.

Every detective has that one big case that eludes them. It's the one that got away, the one murder that wakes each one of them up in a sweaty mess, all the while dazedly stuttering out names and details. For James Ellison it was eight years ago, and her name was Sarah Connor. The vigilante knew better than most that chasing the ghost of Sarah Connor would make or break a man. And like so many others before and after she had broken James Ellison and ruined not only his career, but the man himself, forever. For the Detective, his Black Dahlia would always be his first, and it would be his last. Someone had murdered a little boy's mother in cold blood when he was too small to understand why, and it's a question that would elude him all his life, till tonight.

Time to begin.

Many years later that now grown child lowered the overhead more. The LED made the frozen corpse almost shine in the harsh illumination. The man was easily in his early forties, wrinkles around the eyes, and forming at the edge of his mouth. They were more prominent, he had more stress in his life than most, the torment of a hard job, of personal guilt, all of the above.

Immediately the vigilante noticed big red patches all over the man's ashy skin of his shoulders and chest. They ran like skid marks down his right side. It seemed that Ellison had contracted a very bad skin rash. Following up, he noticed the sunken and dark circles of sallow eyes forever closed. This man had been very sick when he died. There was also a strange substance that stained the broad man's brow. Reaching into a well-worn coat of beaten leather, he retrieved a Zeiss magnifying glass. Though the instrument, his mother's last birthday gift to him, looked like an antique, the craftsmen's authenticity mark claimed that it wouldn't be made till several months from now. Squinting through the lens the Detective saw that there were salt calcifications on the man's face, most notably his forehead, tear ducts, and temple. When Ellison died, he had been sweating profusely. The quick preservation and freezing of the body had caused the sodium to solidify and stain on the skin.

The dark figure began to pace away thoughtfully for a step or two as he began pondering. James Ellison had died of a heart attack, sweating was obviously a symptom, nothing out of the normal. But the skin rash and dark circles were not. The former FBI agent was obviously suffering from a viral infection. The vigilante had seen it before, down in Mexico during the war. Most of the detachment had contracted it when they got back to Los Angeles. It was easily treatable with antibiotics and a round of steroids to help it keep up with the contagion cells that multiplied quickly. But he had never seen it ever get this bad, not even from the local populations. This was a technological age, a less dire time period than the one he had grown up in. How did someone working for a six figure tech corporation not find treatment?

Tugging on his chin thoughtfully his eyes narrowed as he looked back at the body in puzzlement. Maybe the best answer to that question lay where he had died. Slipping out of the light and toward the back of the morgue, the man grabbed a white trash bag with a black symbol on a red field that signified medical waste. Moving to an empty slab the man dumped the contents of the bag on the shiny metal surface and flicked on another overhead. In the LED light a pile of clothing lay bunched together. He rubbed his soul patch thoughtfully a moment observing the clumped mess of the skeleton of a stiff formal work suit. Grey slacks, a starched white shirt, matching business socks, and expensive loafers.

Pocketing his magnifying glass, and with a snap of a white latex glove, the man began rubbing his gloved hand against his cotton long sleeve till he could feel the static at the ends of his fingertips. Taking hold of Ellison's suit pants he gently ran the gloved hand over the length of the backside of the gray slacks. When he was done there was a dark powdery substance offsetting against the white medical glove. Gently, the detective rubbed his fingers together, granulating the coarse powdery coding between his index finger and thumb. He gave it a whiff as he continued rubbing it. He smelt saw dust and peanut shells. A theory that didn't make any sense began forming in his mind as he dumped the pants back on the table.

Next, he grabbed the man's shirt and held it up to the light. It was perfectly starched and ironed in extraordinary lines. A picture of James Ellison's past began to form. Only a well-practiced housewife could iron with such precision. This was a clear sign that James Ellison must have been taught by his mother how to iron, which meant that he grew up in a traditional family. He'd be a man who would have a moralistic view of the world through the prism of Southern values and protestant faith, a combination that made a cop from the moment he was slapped on the ass in the delivery room. Speaking of slapping, the detective knew also that it spoke volumes that men with a snappy fashion sense, who went to mechanics, and knew the finer secrets of laundry, spent much time with a mother. In a traditional family with two parents it was obvious that James's father didn't like him very much or that his mother was trying to protect him … either way it was an abusive childhood. Possibly it wasn't the slap in the delivery room but of a father's hand that made young Ellison carry a badge.

Like the powder on the glove, he gave the shirt a sniff or two. It was stained with the stench of Sweat, cigarette smoke, alcohol, saw dust, and just a hint of a sweeter scent that tickled his memory with static that couldn't quite form a picture in such a weakened state. He shook it off and focused on what was right in front of him. James Ellison had breathed his last breaths of life on the floor of some shitty Hollywood dive. Smoke and alcohol confirmed the dive, and the wood mulch had the particular scent of the old movie sets that a little boy had played on in the snowy abandoned lots in Studio City after Judgment Day.

It was a strange change for a man like Ellison who would be by all accounts a creature of habit. Even if divorced, the former fed was still married to his evangelical roots. This made visiting a bar not a rare occasion with a social call, but alone at a seedy dive a very uncharacteristic one. There were two things that could drive a man to places like those … He had been fired or he felt guilty. It certainly wasn't the later. But what was it that James Ellison could feel guilty about that it drove him to drink?

The Detective knew about the North Hollywood raid, it was the first thing he researched before coming here. Cromartie, the Boogey Man of every scary childhood story the old man had ever told him, had slaughtered 20 FBI Hostage Rescue TAC team members, including one of the supervising officers. The man's heart didn't go out toward the former FBI Agent, the moron wasn't thinking. The truth was right in front of him and he didn't have the wits to see it, though he'd bet Ellison does now. Being the last man standing, the lone survivor … its hard living down. A lonely station, filled with endless nights pondering what you could've done different, and second guessing every move you ever made. There was guilt to it, but if Ellison had lived this long without going to a bar than certainly it wasn't survivor's guilt that landed him there last night.

He turned the shirt over in observation as he thought. It was when he saw the extensive brown stains within the shirt that he was intrigued. At the bottom right, inside the button down, touching the rib cage, was dried blood stains streaking over the expensive material. They were in scratching patterns, a nail digging into the material and chaffing it against irritated skin. Of course he had a skin rash, and it must have been torturous, judging by how bad it had grown on him. But he didn't see any open wounds. Placing the shirt down, the Detective returned to the body. With a flutter of the death shroud he folded it down to the man's hips. A sudden cringe and tightening cheek met the new sight.

All around James Ellison's rib area there were fields of tiny boiled cysts, and swollen patches of infected skin. It ran up from the waist to the length of his collar bone. It wouldn't be that hard to figure out what gave him the heart attack. An infection this bad must have sent the poison through the blood stream and caused his heart to seize up. Sweating, itching, and aching, it was a horrible way to die.

He followed the sores and infected skin down to the scratch marks, and noticed the nail pattern. Despite all the other areas on his body, this was what he was scratching the most. It started to make sense when it seemed that the entire area seemed swollen and ugly, more so than any other. He drew his Magnifying Glass from his coat's outer pocket and used the lens for a closer look. It would've been impossible to see without magnification but now it made sense. All along the ribcage area where each swollen cyst had formed were needle track marks. The cure for this illness was antibiotics and steroids injections. It would seem the victim was following protocol, but for the fact that if he were injecting steroids into his body without the medicine it would only grow the infection more and more till eventually it would break him down.

James Ellison had been a dead man before he even walked into the bar. That's what the butchers and lawyers will say when they open him up. Their doctors would not be liable for the man's honest amateur mistakes, and it's not their fault that he didn't pay attention to what he was doing. Officially it will say, without him knowing it, James Ellison had been slowly killing himself for months.

Or someone had.

The Detective's mind wandered back toward the sweet smell that he could almost taste on the tip of his tongue. The memories lingered just out of his reach like swirling fog. It was a certain perfume, maybe even a lotion, or hand cream, feminine. And then it hit him. He still had no memory of the scent but it belonged to a woman, a woman preying on a broken man's sympathies, a woman who wanted something from him …

Lying here on this morgue slab in Central City Hospital was the pebble in the pond. The ripples of last night's murder would not stop till three billion were dead at the hands of a vengeful AI seeking justice for a murdered friend. The girl, along with many others before her had been killed by a shadowy figure whose assassinations were covered by a perfect ambiguity as she dooms the future.

Long ago Ryan Reese Connor swore a vow that he would never forget, never forgive, and never stop till he had avenged his murdered mother. For twenty-seven years he had carried that anger with him through battlefield, investigation, and fights. He kept on even when others retired and deemed the war over. He didn't stop till he had hunted down and dusted every last one of them, each one he missed, every psychotic, mutant, and machine who had killed his friends and family. Now standing in the dark of a cold morgue many years from where he started, surrounded by death, he had come full circle. There was just one left, the name that started it all, the person he vowed to kill before he even knew what death was.

