Thank you guys, you're the best! I really didn't expect to gain such a positive response with this story. I'm no writer (especially not in English, LOL) and to reach out to so many people … well, it's simply amazing.
The next chapter: I promise it's the last one dedicated exclusively to 'revelations'. From the next one there'll be even more fluffy moments, silly action, teenage behavior … the story is going to lighten up and they're going to do what they came to do – winter activities.
This chapter might be a bit surprising … or not? I used some stuff from the show in it – as a 'template'. If the last section of this chapter confuses you - I'd just like to remind you that after I finish this story, I'll post a prequel to explain why Cameron and John act like they do from the beginning of this story.
Chapter 18 - Revelations & Reveries, Part Four
After John and Cameron left, Sarah sat unmoving for few more minutes, her face hidden in her palms and completely lost in her thoughts. She was still trying to devour everything John and Cameron just told her. Her son was in love with a machine! Even stranger - it seemed that this same machine was also in love with her son, no matter how impossible it might appear. But how was it even possible for a machine to feel anything for a human? To feel anything at all? Perhaps John was really right from the beginning as he insisted that Cameron was different than other machines. Perhaps she really was different? But that much?
She groaned in confusion, anger and disbelief mixing in her and sending her from one feeling to another; from total aversion to acceptance. She knew that she'd have problems with ever accepting Cameron as her son's lover. HUGE problems! She could probably cope with her as a person, true … but accepting her as her son's love interest? She didn't know, but one thing she knew for sure: should she oppose their relationship, John could easily turn away from her. He was every inch of the way as stubborn as herself; perhaps even more.
Unable to come to a clear conclusion, she suddenly felt the urge to have another shot of tequila. Great! Now I'm going to become a drunk if this doesn't stop. But deep down inside she knew that it was her, who had to change, who had to accept the changes in her life. She just wasn't ready for it. Not yet.
She decided to go down to the bar to have a drink. Maybe Derek was there too and she could tell him the news of his nephew, falling for a machine, Derek hated from the bottom of his heart. It would be definitely better if she'd be the one to tell him than John or even Cameron.
She descended down to the lobby and made her way to the bar in a daze, not really knowing what was happening around her. Only after entering the bar, she managed to return to the reality and to really take in what was going on. She scanned the tables and immediately found Derek, sitting in the back of the bar, close to the emergency exit, carefully sweeping the room every now and then. She almost smiled at the look. Old habits die hard! He probably isn't even aware of what he's doing.
She went over to him and noticed that he registered her appearance immediately after she entered the bar. When she came to him, she remained standing at one of the free chairs: "This seat taken?"
"Not really. I've only got ghosts as friends, so … go ahead." He groaned while holding a large mug of coffee in both his palms as if he would be trying to warm them with a hot brown concoction.
Sarah plopped down and cast an unbelieving look to the mug: "What? No alcohol?"
Derek snorted: "I've had enough of it for the whole vacation."
Sarah grinned at him: "Believe me, after I've told you what just happened, you'll need a drink. Not a beer. Something stronger!"
Derek searched her eyes for some explanation, but she tried to maintain the blank poker face as good as she could. Either she was very good at it, or Derek wasn't as perceptive as normally, for he obviously didn't find what he'd been looking for, so he turned his attention to the coffee mug for a second, before lifting his face towards her again and asking: "What did John do this time?"
Sarah laughed humorlessly, put her elbows on the table, intertwined her hands and leaned her chin on them: "I have to have a drink before I can tell you anything." She turned to search for the waiter, but Derek managed to spot one before her and showed him that they'd like to order. The waiter nodded and after he finished taking orders at one table, he came to them: "Good evening. What can I bring you?"
"Tequila. Make it triple!"
Derek looked at Sarah in astonishment. "Well, well, well. It looks like our boy did something really terrible this time. After a simple talk with your son you ask for a triple tequila." He shook his head with a grin.
"Don't, Reese! Just … don't!" Sarah growled.
Derek understood that he'd better be silent so he turned his attention to his coffee again and grinned to himself while waiting for Sarah to get her drink. He shook his head slightly and decided to remain silent until Sarah would get her drink.
After a minute, a waiter returned with a big glass of tequila, placed it in front of Sarah and asked: "Anything else, ma'am?"
Sarah grabbed the glass and nodded to the waiter: "Yes, repeat the same again!"
