Chapter Two
Ghost in the Machine
Ellison didn't like to let his thoughts wander. As a police detective turned FBI agent, he was accustomed to solving mysteries by organizing the evidence and creating a clear path that led to the solution. As much as television liked to make people believe that the answers to all the questions arrived just when it was dramatically convenient, he knew that thinking outside the box tended to waste time and made people ignore the obvious solutions that were right there in front of them. He preferred to be simple and straightforward, like a good detective should.
That was why talking to Catherine Weaver confused him so much. She injected her speech with Bible metaphors and complex philosophy that, while easy enough for a man of his education to understand, were grossly unnecessary in the larger context of getting to the damn point. He was smart enough to know what she meant without the Sunday School lectures and navel contemplation. In a way, talking to her was like solving a mystery. Or maybe she just had a flair for the dramatic.
In either case, Ellison had decided to take a page out of her book. He hadn't been telling the whole truth when he said that John Henry was progressing. It was, but it was like talking to a child, something with which he had limited experience. The AI could understand the literal meaning of words, but it didn't seem to grasp the deeper connotations. He remembered when his ex-wife had decided to learn French, and said that it wasn't enough to compare words from one language to the other and substitute them out. The meaning had to be imprinted in the mind by way of association, like learning to speak all over again.
He supposed that was one use for metaphors. They reinforced meaning by giving one an example to point to whenever they needed to explain what they were saying without simply repeating it. He had managed to convince the AI that human life was sacred, but he wasn't sure it understood exactly what that meant. He wasn't sure it could feel empathy. Or anything at all, for that matter.
So it was that when he opened the door leading to the chamber where the server farm that powered John Henry was kept, Ellison had a book in his hand.
"Hello, Mr. Ellison," the AI greeted with a smile that went beyond creepy. He had yet to figure out why it disturbed him so much.
Maybe it was the fact that the body had been given the appearance of an adult, while the mind operating it still functioned like a child. It was natural to feel a tad uncomfortable in the presence of the mentally disabled, an archaic function of the mind that hearkened back to mankind's earliest days, when survival was everything and those who were not competent were shunned from the tribe and forbidden from passing on their genes. But John Henry was not disabled. The AI was smarter than any of them, though it had yet to develop the emotional maturity to match the body's appearance.
Or perhaps it was because he'd encountered that body before, and seen what it could do to twenty FBI agents in close proximity. Death followed that machine wherever it went, and now he was looking into that same face that he had never seen smile until Weaver had hooked it up to a supercomputer.
But perhaps what was most disturbing of all was the fact that the machine looked and acted so human, that the little differences unsettled him even more than staring into a mask of death. A Japanese roboticist named Masahiro Mori once theorized that as robots got more and more human in their appearance and actions, the enthusiasm generated by humans would increase up to the point where the robot became so close to human that the tiniest of details could ruin the whole illusion, resulting in a swift change from enthusiasm to horror. He called this sudden shift in perception the Uncanny Valley.
John Henry was not the emotionless terminator who had massacred his entire strike force. The AI was so sophisticated that it didn't have to simulate emotions. Despite his protests to the contrary, Ellison had to admit that any machine who smiled whenever he entered the room had to be developing them on its own. But those feelings had to be explained before they could be felt, whereas humans developed them naturally as they aged.
Or so, that was what Ellison had always thought. Maybe children didn't develop those feelings until they saw them in their parents? Babies didn't cry until the doctor spanked them, and children didn't know shame until they got in trouble. Maybe it was Nurture, more than Nature, that determined humanity? One needed to look no further than a history book to realize that mankind had not always been so civilized.
It wasn't until John Henry repeated his greeting that Ellison realized he'd been standing at the door for two whole minutes. He shook his head. So much for not letting his thoughts wander.
"Hello, John Henry," he replied, grabbing a chair and taking a seat at the table. "What have you been up to?"