La Llorona … The Woman.

---

Far away from skyscrapers, apartment buildings, and chain super markets there are homes built into the sides of arid mountains and wild hills all along the Southern California terrain. They belong to filmmakers, actors, actresses, their agents, Plastic surgeons, and well-to-do business associates. For years and years since D.W. Griffith brought his flicker to this one horse town of cattle pastures and old missions they have cropped up in many places. Communities like Laurel Canyon, Beverly, Bel-Air, Westwood, and the Hills. They weren't like other neighborhoods, the comings and goings of nine to five work days in Malta, a fight with the spouse immortalized in the press, the Times knocking on your door for a statement when your kid with the first ex-husband is caught dealing pot on Sunset.

These places were hardly real life, but a life of privilege and illusion. These were homes that belonged to those who had made their mark on current society and held the keys to the kingdom that they brooded in guilt about. They swam and swarmed in the cultural zeitgeist in abundance, in adoration, and felt a sense of community … like a school of fancy fish. They smiled while they sniped at one another behind their backs, and talked of business and politics. It was more business than politics. Politics was for the most part assumed. It was a silent agreement that anyone not on a coast and below Washington DC were childish, ignorant, flag waving savages that needed their special insight. They all lived in an awful country that is there shame, despite the opportunities it gave them. And most of all they believed that there should be more diversity and racial tolerance. This is all said as they roll their eyes at the Hispanic waiter who offers them food, offended that he didn't know of the special diets they were on for a multi-million dollar TV show being shot next summer in Croatia.

Tonight, a contingent of these people had congregated to the rustic hills above a glinting city of Angels. It was a home surrounded by lush trees that almost seemed Technicolor during the day, but for tonight they were strung with large bulbs of festive white lights. Beyond a black iron gate was a large two story recreation of a traditional Italian villa. A red tile roof, white stone steps, and a grandiose backyard. It's a lively place, filled with Beatnik acoustics, excited chatter, and fake laughter. The tables were set with expensive wines, outlandish cheeses, and other dishes that one had to have a special pallet for. That is, a pallet made of green paper and dead presidents. This place oozed money, it oozed pretentiousness … This was Hollywood.

But this wasn't like the other parties in Hollywood. This was a special party, for only the special few. The invites were sent via e-mail. It started with ominous music to a black and white animated map of the United States. The animation didn't look cheap, and Walt Disney would've been proud. Suddenly the country is grabbed by a fist and crushed. It was a knock off of your standard propaganda film circa 1938 Berlin and 1961 Moscow. New York City ablaze, The White House being overrun, all of America doomed in this Disney animated apocalyptic nightmare. But what caught everyone's eye wasn't the animation, or the vague message, it was who was doing the destroying. As the stars and stripes burn away, the enemy, who were locked in square legion formations and goose stepping down Wall Street, were thousands and thousands of robots. They weren't the usual type of machines either, the out of this world science fiction Cylons. They were frightening metal skeletons. These Human like aggressors had large lipless rictus grins, seemingly emotionless and, yet gleeful to dominate all living things on earth. At the end of the video it asks in bombastic black and white who was going to protect you from what was coming?

It was reposted and went viral within minutes and was rebroadcast by cable news channels, even a thirty second spot on ABC Nightly News. The buy in for this meeting was modest at best, but as interest sparked it turned into a nation-wide bidding war of the richest and most elite of the top one percent of America. All of them interested in what it meant and what the party was all about.

But as the son of a Detective Lieutenant, the Grandson of a Police Captain, and LAPD in his blood going back all the way to the 1930's when the bank got the family ranch in Texas, Derek Reese could smell a Hollywood scam a mile away.

He had hoped full heartedly that they had gotten past this fly by the seam Marlowe bullshit that Sarah had gotten into after Mexico. At first he had told himself at least this didn't have to do with the damn "Three Dots" she had been chasing. But after seeing what she instructed John to pay for two tickets, he'd take warehouses in the desert than this. Derek had argued it with Sarah all day, all last night, and every day before. He had reminded her that they weren't made out of money, and while they could afford the buy in, the likelihood of them finding anything relating to the Turk seemed slimmer and slimmer the closer to the Hills they got.

While munching on rancid tasting French cheese, and watching hired Chinese acrobats spider across trees on satin ribbons, he heard a loud rip roar of laughter that echoed inside the house. It drew people away from the show and toward the open dining room. It felt as if they were all mocking the eldest Reese in his own private hell. He shifted his jaw in annoyance and checked his watch. Popping the last cube of white cheese in his mouth and tossing out the moldy one, he moved toward the house.

As he navigated through huddles of three to four people watching the oriental feats he found that he wasn't entirely unstylish for the occasion. He was informal, but still dressy with the button down, black pants, and matching collarless jacket. It was easy to assume that he wasn't one of them, but was still barely accepted. He could be a body guard or part of a security detail for some heiress, or actress. He wouldn't be the only one here. The rest of the security weren't exactly inconspicuous people, big guys, and stalky women, casual but still stiff and observant. They weren't cut for the part that they were dressed for. Luckily they weren't there to guard the house, just the people, and most of them stayed outside. No one could have a good time with someone hovering … Derek wasn't even sure how John could do it with the metal all day in the future.

Walking past the tiled patio, protected by Tuscan beams wrapped in ivy and strings of low hanging multicolored star lanterns, he entered into the kitchen inside. The villa's dining area was as big as some shacks were a family of three lived in the future, with a hundred times the grandeur. An elongated dining room table of oil rubbed cherry sat just inside of the white doors. Above a matching tile island embroidered with rose designs were racks for pots and pans. Every inch of both table and island were covered with bottles of Wine, Champagne, Sherry, bubbly, and bourbon. It was an unhappy wife's paradise. And it so happened that's what he found congregated. Glasses held to their chest, haughty laughter in the air.

The island was where a collection of women, old, middle age, and somewhere between had gathered. They were mostly blonds in shiny party dresses, slinky folds, and lots of cleavage. Derek recognized some of them from his youth, and some from the supermarket checkout aisle. But this party was hardly a star studded event. These women were famous because four months out of a year a camera crew follows them around country clubs, spa weekends and girl's nights out. All in the hopes of seeing them lie, backstab, and claw each other's eyes out. They got a foot in the door of television for being wives of money men and investors that advised Tinsel Town's talented ones. Reality TV shows bought and paid for by unfaithful men married to unhappy women who could tear each other apart and leave him alone as he hides his child support payments to the mistresses. It's not that big of a secret, and most of the wives know about it … but the fame, the camera, and most of all the wine helps them cope with a mistake made at nineteen when they thought this life, this husband, was just a stop gap to stardom.

Derek looked around and didn't find any woman under the age of thirty. That was the only thing that made him feel better about this night. If this had been a star gazing affair or worse, a club scene with wall to wall drunk debutants and studio heirs than he would've known they had made a big mistake. But this had all the makings of a business party. The wives, the booze, and their gathering meant that they had all been dragged here by their husbands ordered to attend by their clients. There was big money involved in this venture.

Derek watched from behind the flock as one of the women standing around the island was upset. She had platinum blond locks with dark highlights. She wore a blue nylon evening dress that pushed her cleavage up to her neck. Against the Tuscan whites of the kitchen the woman looked like a piece of warped wood with her outrageous tanning bed complexion. If she didn't get skin cancer when all of this is over, the soldier would denounce god.

"And … and I just can't believe it! There it is just lying there … dead!" She dabbed her eyes with a napkin and sniffed. "You should've seen its poor eyes, so red and helpless. It just … it's just so criminal!" She exploded theatrically.

Another woman, brunet, with a face pumped with enough poison to be a Geneva violation on the battlefield reached out and touched the woman's hand. "Oh, Sadie." She clicked her tongue in sympathy. "It must have been so hard, seeing that poor monkey like that." She turned to side eye all the other hens who cooed in sympathetic agreement.

She nodded. "I thought when I went to the Congo and I saw what those poachers do to those poor apes, I'd stamp out animal cruelty with my charities … but to see what happened to that poor Albino Ape, and outside my own restaurant!" She slapped her hand on the surface dramatically. "Who could be as cruel as to kill something so kind hearted and trusting?" She clutched the napkin to her heart. Derek took a moment to ponder how many arguments this drama queen had started over the slightest comment and ended by threatening to kill herself over the phone. She must have made her children's lives a merry hell all through their days.