Waiter's eyes widened slightly in surprise but he managed to keep his face straight. "As you wish." He turned to fetch another glass of triple tequila for the lady who was obviously having some issues.
Sarah downed the spirit in one go and grimaced. Derek smiled at her: "So, Sarah, are you now ready to tell me what's bothering you?"
Sarah turned to him, inhaled deeply and shot: "John's in love with Cameron! And she's in love with him!"
Derek's jaw fell and he stared into Sarah's eyes incredulously: "You're joking, right?"
Sarah shook her head: "No, unfortunately not."
Derek managed to gather his thoughts: "What did you tell them?" He forced himself to act calm.
"What could I have told them? That I don't approve of it. What else?" Sarah shrugged.
"That's it? Just … you don't approve? What about puling John at his ears to make him come to reason? What about pulling the metal's chip and crushing it? What about forbidding them to be together in one room?" Derek's voice war gaining on volume but it still remained in normal limits.
Sarah looked at him: "As if anything of what you're proposing would be possible!" She snorted: "They're set on pursuing this relationship. And there's nothing you or me could do to change it."
Derek's eyes flashed at her in anger: "Oh, I wouldn't give up so quickly. There has to be a way to keep them apart!"
Now it was Sarah's turn to glare at him: "If there would be a way, I'd already found it, Derek! You've seen the results of our last try. I'm not making the same mistake again. If he wants to be in a relationship with her then I'll not stand in his way. But I will watch them very closely and if tin miss even looks at him the wrong way I'll make her regret the day she's been built. I'll find I way to destroy her no matter the costs!"
Suddenly anger disappeared from Derek's eyes and he laughed humorlessly: "Sarah, let me tell you something about the metal." He stopped, wiped his forehead with his hand as if he'd try to wipe away unpleasant memories, lifted his eyes again and looked into Sarah's green ones: "Few months before I came back in time, me and my group have been captured by the Skynet forces. We couldn't understand why the tin cans didn't kill us on the spot. Instead, we were brought into an old, abandoned house to interrogation. They put collars on us and chained us to the floor so that we weren't even able to sit. We could only lift our heads for few inches so that we could turn them to look the other way. They also bound our legs and our arms behind our backs so that we were unable to move anything else but our heads.
"They let us chained without water and food for two days and then the terminators began to pick the ones to be brought to interrogation. They've been away for hours and when they were brought back, they were wild with fear. Not beaten, not bloody, but more than obviously psychologically mistreated.
"On the third day they finally brought us some water. They put rusty dishes close to our heads but we remained chained to the floor and were forced to drink like dogs. They even brought us some food, but we had to eat it the same way. Picking it from the floor with our mouth. With our hands bound behind our backs there was no other way but to eat like animals."
Sarah's eyes widened at Derek's words and a soft gasp escaped her mouth. She wanted to ask something, but couldn't and like in a trance, she waited for him to continue.
Derek sighed heavily, his gaze dropped to his coffee and he waited for the waiter, who just returned with another glass of tequila for Sarah to put it in front of her. After the waiter went away and was far enough not to hear anything he continued: "After everyone else was already brought to the interrogation room, I began to ask myself why I was being left out all the time. I began to fear that they were preparing something very special for me. I was sure that the metal figured out that I was the commanding officer and that everyone else was just preparing them for my interrogation.
"I tried to find out what was going on during those interrogations but no one of my man would or could give me a straight answer. They all just mumbled something about music, horror and a girl staring into their eyes. No matter how hard I tried, that was about everything I could get out of them.
"On the fourth day they finally came for me. They unchained me, lifted me, for my legs weren't working exactly well after all the time I spent lying on the floor and dragged me down the stairs into the cellar. Before they brought me into the interrogation room I could hear some classical piano music. I don't know which composer it might have been … I've never learned anything about that king of music, I just know that it was classical and it was making my blood froze in my veins. God, it was purely terrifying!
"After they sat me down on the chair, I finally managed to look around and noticed that the room was very small, there were only two chairs at the opposite sides of an old, almost broken table. The music was coming from the room next door. After a while it stopped and my interrogator came in. I can tell you that I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw what just came in. A fragile, slender girl with curly long brown hair and big brown eyes. I knew her, but it couldn't have been the same girl I knew, for she's been missing for few weeks already. Whoever was missing for such a long time was definitely already dead. Then I looked into her eyes and saw coldness there. Then I realized that I was looking into the eyes of a terminator."
"Was it …?" Sarah gasped and couldn't finish her question.