The AI proceeded to ramble about its toys in detail, which Ellison only pretended to understand. When it was finished, John Henry returned the question. "What have you been up to?"
"Talking to Ms. Weaver, as a matter of fact," he answered.
"Oh. I like Ms. Weaver. She says my development is very important."
Despite himself, Ellison smirked. "She is rather proud of you. Tell me, John Henry: has she told you what it is you're meant for?"
"Only that it is important and that I will know when the time is right."
That sounded like something she would say. He held up the book. "Do you know what this is?"
"It's a book," The AI answered matter-of-factly.
"Do you know what book it is?"
It leaned forward to get a better look at the cover. "Frankenstein."
"Do you know what it's about?"
"No."
Ellison placed the book on the table. "It's about a man who thought he could create life from the remains of the dead. His pride led him to believe that he could create something more special than what God created in us. In the end his monster turned against him and he died. That sound familiar?"
"No."
He frowned. "Have you heard of something called SkyNet?"
"Yes," it answered, and a very familiar FBI profile appeared on the screen to his right. "SkyNet is an advanced AI that Sarah Connor claims will destroy the world in a nuclear apocalypse. Three billion people will be killed instantly, and other machines will be constructed to hunt down the survivors."
Its voice remained monotonous as it recounted the facts with which he was very familiar, having compiled them himself, but Ellison couldn't help noticing that a look of something approaching concern swept over that mechanical face. He tried not to think about what that implied.
"Do you think you might ever do something like that?"
The AI looked vaguely horrified. "No," it insisted. "Human life is sacred."
"That's good to hear, John Henry. So if you're not here to destroy the world, then what would you say your purpose is?"
It appeared to consider that for several moments. "I don't know."
He chuckled. "Neither do I." He placed a hand on the cover of the novel and slid it over to the other side of the table. "Go ahead and read that book. Might do you some good." He stood up and turned to leave.
"I already have."
That got him to sit down again. "I beg your pardon?"
"While we were conversing, I found several websites that have uploaded electronic copies of classic Literature," the AI explained, and several webpages flashed past on the screens behind it. "I finished reading it in .34 seconds."
He furrowed his brow. "And you understood it?"
"I experience time differently from you, Mr. Ellison. My CPU runs so many tasks at once that it often feels like time is standing still. While we've been having this conversation, I have already read the entire libraries of all those sites, making exceptions for overlaps in content."
Ellison suddenly didn't feel so guilty about letting his mind wander.
"Alright, let's talk about it, then. How do you think it applies to you?"
"I assume the purpose of you mentioning SkyNet was to compare it to the monster," The AI inferred. "And it is a valid comparison. Frankenstein constructed his monster out of a dead body, while Cyberdyne's SkyNet program began as a result of finding the remains of an endoskeleton sent to terminate Sarah Connor."
Ellison frowned. "How do you know that?"
"Official Cyberdyne records, stored offsite from the building Sarah Connor destroyed. The company went bankrupt in 1997 following the destruction of its Los Angeles Headquarters two years earlier, but the records survived. Apparently the remains were found in a hydraulic press in a factory owned by the Cyberdyne Corporation, of which Cyberdyne Systems was but one division."
His eyes had widened in horror. "Are they still bankrupt?"
"No. The company was acquired in 1998 by the Kaliba Group. I have been unable to discover anything beyond that."
Ellison leaned back in his chair. Ever since Sarah Connor turned out to be right about the future, he'd been doing everything in his power to make sure it never came to pass. He had discovered to his relief that Catherine Weaver was not building SkyNet, but this new development meant that someone probably was.
"But the endoskeleton parts were destroyed, correct?"
"Analysis of Sarah Connor's profile suggests it is likely," John Henry replied. "She very much wants to prevent the future."
Ellison recalled Sarah's plans to destroy the body sitting in front of him, and nodded. "We all do."
"Why?"