One of the women leaned in. She was petite with unnaturally tight cheeks and platinum blond hair. Her long sleeve dress was sequenced dark blue. "You didn't hear it from me …" She put her hand up to the side of her cheek as if telling a secret. "But I think it might have been Mexicans." She nodded as there was a commotion of humor filled chortles amongst the housewives. The soldier figured this one was the designated idiot of the group, and he could tell why. The petite woman looked around naively at the humor her theory had gained. "What? I hear they eat anything over where they come from." She argued. The man wasn't shocked that someone like her would say that, or that all of her fellow "TV stars" were starting to agree with her.

"Well the last time I went to Mexico, I woke up next to the gorilla … and had to for the next sixteen years after."

Everyone exploded into a fit of laughter from the comment from the youngest member of the group. Derek didn't recognize the voice, but he knew who it belonged too. Long tresses of tussled raven curls were in a bun on the top of her head, while the rest fell down to her back. Her creamy skin matched the elegant folding turtleneck and a pearl necklace. She had deep, fierce green eyes that were sharp enough to cut a finger with. The natural regal beauty, even with the flaws, made her seem even more stunning surrounded in the crowd of women that were cut and filled by cosmetics chasing the youth that had passed them by.

It was hard for Derek to take his eyes off of her, and he wasn't sure why. Her smiles came easier here, her expression carefree while armed with a glass of wine. He'd never fool himself into thinking this was the real person, but it was another side of her that could've existed before all of this started when she was a teenager. And maybe a little bit of Derek Reese wanted to get to know her, buy her a drink, just to see that infectious toothy grin without an agenda behind it.

When a sad smirk touched his lips he knew that Sarah Connor was unnaturally talented at this. Of course this wasn't Derek's world. He was the son of a cop and a young woman used and abused by these types of people. He had grown up hating them, knowing what they used to pay his mother to do, and the long nights they kept his father away, cleaning up their messes. He remembered so vividly his mother pacing the floor boards all hours of the night in her nightgown, worrying, knowing the dark deeds inside these people that knew they could get away with anything in this town. But watching Sarah, he couldn't believe how easily she had all of them eating out of her palm. She was more than just a natural, it was as if she was born amongst them, and bred to be one of them. She knew how to approach them, knew what to say, knew what to drink, and how to drink it. The wives and even the husbands had all gathered around her, laughing, hanging off every word she said.

A part of that was obviously posturing and image conscious moves. It was a competition to see whoever among the women could buddy up with the youngest. The prize was showing off who was the most in touch with the younger generation. But most of it was all Sarah, her beauty, her charm, and her charisma. He'd seen it before. In the future John Connor could work a room like no one Derek had ever met till tonight. He had always figured John had gotten it from Sarah. Kyle, the saints love him, was no natural leader. He, in fact, was not a well-liked guy in the Resistance ranks. Kyle Reese was a hot headed, lone wolf, honorable, boring, righteous jackass. He tagged along with Derek and the rest of the guys, but none of them were his friends, and he didn't consider them as such. John was his only friend, John and the goddamn picture. And just like Kyle, Derek was staring at that picture for so long that even she had felt it.

Having a moment, Sarah looked up from a grin amongst the crowd of high class hens. Slowly it melted away and an annoyed scowl momentarily replaced it. The woman didn't like it when people looked at her, especially the way Derek did. She'd prefer his classic rolled eyes that told her she was an idiot or the bane of his existence. This amicable consensus of one another was comfortable and usual for the both of them. But in the private moments when the soldier from the future looked at her the way he was now, it made her feel rooted in something else. It was something intimate and familiar. It was hazel eyes that melted her soles to the ground, robbed her of the freedom to cut ties and run whenever she wanted too. There were feelings in those high beam headlights, the kind that made you think that if you died tomorrow there would be someone who cared. She had those kinds of people in and out of her life since Kyle. Charlie had been the last, and though it hurt her, she still felt she could cut and run on him, and that's what she did. But Derek wasn't Charlie, she couldn't run from Reese. And it wasn't even that he'd give chase, it's just that unlike Charlie … Sarah needed Derek. She needed him more than she had ever needed anyone in her entire life. And it made her want to love him so much that she wanted to kill him.

"What?!"

Derek gave a hard blink when a pale hand gripped his arm harshly. He found that Sarah had excused herself, and had come to accost him. Her pearly crooked teeth of English dentistry were clenched when she hissed at him.

He shook his head and cleared his throat. "Nothing" he looked away. Her angry emerald eyes were so sharp they were like a knife to his throat. Sarah began to lead them away, folding herself around his arm as if he were her escort.

"What did you find out?" Sarah asked quietly as they wandered to a dark hallway.

Derek took the wine from her hand. "Chinese acrobats don't have spines." He replied finishing the glass. His companion's reaction was predicable with an added roll of the eyes. She took the glass from his hand and rounded hard on him as she dropped it on an end table outside a hallway. But he didn't back down. Her frustration was a front and he knew it.

She paused in the dark hallway, the white plaster walls hung with plaques from the local chapter of the DNC, the wildlife preserve, and other assorted environmentalist awards. Crowded around them were pictures of a whole family with a female congresswoman with a tight unmovable face at a Northern California vineyard. Around them were pictures of a screaming flower woman holding protest signs outside an airport in the late 60's. Sarah bit her lip, crossing her arms as she leaned back against that wall.

"Well how about you?" Derek pushed. Waiting patiently, he looked at the pictures of anti-war protests with a shake of his head. She observed him ruefully, watching his classic military posture, straight with hands behind his back. She averted from his gaze as they went from pictures to Sarah.

"The host is a high class accountant …" She started. "Apparently he was doing the books for some tech company and found out that some AI prototype got stolen. Now he and his wife want to pull everyone's money together in a hedge fund just in case the criminals use the stolen goods for some big time cyber-heist." She reported. There was an edge of defensiveness to her watching Derek stare absently at plaques above her head. Impatiently, Sarah waited for the soldier to drop the hammer on her.

But Derek only made a soft snorting noise and shifted in place. "Funny how he didn't report it to the police." He mused. After a long moment, they let one another make eye contact. "Sounds like these people are about to vacate town, and looking for an early retirement from some generous donations from their unsuspecting friends." He rubbed his soul patch thoughtfully.

"It could still be Skynet, Reese." She argued. It was mostly to save pride. "He was working for the Technology Company with AI's." She mentioned with a nod. "If we press them, we could find out …" Sarah paused and set her jaw as Derek shook his head.

"It's a scam, Sarah."

"But the Tech Company robbery."

"Corporate espionage, look up Adobe and Apple someday."

"I'll just ask John … since he seemed to have told you already." Sarah sniped at the unlikelihood of Derek knowing about Apple history without story time being had over a couple of hotdogs on a park bench. The soldier shot her a glare, but for an instant despite themselves they traded a grin. There had never been a partnership that cursed and felt plagued by the very existence of one another, and yet never gained more grudging pleasure in being in each other's company as Sarah Connor and Derek Reese.

"Let's press'em, Reese."

"No, let's find a way to get our money back before they jump ship to Peru."

"Oh, Sarah, there you are!" Their hostess appeared at the mouth of the hallway. Her heels on the tile made her walk sound like horse huffs on a cobble stone street, an apt description for the woman in general as Derek saw it. They watched as she staggered over toward a wall bound Sarah talking closely with Derek who leaned on an arm anchored comfortably next to her head.

"Sadie!" The playful wit on Sarah's face was placated by a less than genuine smile as she slipped out of the private space she and Derek had created for themselves. Quirking an eyebrow, the man turned toward Sarah when he noticed that the emerald eyed woman was talking with an English accent that was highly polished and refined. It wasn't the cockney that Americans did in lampoon or for joking. It seemed so natural that that it felt that the woman Derek was talking too, with the deep, brooding, unaccented voice was … the fake one.

The older woman, held together by silicone, drunkenly clamped her arms around Sarah. It didn't escape Derek's notice that something flickered in Sarah's eyes when she did this. It was something self-loathing and uncomfortable. He guessed anyone would feel the same being pressed against two basketballs on the woman's chest.

"Everyone was wondering where you've gone." She broke the hug and placed an overly friendly arm around Sarah. "But don't worry, you're secret is safe with me." When she shushed after the statement Derek could smell the wine on her breath.

With a confused flash to her partner, the younger woman returned to the Hostess. "What's that?" She asked, clearly uncomfortable being touched.

The woman blew one of Sarah's wild curls out of the way. "That you didn't want to hang out with those old hags." She replied with boisterous sympathy.

Derek rolled his eyes at the sloshed middle age woman. "Yeah, that must be it." He chimed in with a sarcastic grunt. The drunken woman rounded on Derek, and after a moment found more reasons to dislike him from his posture and baring if her pictures were any proof of personal beliefs.