Derek nodded without looking at her: "Yes, it was the metal, John's pursuing a relationship with." He finally lifted his head and looked at Sarah. She could see tears forming in his eyes as he was reliving the horror of the nightmare again. She put her hand over his: "I'm sorry Derek. What did she do to you? Did she torture you?"
Derek sniffed and wiped his eyes: "Not like you would think. She didn't even touch me! She just sat there in front of me, stared into my eyes and asked questions about John Connor and the camp. She stared at me unmoving and unblinking for six hours straight! Six hours, Sarah! Every time I tried to look away, the other terminators forced me to look back into her eyes. Cold, lifeless eyes! There was nothing in there, I felt like I'd be watching into the coldest Siberian winter."
Sarah gently squeezed his hand but in the next moment she said something she'd never thought possible: "But she changed. She's not that cold machine anymore. You saw it yourself."
Derek appeared to be completely lost in his thoughts and obviously didn't hear her, for he never even tried to answer. After few second he continued: "You have no idea how it is to look into such eyes. At first I thought I'd manage it, but after an hour, I began to tremble and after two hours I was completely out of my mind. And she continued staring at me and repeating the same questions over and over again. Sarah, I broke down! She broke me with just a stare and I told her where the camp was."
He sighed and looked into Sarah's eyes again: "After they brought me back to my chain, I fainted. As I regained my consciousness I realized that my chain was much longer than before, my hands were free and beside me there was an axe. Everyone else was dead. I managed to cut the chain with the axe and fled like all the hell's furies would be hot on my heels. I didn't even realize that there were absolutely no machines around. I was completely alone."
Sarah frowned: "Who could have left an axe there and why?"
Derek shrugged: "I have no idea and I never really asked myself who and why. I was too glad to be free." He made a short pause and continued: "I had no idea where I was so I wandered around for a week before I found a recon team which then brought me back to the camp. And after I entered it, the first one I met was the metal. I tried to shoot it, but the guy who brought me in stopped me and told me she were on our side."
Sarah nodded absentminded: "Probably she had tried to infiltrate the camp they discovered her and reprogrammed her." She focused on Derek again: "Derek, I can't tell you how sorry I am that you had to go through such torture."
She wanted to continue but before she could, Derek cut her off: "The irony is that two days after I came to the camp, one of reprogrammed terminators went berserk and killed a lot of people. I was already on his list, I already stared into the mouth of a gun as she appeared and destroyed him. First she almost made me go mad and few days later she saved my life. Isn't it the purest irony?" He laughed silently and continued: "Do you know what was the scariest of all? Not the fact that she brought me to the edge of sanity; not the fact that I lost all my men; not the irony that she saved my life. The worst thing was the fact that I caved in; the fact that I betrayed John Connor."
Sarah looked at him: "Did anything bad happen because of that? Did they kill John? Did they manage to harm him?"
Derek shook his head.
"Well, than it's not so bad. Your act had no negative consequences." Sarah forced her to a small smile. After a short pause she started: "But the fact remains that Cameron, whom we know, isn't that terminator anymore. She changed. John changed her." I can't believe that I'm defending a terminator! I must be completely out of my mind. Oh well, I'm not protecting her, I'm protecting John!
This time Derek heard her remark and jerked his head up to look into Sarah's eyes. He opened his mouth to say something, but reconsidered and hung it again. After a long pause, so long that Sarah didn't even expect him to say anything more, he said more to himself than to Sarah: "I know. I've seen life in her eyes before. I've seen how she looks at John. And that's what scares the hell out of me – the fact that she seems more human than machine. If a machine can change so much …" He trailed off and lost himself in his thoughts again.
Sarah nodded: "I understand your fears. But John says that she's unique. And he should know what he's talking about. I think that there may be few machines, reaching self awareness, but very few. I think that Skynet wouldn't exactly approve of self aware machines roaming around and handling according to their own agendas." She laid a hand on his shoulder: "Come, Derek, I think it would be best if we'd try to get some sleep. So much happened today and I'm really tired. We'll have a lot to discuss in following days. We cannot solve the problem, if it is a problem at all, it right now. Especially not in such mental condition as you're in."
Derek nodded and looked into her eyes. His face was tired and his eyes lost the fire which she saw in them only few minutes ago. It looked like he'd aged ten years in a matter of minutes. "I guess you're right Sarah." He stood from his chair and offered Sarah his hand.