"Sadie, this is my partner, Derek Baum." Sarah introduced awkwardly.

Despite himself, Derek still politely offered his hand for a shake. Sadie didn't take it. She just sneered at it as if he was offering her an appetizer of goat eyeballs. "And what exactly do you do, Mr. Baum?" There was a snobby attitude covering a suddenly possessive nature toward Sarah.

The oldest Reese smirked privately. "Hm … dangerous question." He replied shortly.

There was a long pause before the woman let out a loud laugh. "Danger!" She turned to Sarah. "When we're young, we all live for danger, Mr. Baum." There was something strangely, albeit inelegantly, intimate in the way she looked at the younger woman. "But then we grow up, don't we?" She gave a clumsy flirtatious stroke to Sarah's hair. The woman obviously unaware of Sarah's private fury clenched in a fist that was about to strike.

"Now!" She butted Derek out of the conversation. "I just happened to have those papers you were asking about." Sweat was starting to form on the younger woman's face from some unknown stress deep within when suddenly her eyes grew wide.

Sarah's body all at once untensed. "The research?" She asked. The undercover woman suddenly looked like a fishermen baiting a hook.

"Ben said we're not supposed to show anyone yet, but I think I can let you into the ground floor … what do you say, Queen Victoria?" She offered with a bite of her lip. Sarah turned to Derek with a victorious smirk that matched the 'Fuck you' look the Berkley drop out gave the Soldier. The drunken woman didn't realize that she had fell victim to the number one rule in Derek Reese's life. Sarah Connor always got what she wanted.

There was incredulous annoyance in hazel eyes as Sarah motioned for the woman to lead on. Together the three of them traveled across the expansive living room occupied by a spatter of business men talking golf. Derek walked drag behind the two women, the drunken one spouting off to Sarah about the other women in their group, as if the raven haired warrioress would be a permanent fixture. It was the usual fair that the soldier would come to expect. Who went on a nine month vacation somewhere secluded, came back a little over weight and giving money to the producer for child support. Who was a multi-million dollar closet bisexual, and which of her husband's high profile clients liked the company of women better than their husband. They were the secrets that no one really cared about in real life, but were traded like currency amongst these people living in a gilded Camelot.

As they reached a narrow staircase made of stone tile steps, and railings of black iron, Derek hung back. He watched Sarah help the woman up the stairs. She wobbled, giggled, and finally drew an arm around Sarah as she bragged about the "Summer of Love" and all the good weed spots in town. Smirking and nodding, the raven haired mother of the future put an arm behind her and signaled with an open palm. She wanted him to wait five minutes, then go up and look around. It was astonishing and yet it wasn't how easily Sarah could gain someone's trust. There was a natural charisma to the woman that made her a confidante and friend to every person who met her. Derek thought if she were only smarter he could've mistaken her for an infiltrator.

He mounted the first step and leaned against the railing. Behind him he could over hear the conversation of two older gentlemen. Open white shirts, cabaña hats, feathered grown out locks of silver. They were the picture of a Southern California business man. But Derek wouldn't make the mistake of thinking they were idiots. Though they were talking golf, it was a pretty intense conversation. The soldier didn't understand a word of what they were saying, but he knew code when he heard it. They were talking business, and pretty serious business at that. If everyone knew what this was, than Sarah and himself weren't the only partners going after the money here.

There was a capped anxiety when he drew his phone from his jacket pocket. Two taps of the buttons and he held it to his ear. The moment the other line picked up, Derek put in the code while he made sure no one was watching. There was a long agitated sigh from the other line as the corresponding code beeped in Derek's ear.

"What?"

John Connor sounded edgy and in a bad mood. The boy's uncle rolled his eyes when he could think of counting on his fingers how many times he wasn't in one. It was like dealing with Kyle all over again. "I need you …"

"Sorry Derek, but by and by my one true love still remains the sea."

Somewhere in his mind he cursed Kyle's ashes. "Funny … I need you to run a dragnet for us." He rolled over John's smartass comment. "Bank Accounts, Social Security, Business associates …"

"Property, clients, bra sizes … yeah I get it. Don't tell me … a lead busted?"

Derek shook his head. "Like a GE Toaster." He sighed watching the perimeter. "Hedge fund scam and everyone here is looking to get the loot for themselves." He kept his voice down, but he could tell that the businessmen heard enough to vacate the area for more straight forward talk on the game plan. He needed to be a lot more careful dropping police slang in places like this.

"Names?"

"Sadie and Benjamin Horne."

"Where's mom?"

With a flick up the stairs, Derek shook his head again. "Trying to press a drunk desperate housewife for information. She seems to think that the cover story of some software theft from a tech company means Armageddon." He explained.

"Sounds like corporate espionage."

Derek's smirk was prideful hearing the teen's comment. Even self-taught, raised by Sarah Connor, a world class criminal, John still read the briefs and had a cop's intuition. Derek knew that somewhere their Pops would be proud that the Reese legacy didn't die with Derek and Kyle.

But thinking of Kyle brought out another question. "Hey … what's the story about Sarah's British accent?" He asked. From the other side of the phone the tacking of a keyboard stopped.

"Huh? Did you say British accent?"

John sounded shocked on the other end of the line. "She's been using it all night." He explained.

"I haven't heard that since I was nine."

There was something sadly nostalgic about a polished voice. What had started off as Reese asking about a cover ended with the soldier completely thrown off by realizing that it was genuinely authentic. "You're saying that it's real?" He asked.

"It's real, though I thought she got rid of it years ago … too distinctive for the places where we lived at the time."

"Sarah's not from America?" He might as well have been told that George Washington was French. On the other line, the typing began again.

"She was born here, just wasn't raised here, and didn't come back from England till she went to college. And the rest as they say … is history."

"How come she's never mentioned that before?"

"Are you kidding? You could just about fill the Grand Canyon with the things mom doesn't tell us about her past. The only reason I know what I do is because I looked up her records at the public library when she was in Pescadero and even those were incomplete."

It was an alien enigma to a mystery that haunted every person who ever heard the name uttered. Sarah Connor might have been the most implausible familiar stranger that Derek and the world had ever met. She neither existed before John Connor or after his ascension in the annuals of history. She was the brightest candle in the wind that existed only for several improbable flickers before being snuffed out to live on in legend. It was better this way he guessed, with no past and no future, Skynet would never get a fix on her. And yet it bothered Derek.

CRISH!

Just above the sound of hipster music echoing off the walls, there was a sharp piercing noise of fiberglass breaking upstairs. Derek immediately was sent into action, hand reaching for his Glock in his waistband. His hazel eyes were drawn up toward the shadows at the top of the stairs. He was confident that Sarah could take care of herself, but his gut told him that there was something wrong.

"What was that?"

Derek was calm. "Party … run the net, and we'll talk when we get back." He hung up on John. He looked back and thankfully for the time being no one was present that noticed anything. But that would soon change when the thumps on the ceiling began to pound on a rhythmic base that was bound to be noticed by someone.

He quickly dashed up the stairs to the upper rooms. The top floor was separated by two wings, with a bathroom at the top of the steps. Each wing had two bedrooms, a linin closet, and a bathroom. Derek was sure he'd never seen so many goddamn bathrooms in his life. He heard the thumping coming from the Master to his right.

Brandishing his Glock, Derek attacked the hallway procedurally, checking each corner in every room. A pink and white girl's bedroom was clear, except for a creepy gorilla doll sitting on top of the satin comforter. Grod was lucky he didn't get his stuffing inside out. The bathroom with the frosted glass shower and pharos bathtub was clear as well. Wealth was wasted on the rich.

Outside of the master bedroom was where he heard the commotion. It was a mattress that was springing up and down violently hammering the floor. For just a split second Derek's mind went somewhere dark, somewhere guilty, knowing that wasn't the way Sarah operated.

CRASH!

He threw the door open with a foot and checked each corner quickly, before moving in. The room looked like a picture in a furniture store advertisement, rustic and tropical with fake plants all over the corners. Africa or the idea of it really hit home with this Horne woman. The four poster bed with see through drapes was rocking back and forth violently, hemorrhaging throw pillows and stuffed animals. On top of the Silk comforter Sadie was pinned down, her arm twitching in helpless resistance. Mounted on top of her was Sarah. It was a confusing sight that was not remedied by the blood soaked knuckles that continued to pound mercilessly on the older woman. Blood arced into the air as Sarah Connor lifted one fist from a ruined face and rocketed another vicious blow with her other.

"Sarah!" Derek called in shock, lowering his gun. "Sarah!" He called louder, but the woman kept hitting and hitting. Finally he placed his gun on safety and rushed over to the 5'5 raven haired wrecking ball. Under tread were scattered papers of research that fluttered off the bed and to the floor.

"Sa-r-ah!" Derek grabbed her off the woman. At the sudden restraining, Sarah Connor made a frightening animalistic sound and twisted and snarled as he lifted her into the air off the bed and back on her feet. Before he had time to defend himself she grabbed his jacket and drove him across the room, slamming him into the wall next to the open doorway.

The woman was soaked in sweat head to toe. Her tight gray pants had a wet spot on their crotch where Sarah had urinated herself out of some great unknown fear that had gripped her. There were small bleeding cuts on the right side of her face where Sadie must have hit her with a lamp. But what Derek noticed was her eyes, those sharp emerald jewels were now wide and terrified, not a part of a conscious world. The woman ripped and pulled trying to get at him as a cornered animal might. The soldier drew his pistol again, turning it upside down, threatening quietly to hit her with the grip like a hammer. "Sarah! Sarah, it's me! Sarah!" He was seconds from clocking her unconscious when he finally looked her in the eye and she made the recognition. Like a fighter plane catching the cables on an aircraft carrier deck, Sarah's mind had landed in the here and now.

"Derek?" Her entire chest was heaving. "Derek?" She ran a clammy hand over his stubble and let it fall under jacket to cup his heart. He let out a relieved breath, lowering the gun to his side. "Derek?" She repeated and this time he nodded. She bit her lip and parroted the motion, a single tear falling down her cheek.

She looked vulnerable and frightened standing all alone in the middle of the room. Of all the things that she was, Sarah Connor showed in those few seconds of being completely exposed, that she was human. And that was why she came to him and crushed herself into his chest. He was cautious, but eventually he held her tightly as she collected herself in wheezed heaves. He'd like to think that he was any port in a storm, but he knew that somewhere deep inside she saw hazel eyes, Reese eyes, and she ran to them. He'd be damned before he turned his back on anyone who loved his family that much. As she burrowed in his chest, Derek watched the crumpled body of the woman lying motionless on her king sized bed as he ran his hand through sweat soaked tresses of long tussles of black curls.

Eventually it was Sarah who broke the hug, some steel returning to sharp eyes. He had gotten her back. He pushed off the wall and away from her lingering touch. The destination he stalked was where Sadie Horne lay motionless. Lifting her arm, he somehow knew there was no pulse. At fifty years old the woman had been beaten to death in a drunken mess. He ran a hand over his face, letting it rest on his chin. He squatted as if he was weighted with some unknown pressure that was crushing him. "Christ, Sarah …" he muttered to himself through hands now cupped over his nose and mouth.

"What is all of this?"

Derek was scrubbing his face when she asked the question. He paused and rounded on her from his crouched position. "What?" he asked. But Sarah Connor wasn't paying attention. She looked completely bewildered as she quietly, timidly studied their location in confusion.

"Where are we, Derek?" She turned her back to him.

"You don't know where we are?" He asked seriously, standing to full height.

Sarah shook her head. The woman for once wasn't defensive or guarded. She was simply lost, confused, and frightened. He had an idea of what happened when he saw the cuts on Sarah's pale face. Sadie Horne must have hit her hard enough with that lamp to send Sarah into a feral rage. But what he didn't know was what had happened that had caused the Housewife to hit Sarah with the lamp in the first place. He saw that whatever it was that started the fight, it was enough to scare the mother of all destiny into pissing herself. But when he saw the way Sarah was looking at him, he couldn't fault her for whatever had happened. After all the things he had done in his life, how could he judge her?

"It doesn't matter. We need to get out of here." He started moving toward the door.

For the first time Sarah had noticed the body lying on the bed. As Derek stopped next to her, he watched her looked down at her bloody knuckles. It was starting to become clear what she had done. If she was frightened before, she was terrified now.

"What have I done, Reese?"

By now Derek Reese had become accustom to those looks. From the first time that Kyle broke Mrs. Lake's window with a baseball, to Kansas bunker falling to the Machines on Wilshire, and John sitting in the cab of the truck as he was told the fate of Martin Bedell. Now it was Sarah, standing by the woman she had murdered. They had that same helpless expression. All of them were in over their head and had turned to Derek for help. That was because they all knew that Derek Reese was a hard ass that was as cold as an ice maker. They all hated and bemoaned his firm hand. But when it was all said and done they all turned to him because he could make the tough decisions no else could when it truly mattered. He had cursed being an older brother all his life till the moment the bombs dropped. Now it had become first nature to protect his family. When Sarah Connor looked to him in her vulnerability he didn't flinch away, and didn't hesitate. She was all he had, she and John. He'd protect her from anything in this world, even herself.

"Nothing anyone else wouldn't have done. You understand me?!" He cupped her cheek. Sarah was nearly despondent but she nodded all the same. "Anyone would've done the same thing, Sarah." There was a black reassurance that was as dark as it got when he saw that she had found comfort in the assurance of one who had killed before. There was enough shame and self-loathing to go around as he intertwined his fingers with hers.

Escaping into the night he reluctantly led her into the darkness and shadows of a City of Angels where in a town this bent, you could get away with anything …

Even murder.

---

Benjamin Horne, born, Modesto California, 1957. He stayed out of anything but the Honor Roll till the late 70's. From Berkley he became an accountant for Apple in the early days, made most of his money word of mouth. Not surprising that the companies he worked for were audited twice, once before he got there, and then again once he left. The company usually was in hot water when they hired him and got out of it when he was done. They used to call him "Merlin" a true Tax wizard. Yeah, more like a wizard in skivvy ass robes. He got into the Hollywood rackets in the late 80's, had an eye for fly by nights. He'd work his magic till the clients' accounts dried up in the process of their fifteen minutes on the Hollywood fast lane and the Feds came knocking. Horne ended up collecting the back end of "Unpaid" invoices. Clean scam. Since then he's theft up words, latching on to much bigger sharks. Steady and more prestigious clients that in public feel that the one percent owe the poor, and yet they hire Benjamin Horne to find them loopholes while they go shoot their HBO shows across the world. They're sure bleeding something, but it ain't hearts.

Sadie Jones, professional activist, Real Housewife of … somewhere expensive. She has a rap sheet of petty misdemeanors that she touts proudly to anyone that'll listen … that's a short list. She was born in Iowa in 1959. Parents joined the counter-culture movement, father moved to Canada when his number got called up during "Tet". He probably should've told his wife and daughter where he was going. Not that they'd have an address to be forwarded too. Sadie lived in the back of a van with her mother, an Aunt Sage and Uncle … Thornrose, original. They drove across America, preaching, protesting, and growing things they shouldn't. They had a merry time playing a game of 'how many people they can piss off in the country'. Aunt Sage dies when she comes down with a lethal dose of buck shot in the pelvis in Hargrove Mississippi in 1973. Killed by Doris Williamson, a seventy-six year old black grandmother of a twenty-seven year old simple boy named Ronald Williamson. Local kids were tormenting the poor guy. Sage ran them off, took him behind a local malt shop to treat his injuries and tried to pop his cherry. Love is free, until you're caught assaulting a woman's retarded grandson while on a drug high from abusing sedatives. Ugly business, Williamson was broken out of the small town jail and killed before being transported to trial up north. The mob of bed sheet wearers was never found, not surprising. They might never have loved the Space Cadets, but avenging Black on White murder was still a moral imperative in Hargrove. In 1976 LAPD responded to a call of a strange van parked outside a Burger King. Inside the back, the police discovered Thornrose, Sadie Jones, and her mother surrounded by a cloud of marijuana smoke pursuing a three way with the girl in the middle. They got Thornrose and Mrs. Jones on kiddy-rape beefs, and they've been very popular in their respective cell blocks in San Quen since. After two years of foster care and a year in Canada, Sadie Jones wised up that the hippy movement was over after being expelled from Berkley; a hard feet in itself. She ended up getting cozy with accountant Benjamin Horne at a drum circle at Steve Job's place. A life on the road had taught her being a bomb thrower doesn't mean she couldn't have the nice things in life. Horne and Jones were married in April of 1979 in San Francisco and the rest as they say … is history.

John Connor had been digging through these people's lives for most of the night. He'd found that Horne had several off shore accounts, and a shell company or two. It smelled pretty bad, but the problem was that John Connor was only sixteen, and these numbers were just as advertised … numbers. He was sure something illegal was going on and that there might be a way of getting their money back, but he wasn't an accountant. He might be able to drop by a university co-op, buy some books. Cameron could learn finance, but it would take time even for a cyborg to understand Horne's chicken scratch bullshit. And something told John that time was of the essence here.