She accepted it and after they started towards their room, Sarah nudged him with her elbow: "I'm glad that you finally decided to let go of your hatred for Cameron. Well, at least I now know why you hate her so much."
Derek shook his head: "I really don't know if I still hate her. Can you hate someone who's obviously making your nephew, whom you love very much, happy? I still trust her only as far as I can throw her, but I'll give her a chance."
Sarah grinned: "I guess that's more than anyone could ask for. Just for the record: I think you couldn't even move her. And throwing her would be something I'd really like to see."
After Cameron and John finally managed to let go of each others' lips for long enough to open the door and enter their room, they continued to kiss on the other side of the door in the room They didn't manage to get into the room, they simply stayed right behind the entrance and hung on each other like hungry wolves. Cameron was enjoying it more than she thought she would be capable of. John noticed how eager she was to be kissed and was only too happy to fulfill and even surpass her expectations. The fact was that he enjoyed it just as much as Cameron. He remembered some of the girls he kissed in the past, including Riley and realized that those kisses were actually only fooling around and had nothing in common with real kissing. This, with Cameron … this was it! Now he finally knew how it was to kiss the one you love, to be lost in emotions. He even felt a little ashamed to be thinking of someone else while kissing the love of his life.
Few kisses and many minutes later Cameron finally decided that she wanted to ask John an important question. She leaned back in his embrace and looked into his eyes: "John?"
John glanced dreamily in the beautiful face of his beloved: "Yeah, Cam?"
"May I ask you something?"
"Of course! Anything you want."
Cameron stammered a little and that caught John's attention. It was absolutely uncharacteristically for her to stammer. He tilted his head and smiled at her to encourage her. "John, there's something I'd like to know." She paused again and her eyes darted around for a second. Then she focused on him again: "Why did you change your attitude towards me so much lately?"
John frowned: "What do you mean, Cam?" But he knew exactly what she was getting at and he was actually only buying time to consider his answer. He knew he would have to be very careful. Cameron was not only a walking heart attack, she was also kind of walking lie detector and while she was so close to him, hugging him, she'd have no troubles detecting should he try to lie to her. He was just hoping she would be distracted by kisses and his hands, roaming along her back. Even if it was just a foolish hope.
Cameron finally got her emotions under control and noticed that he wasn't exactly truthful, but decided not to pursue that fact until she got her answers, so she replied without hesitation: "Few weeks ago you didn't want to have anything to do with me. You despised me, you sent me away anytime I tried to talk to you. You ran away from me every time you thought I was too close. But shortly before this vacation you changed completely." She looked into his eyes a bit insecure and waited for his answer.
John felt embarrassed. He understood exactly what Cameron was asking and couldn't believe that he'd been such a pain in the ass before. He knew that he behaved very ugly and now he only wanted to make it up to her for all abuses he'd subjected her to before. He sighed: "I'm sorry Cam for being such a jerk."
"John, you don't have to apologize to me constantly. You've done it quite a few times in last days and you're beginning to sound boring." She grinned at him mischievously to show him that she was just joking and continued: "I'm happier now than I've ever been. I just want to know what changed your attitude." She gently stroked his cheek. She really just wanted to know why he suddenly admitted to his feelings for her. She needed to know what happened to change his mind, to make him to admit his feelings for her. She needed to be reassured that it wasn't just a temporary change of his mind but that he would still care for her also after this vacation was over. Her big brown eyes gazed warmly at him.
John swallowed, leaned into her hand on his cheek and put his hand over hers. His voice was trembling noticeably and he was having difficulties talking: "You know … few weeks ago … when I saw you lying there on the driveway … lifeless … and then you … didn't reboot. I thought I've lost you. In that moment I understood what you mean to me. In that moment I realized that you mean a life to me." He embraced her fiercely, clutched to her like to the lifeline and whispered into her ear: "Please, don't ever leave me, Cameron! Stay with me forever!"
Cameron suddenly felt like she should laugh and cry at the same time. She felt how her eyes began to fill with tears and she gasped while encircling him with her arms and squeezing him forcefully, almost forgetting that he was just a fragile human and couldn't withstand her display of affection should she apply too much force. "I will never leave you John." She stretched to kiss him on lips passionately: "Thank you for telling me."
John felt how his eyes filled with tears too: "I love you Cameron! I love you so much!"
Cameron leaned her head against his chest: "And I love you John. I always have and I always will."
TBC