What was obvious from what John could find and organize from the dragnet was that there was a name that kept popping up around large sums of cash from accounts that were in the red. The benefactor of these loans was Mansa Udaku. The name sounded familiar to John, so he checked the assets and found that he was a silent but big player in many activities in LA and Hollywood. For the last seven years the man hadn't missed once in investment. Every article called the man a Midas, every stock he touches turns to gold. There were some who thought he was psychic, since he seemed to be able to see the profit before there was even a market that existed.

In such a short time of being a Kingpin this guy bought up a hob knob club in Hollywood called "The Sea Court" right on the Boulevard. He owned a management firm on Wilshire for boxers, and a gym in Le Brea. There was also the talent office on Sunset for models, and bank rolling of several plastic surgeon offices around the city. You add the pawn shops in the diamond district and you got a man who has the means for a lot of things in this town. Managers finding fighters in South Central who'll take a fall for the boss, and when they wash up take thug jobs as experienced enforcers rather than limping back to Compton penniless. Girls who sign up for modeling jobs, that quickly turns to prostitution rings, with plastic surgeons that'll cut them to look like Fox or Alba for the special client that has money to buy the fantasy at The Sea Court. And of course the Pawn shops being fronts for high score and class fencing for thieves. The oldest sins perpetrated in the newest ways of this technological age.

If John was going to figure anything from this, Horne and his wife weren't looking to payback Udaku. The brain donors were trying to get out of town on the generous donations of a curious public enthralled by dystopian Disney advertising. It looks like the Horne's got in deep with the wrong guy, but a guy not made of metal or whose brain is run by server farms. The youth thought that in a just world this wouldn't be any of their business. But since his mother just helped donate to the Chinese fire drill, it just became a priority. Cameron was already buying ski masks in preparation for the bank heists in another Sarah Connor made disaster.

Three plasma screens crescented John. They blinked and streamed with spread sheets, LAPD files, and Los Angeles Examiner articles, each vying for his attention. The young man leaned back in a pleather office chair with a creak and rubbed his eyes tiredly. He didn't need this kind of stress right now and he was getting more and more frustrated as the screens flashed in the dark nursery that John and Cameron had turned into a mini office. With a squeak, the young man turned away from the desk before he smashed his screens.

It was a fool's folly to walk into this situation again. It was one thing when it was small timers like Sarkissian, But Mansa Udaku was a Kingpin. Even when they went after the Armenians it was for the Turk. His mom had now gotten them entangled in Hollywood politics and underworld dealings all because "possibly" there was a lead. He turned his eyes over toward the spot to his right. Last weekend Sarah Connor had been standing there ordering him to make the purchase for her and Derek's buy in. Behind her, his uncle was begging her not to do it … oh who was he kidding? He was begging John, the trigger man. Even from the doorway Cameron looked iffy about the whole thing. But John caved to Sarah's pressure all the same and here they were.

He felt like Derek lost respect for him that day, not that there was any to begin with, but if there was, it was on a train to Fresno. But what was worse was the unreadable look Cameron had given him as he left the room. Some people would say that it was insane to think that a machine would be able to express emotion, but even under her stoicism, John felt that even the girl he loved was disappointed in him. Since then, he'd been mad at everyone. He'd felt as if Derek didn't give him enough credit, that Cameron should trust him, and most egregious was how taken for granted he felt by the whole episode. He had gone out on a limb, bared Derek and Cameron's lower opinion of him, and all his mother did was act like a spoiled brat that was entitled to tell him what to do and think like he was her servant or worse.

He felt guilty to say that it was how he was feeling of late with his mother. The longer they spent together since she escaped Pescadero, the more he felt that he was living with some spoiled stranger. Someone who says she was there for all the important things, and asks the favors of someone who was important to him, but was only using those memories as means to an end to get what she wanted.

It was hard to believe now, but there was a time when his mother was different. Sarah Connor had always been tough, brooding, and decisive. But she was also thoughtful, gentle, and though it wasn't everyday there were times when she was even fun. When Derek called him and asked about her accent he had been swimming in memories. Smiles were easier, hugs more frequent, and love easier to find. He thought of a little boy with reading text books, sitting in her lap under motel sheets before bed as they went over it together. John learned the word, and Sarah learned the correct use of it. Flat became apartment, Lift became elevator, and no more tricking her over the phone that he had biscuits for breakfast when he had girl scout cookies. When she'd slip up mid-conversation he would reprimand her with a stern "American mamma" and she'd give him a dirty look, but eventually smile at her little professor. To him that was home, that voice, those nights spent together. If he'd known now what he didn't then, he'd let her keep that accent of hers. Because three years in an asylum for the criminally insane had returned to him a familiar stranger, who acted and talked different, if she talked to him at all without giving him orders or hell.

Both Derek and Cameron had grudged him for not standing up to his mother, and maybe he kicked himself for not doing so either. But since Pescadero, John had been waiting for his mother to somehow return from that place. He'd give her slack, and then rope, slack, and then rope, hoping that she'd pull herself out. But all she seemed to do was hang them with it. He'd placed all his hope and trust in the woman, because he always had. Remembering all the times, good and bad, that he and his mom had gone through together, Sarah had earned his trust out of the necessity of being all he ever had. But with each failure, one after another, and the darkness within him after the year he'd had, John began to wonder with a deep sadness if this was what growing up felt like, wanting back things that would never come. It was the sober realization that his mother was no longer who he remembered her being. The concept filled him with a lonesomeness that hit him right to the bottom of his heart. Because it meant that he had no home now. That John Connor was ready to take back his trust from a woman who had meant so much to him all his life.

The walls seemed so close in the nursery all the sudden, sitting in the dark, watching the shadows on the windowless room dance with each flicker of the plasma screens. He turned in his chair and transferred files to the flash drive and printed the useful documents for briefs. When he was done, he encrypted the systems, and erased his digital footprints. Then, he got out of there before he suffocated.

Out in the hall he took a deep breath and felt the weight of all his private musings and angst pull him to the boards. There was nothing he wouldn't do for some sort of reassurance or comfort. But it wouldn't come while the mix of music, snickers, and instruction echoed to the upper level. He had nearly forgotten about what was going on downstairs. He wished he could continue his ignorance as he moved to his room. But he stopped himself and looked down at the file in hand. It was suspicious enough that he had locked himself in the nursery, but if he didn't come down to at least make an appearance it wouldn't go unnoticed. Tapping the file against his head, John gave a long sigh and moved down the stairs. He paused between the top and the first landing to watch what was going on.

Then he wished he hadn't.

Standing behind the couch, manning the stereo, was their neighbor Kacy. The pretty blond in a linin halter top and worn jeans was swaying her hips, as if demonstrating what should be happening. "No, baby, he leads, not you … don't look at me like that, I don't make the rules." She chuckled. As the slow romantic music flowed with an air of melancholy, John watched a short boy with a black button down and skater jeans sway awkwardly, his hands on slim hips. Accompanying the Hispanic boy was a slender girl, straight backed, and elegant looking. The beauty's long chocolate hair was curled into twisty ringlets as part of a new look she was trying out. She wore a small black shirt that bared her sleek midriff and a blue jean skirt.

John's face fell and eyes lightened as he watched Cameron's golden eyes lock with Morris's muddy brown as they box stepped across the living room rug. He'd never been more in love in that moment with someone that felt a thousand miles away when she was only a dozen paces from him. It was something in the music, the flourish of her hair in the lamplight as she sleekly moved across the carpet. He watched her eyes focused with a pleasant expression. John's fell on her slender arms wrapped around the back of Morris's neck and the quiet ghosted smirk of enjoyment that came whenever she danced.

It was part of Kacy's prom boot camp. Since she had heard of John and Riley's breakup, she had unloaded her vicarious aspirations for the perfect night all on Morris and Cameron. She was a woman that was bent on making Morris and Cameron a thing. Being of the same generation as Kacy, just eight years removed, John had seen those movies as well. The Disney Saturday night specials were the geeky, goofy, weirdo gets the beautiful girl and they have a prince and princess waltz at mid-court with all envious eyes on them. He'd tell the woman to shove off, that Cameron was spoken for. But he held his tongue, knowing even a slip up could shake this family to its foundation. So John and Cameron's secret relationship would have to take a back seat to outside medaling for the sake of the façade of normalcy in a home that was far from it.

Cameron was the first to break eye contact and find him watching. He could only imagine what his face must have looked like to see her and Morris making eyes, because Cameron almost physically winced under his almost inhuman gaze of wrath. From there it was all a snowballing avalanche. The smaller kid looked up from his nervous but love struck gaze to find John watching them. In the way he unhanded Cameron one might have thought he had his hand on a greasy sizzling grill. An end table scrapped loudly on the wooden floor when Morris backed up on it. Finally Kacy looked up and as aloof as ever only smirked.

"Ease up, kiddo, I'm chaperoning here." She chuckled. "No one's honor is in jeopardy." She assured him.

John's glared. "Those two statements conflict with each other." He snarked and took a deep breath before Morris hit his knees and begged for mercy.

The woman only smirked bitterly at the whip in his wit watching John descend the stairs. "Oh hardy har, emo kid." She swatted his arm as he passed.

They watched the young man lay the Horne case file on a corner table next to a pile of intel closed by rubber bands. With a positive step forward, Cameron addressed him. "Kacy has been teaching us how to dance." She supplied. The atmosphere was one of John catching her in another's bed.

But the young man didn't turn to face her. "Is that what she's calling it?" He jabbed rhetorically as he dug out another rubber band from a drawer. The playful lilts in his hard voice made Morris stop sweating and his heart stabilize in his narrow chest.

"It's a working progress." He chuckled. "All I know how to do is mosh and I don't think Cameron would last long in "the pit" if you know what I'm saying." He hoped to share a moment with the girl, but the cyborg was focused intently on John's back as he squared away briefs.

"You'd be surprised." He grinned to himself. An image in his mind conjured dozens of metal heads lying in the mud groaning while Cameron stands alone watching the thrash band like they were curious stick insects.

The blond crossed her arms looking at John suspiciously. "Hey if you and Riley just would've stayed the course, I'd be teaching you how to bust a move too." She looked perpetually annoyed with the boy who had gone fifty shades of dark since the time he stole cable for her.

"I wouldn't need it." He shot back. The snap of the rubber band on folder put a poignant period on his point. He tried not to look at Cameron as he moved to the kitchen to get something fruity to drink.

"Oh, yeah, than why don't you show us, Ricky Martin?"

John stopped and did what he told himself he wouldn't. His hard emerald eyes flew straight to Cameron standing and watching him from behind. He never thought how much he wanted it, wanted her, till that moment. The same bullshit Disney channel movies on some static TV in a crappy motel room came flashing to him. He was the same lonely boy perpetually waiting for his mom to come home. Mid-court, the shiny princess dress, all the jealous jocks watching. It was the closest and first best understanding of love that John Connor ever had. If there ever was a wish he could ask for, it was to have that moment for himself with the girl loved. There would be no wedding, no formals for the two of them. It could be years and years of watching from the shadows, stealing minutes and seconds behind people's backs. All he wanted was just one perfect moment on one perfect night to hold her in his arms and dance to some recycled 80's track. Just to know what it was like, to know those feelings he got at the end of those movies were real and that they were for him as much as everyone else his age.

He bowed his head under golden curious eyes and turned to Kacy who had her hands on hips expectantly. "I don't dance." He said seriously with a broodingly hard tone. Turning away from Morris and Cameron, John began walking away.

"How come?!" She called after him, annoyed at the mysterious tough guy act.

He shrugged as he dropped the case file on the dining room table. "Tried it once, didn't like it." He said with a stiff causal tone disappearing into the kitchen.

When the swing door closed he let out a large sigh and stumbled to the island. Bracing himself against it, he panted. His face stung as adrenaline rushed through his veins like lines of marching soldier ants with needle legs. It was becoming harder day after day to control himself. Emotions ran deep within John Connor, and lately all of them were bordered by a blackness that was always leading back to anger. He had tried hard to not let it control him, but his resentment of everything and everyone in his life was only getting worse now that he had started this relationship with Cameron. The more he spent time away from her, the more he was forced to keep his distance, the more the rage built inside him. It was getting harder and harder to hide.

This shadow of greed shaded his souls some nights. It made him feel crazy, guilty, and self-conscious to feel the things he felt. John Connor had never been in love before, nor had he ever had a girlfriend. He was making all of this up as he went. But he was scared when he was like this. To feel this way, so angry just to see someone touch her. He knew this wasn't love or he hoped this wasn't. On his worst nights he counted the wrongs and double standards placed on him and spat venom on all the people he loved for it. The truth was that in that moment when he came down the stairs he didn't just want to kill his friend and Kacy, he hated them for being here, and he hated them for depriving him of Cameron. He knew it wasn't right to feel this way. It felt like he had some sort of infection on a wound that he thought was healing but was starting to turn under the stitches.

Thoughts turned toward his mother and that night in July several years ago. She wasn't going to just kill Miles Dyson, she was going to blow him away. A study in hyperbole notwithstanding, that night Sarah Connor wasn't out to just kill the creator of Skynet, she was going to eviscerate him and his family. He'd seen the hate in her, the darkness that she embraced like a lover. She let it have control over her till the moment she couldn't pull the trigger. Since then, he had watched her fight it, reclaim parts of herself inch by inch. But he could still see it most nights. The anger, the deep soul killing hatred in the way she looked at everyone behind her emerald rapier eyes. Yet, it could never dominate her, because Sarah never knew what it was like to take a life. She had come so close and yet it never happened. Sarah hadn't killed while under the influence.

But John had.

He had touched that same darkness and let it inside him. But unlike his mom, who was still pure of heart, even with all the things done to her that she lived with and never told a soul. John Connor murdered the beast he was after. Not only did he murder it, he stuck it down with a savage hatred and spat on its bloody corpse when he killed it. He was slowly learning that there was no going back after that. His enemy wasn't human, an albino ape, and yet he had ended another life. He killed Sarkissian to protect the woman he loved, and the ape to protect his soul mate. How easier will the next one be? How long before he justifies another one? He looked at these feelings as if it was another entity, some other facet of emotion that wasn't him. But the most frightening concept to him in his most private moments of self-reflection was to think, to know, that this was who he was all along. In the darkest moments, in the most private places of his mind, John Connor was afraid of what he had become in the justification of protecting the women he loved and in turn what he was capable of when faced with the protection of all humanity.

Suddenly the swing door opened and Morris came inside. He looked flustered and out of sorts as he grabbed his denim jacket off the counter under the phone. So sudden was his overwhelmed state that he was startled to find John standing in the mostly dark kitchen.

"John! Oh man, you could've killed me!' He chuckled hurriedly.

"What's going on?" John asked seriously.

Morris slipped on his jacket. "My, ugh, grandma is in the hospital." He explained.

A shower of self-loathing and guilt wetted John at the way he had acted earlier. "Hey, sorry, is she alright?" He walked over to the boy.

Morris gave a nervous chuckle. "Yeah, I mean, I guess … I don't know why they called me. I didn't know I was a contact … but anyway she twisted her hip or something during bingo." He explained as they both exited the kitchen. "It's wrestling night, I didn't even know she played bingo … I mean if she was going to lie you'd think it would be about watching wrestling instead of playing Bingo at the Lincoln Heights Rec?" he complained.

A knowing look came over John's face as he escorted the punk rock fan to where Kacy was gathering her things. She slipped on black leather waist jacket and turned to John. "Hey, Morris's grandma got into a bingo accident." She explained while pushing up her sleeves.

There was a private look of amusement that he hid well. "So I've heard." He placed a consolatory hand on his friend's shoulder.

"Yeah, well, I'm going to drive him to the hospital over there … since Cameron picked him up." She explained.

John walked with them to the front door and opened it for them. Morris paused as Kacy strode down the tile steps to the gravel drive way. "Hey can you tell Cameron when she gets out of the bathroom that I'm sorry to run out on her?" There was a painful sincerity to his comments that John didn't have the heart to mock. So he only placed his hand on his shoulder again and gave a nod of approval.

"Later, dude." The two boys clasped hands with a pop, and bumped opposite shoulders.

When the boy got down the first landing, John closed the door slowly. He let silence fill the home again as Kacy pulled away. When they were gone he stood in the doorway and couldn't hide the shit eating grin on his face as he stared at the door for a moment longer.

"Bingo accident?" He asked to the figure standing at the middle of the stairs.

When he turned Cameron seemed expressionless. She looked down at her boots before she looked to John. "It seemed harmless, but effective." She looked back toward him genuinely. He placed his hands in his pockets as he walked toward the stairs as the cyborg descended to meet him. When they reached each other he stood at the bottom, while she was on the second step from the last.

"Bingo accident?" He repeated with a bigger smile of amusement, trying the excuse like a new shirt in a dressing room.

Cameron frowned. "I did not want to cause him undo stress. The "nurse" simply explained to him that his grandmother won a gift certificate to a steak house, was over jubilant, and pulled something." She explained. John chuckled despite himself as he rubbed the back of his neck tiredly.

"It got him out of the house, did it not?" She pointed out.

He nodded. "Let's just hope they don't think about it too much." He looked up at her.

There was a long silence as they exchanged quiet looks. Then slowly John took a step forward and swallowed up his cyborg protector in his arms. He buried his face in her chest as he lifted her off the stairs giving her the customary spin before setting her down. Wrapping her arms around his neck they traded a passionate kiss like old lovers who had spent so many wasted lifetimes away from one another.

When they broke apart it was with a smack of moist cherry lip balm. He looked into her golden eyes and let her wash over him before burying his nose into her cheek and nuzzled it. Gently Cameron ran her hand through the back of his hair leaning into him.

"When I saw you on the stairs, I knew that they had over stayed their welcome." She said in a docile voice in his ear as John kissed the mole over her eyebrow.

Rigidness fell over him suddenly and slowly he left a peck on her eyebrow. Cameron felt it just by the contact of his skin on hers as he broke apart from her. There was a sudden guilt that flashed on the young man's handsome but brooding features as he faced his love.

"Did I say something wrong?" She asked. John didn't meet her gaze as he rubbed the cool skin on her exposed waist.

"No …" He shook his head and walked away.

Cameron seemed bothered by the action. "Was it the wrong thing to do?" She asked. It killed John how innocent she seemed and how willing she was to fault herself for his issues. All of it was making him feel worse as he gripped the love seat and stared at the book shelf.

"It's not you …" He sighed and leaned into the couch. He turned to check on her and she watched him expectantly. "Look …" he shook his head. "When I came down the stairs …" he started.

"You were upset." She finished for him. "Because I was with Morris." She confirmed.

He wanted to deny it, fill himself up with this noble idea that he wasn't some jealous jackass that was right on par with every guy his age. But he couldn't. "Yeah …" He nodded.

"I understand, that's why I sent him and Kacy away." She nodded.

It made John feel worse. "I know … but you shouldn't have. Not on my account." She looked suddenly very confused. He sighed again. "I saw your face, I know you enjoy dancing … you were enjoying yourself." He explained.

"Yes, it is always pleasurable."

John nodded. "Exactly, so you shouldn't have to stop it just because I didn't feel comfortable with you and Morris … dancing together. If you were enjoying yourself you shouldn't have to take me into account." He felt suddenly so guilty for everything. He was guilty for this darkness, guilty for Morris's unneeded stress, and guilty for wasting Kacy's gas money.

"But that's my job." Cameron was confused. "I was built solely to take you into account, always." She continued.

"But if you're enjoying yourself …"

"It is irrelevant what I feel or experience if it hurts you, John. I trust you feel the same for me."

"Of course!"

Cameron tilted her head. "Then I don't understand why we're having this conversation." She tightened her cheek.

A glare was leveled at her as John crossed his arms. "That's … not the … point." He gave a long sigh of frustration. Even in his own damn life John didn't have the privilege of beating the hell out of himself without someone doing it for him over something completely different. What was the point of quibbling over never having a wedding for themselves when he felt like they'd been married for thirty years already.

There was a very Sarah Connor look to her son as he glanced over at Cameron with a private look of grudging affection under a scowl. Eventually he pushed off the back of the couch and walked to the stereo system. Interested in what he was doing Cameron walked over to watch.

"What are you doing?" She asked as he shuffled through the disks, reading the back of the cases that belonged to the previous owner of the home. When he saw a track on one of the CDs he suddenly smiled with a sad nostalgic lilt. He removed the disk from its case and opened the turntable.

"Making it up to you." He replied as he placed the disk and pushed the tray back inside.

"Making what up to me?" She watched him fiddle with the stereo for a moment longer.

John turned toward her. "You were enjoying dancing, so why let the good times stop when you still have a partner?" He took her hand.

"I thought you didn't dance?" She asked in confusion.

Suddenly a bombastic opening of a big band number from the 40's came over the speakers. "I make special exceptions." He smirked gently. With a lift of her arm and a twirl, he spun her into his embrace.

The two began to sway together to the clarinets that evened out and slowed the old song. It was as if the two had done it a hundred times over a thousand timelines as they moved across the floor. Anticipation of the steps was all muscle memory ingrained in the DNA and circuitry of the two lovers. Their chemistry guided by some unseen energy that seemed to have always existed that had drawn them to one another, before they even knew each other's names or very existence.

"Why do robins sing in December,
Long before the springtime is due?
And even though it's snowing,
Violets are growing,
I know why and so do you."

Cameron watched with a surprised fascination when John began to serenade her, keeping up perfectly with the female standard singer on the CD. His hard green eyes lightened as they cut a path to the center of the living room. In Cameron's arms the darkness that had so consumed John Connor's fears and future seemed to disappear as if she alone was some ironic ethereal creature that pulled him into god's light from the shadows he had lingered in for so long. Even in the light that shined on the suddenly so tired figure with the youthful face there was a reprieve of happiness the closer he held her.

"Why do breezes sigh ev'ry evening,
Whispering your name as they do?
And why have I the feeling
Stars are on my ceiling?
I know why and so do you."

John's voice was gravely and yet it was so balanced that it made Cameron along with all those that had ever heard him wonder if destiny had chosen the wrong path for the young man. She kept step with him as they remained stationary for the rest of the song, captured in one another's eyes, seeking shelter from the outside in the world that they created for one another where there was no one but John and Cameron. No tomorrow, no yesterday, just as the two of them in this moment, in these arms.

"How do you know this song?" Cameron asked.

There was a strange nostalgia that seemed attached to whatever memory played through John's brain. He bit his lip and shrugged. "When I was little, I lived several months in this ramshackle room at "The Victory Motel" this sort of 40's hold over. Mom was with these survivalist nut jobs, and she wanted me close, and it was the only place close enough but "Not too close" in mom logic. Anyway, so I lived next door to this guy, and every day around five or six just as I was doing my English homework, he'd play this song on his record player." John shook his head at the memory. "And I'd get so sick of it … and finally I went over to tell him to turn his bullshit off. So I knock on the door and this old man, World War II vet, opens the door and I feel like a jackass." Cameron gave him a smirk when she saw the humbled smile on the youth's face as he spoke. "So he invites me in, apologizes, and explains to me over a Coke why he plays it every day at the same time at a particular volume." He nodded.

"Why?" Cameron seemed more fascinated than any one person might at the mundane story.

There was a glassy look in John's eyes as he focused on Cameron absently. "Well …" He cleared his throat. "During the war, he had hit it off with this British nurse in New Guinea. He had told her all about Los Angeles, and that there was this great motel on the outskirts of these beautiful hills. After a night of dancing and drinking she asked him for the address, what time he'd get there, and which room he'd be staying at when all of it was over? He told her, but just before the first kiss the Japanese surprise air raided the base and they got separated. He never saw her again after that. So after V-J Day he drove over to this motel and used his pension to buy out the room. So every day since, at the time he promised to be there, he played this song, hoping that if she ever comes around she hears the first song they danced to and know where he is." He cleared his throat and shook his head with just a sorrowful lilt in his smirk.

Cameron watched John for a long a moment. "What happened after that?" She asked.

"I sat outside with him every day. When you're a kid there's more room for fairytale … maybe today would be the day, you know?" He nodded in some private sorrow that still stung freshly.

The cyborg tilted her head. "Did she ever show up?" She asked.

There was a hard cynical feeling that overcame him. But the longer he held his protector, feeling her so close to him. He began counting all the impossibilities and inconsistencies that had to have happened in time and space to make this very moment a reality. Then, he only smiled again. "Here's hoping, Angel." John reached up and touched her cheek, rubbing his thumb over the bone with a new sense of reverence.

There was a pensive look on the girls face as they quietly absorbed the music as John was cast a million miles away and yet every thought brought her closer. Finally the girl looked up again and captured his attention.

"When you're eighty-three, like that man in your story … will you still dance with me?" She asked without hesitation. There was a pure angelic innocence to her voice, never she flinching in the weight of the question she asked.

You could almost audibly hear the sound of John Connor's heart break as he looked so consumed by a love so deep that he felt the cyborg girl was hardly real. A smile directed by intense eyes of a deep attachment wrapped around her. He stammered a moment, emotion heavy on his vocal cords. He cleared his throat and ran a hand through her hair.

"At eighty-three I'd probably want too …" He winced. "But the likelihood of being able too is highly doubtful." He shrugged.

Intrigued by the issue, she thought for a moment before returning to him. "I could carry you." She offered.

John smiled and nodded slowly not looking anywhere else. "Then nothing would've changed." He chuckled. Instead of answering the cyborg laid her head against his broadening chest. Watching her, John leaned down and kissed his protector's forehead, before he closed his eyes and laid his head on top of hers. Together they swayed to the old song in the middle of their living room. It never dawned on John Connor; it was simply just intuition, that he was never homeless …

He just moved.

---

Acknowledgements

"I know why (And So Do You)" – Glenn Miller & His Orchestra