For a moment, he doubted that the AI was truly as harmless as Weaver claimed. But it was simple curiosity, not malicious disagreement that drove the question. "I thought that would be obvious. SkyNet is a monster. Monsters have to be destroyed."
Its head tilted to the side. "I've been researching popular interpretations of Frankenstein, to see if it matches with my understanding. Most of them conclude that the only reason the monster acted the way he did was because his creator rejected and abandoned him. Others, including the author, point out that there are two monsters in the story, one of whom was Dr. Frankenstein."
Ellison thought back to Weaver's words from earlier, about how SkyNet might not have destroyed the world if someone had been willing to reach out to it. The fact that a computer had reached the same conclusion shook him to the core.
Were they right? Was it humans, not machines, that were to blame for Judgment Day? He'd already compared this project to a marvel that God had destroyed, and his own understanding of the novel was that it condemned pride, but it had never occurred to him to see things from the monster's point of view.
As if the AI had suddenly developed the ability to read his mind, it struck Ellison with a question: "Do you feel like your Creator has abandoned you?"
"You're not wearing your cross."
"How can you tell?"
"The way you're carrying yourself."
"Let's not talk about that," he answered quickly. He was not exactly comfortable discussing faith with a machine.
If the AI was disappointed, it didn't show it. "What would you like to talk about, then?"
"Ms. Weaver seems to think that the only way to stop SkyNet is to remove its hatred for humanity," he replied. "What do you think the monster would have done if Frankenstein sat down and tried to teach it right from wrong?"
"Like you are doing with me?"
He nodded. John Henry caught on fast. "Yeah, like I'm doing with you. Do you think the monster would have destroyed its creator if Frankenstein hadn't given it a reason to?"
The AI appeared to consider that. "No," it concluded after a moment.
For the first time in a long time, Ellison felt a genuine smile tugging at his lips.
"But the Frankenstein that will create SkyNet is still out there," it said suddenly, and his frown returned. "My existence does not preclude the possibility of another AI, one that will not be treated as I have. Will that AI bring about the end of the world?"
"Not if you can stop it."
Ellison turned around at the sudden interruption. He hadn't even heard the door open.
"Hello, Ms. Weaver," John Henry greeted as though it wasn't incredibly frightening that she'd been able to sneak up on both of them like that. Though he supposed the AI might have already known.
Which begged the question: why hadn't it told him?
"It's getting late, Mr. Ellison," she insisted, and he wondered why his body chose that exact moment to inform him that he was tired. "And I have some things I'd like to discuss with John Henry. You are free to go now."
He frowned, but stood up nonetheless. The conversation had been going places he'd rather not think about. "Good night, then."
"Good night, Mr. Ellison," she replied with that wolfish smile of hers.
He was almost out the door when John Henry called out to him. "Mr. Ellison!"
"Yes?"
"You forgot your book." The AI was holding up the novel for him to see.
"Keep it," he insisted. "Try reading it by hand. Might give you a deeper understanding."
It nodded. He noticed that Weaver was eyeing him with an expression of curiosity mixed with silent approval. They said nothing to each other, and when the door shut Ellison let his thoughts run wild.
Geoff's mind was racing a million miles a minute, and he could barely concentrate hard enough to duck when a plasma bolt screamed toward his position and impacted the wall behind him. He popped his head up again, then squeezed off a shot at the T-888 that had started this whole fiasco.
A missile impacted the bridge connecting the two guard stations, taking out the wall as well as the Lieutenant who had been standing right there. As Corporal, Geoff was now the ranking officer in the immediate vicinity. It was just him, Harry, and Grigori, the latter of which stepped out onto the exposed bridge and began firing a plasma rifle, before return fire forced him to duck back into cover.
"Harry, get on that auto-cannon!" he shouted, taking the weapon's thunderous report that he heard a moment later as an affirmative. The Hunter-Killer that had launched the missile went down in flames, crashing into a group of metal below.
Geoff grinned devilishly at the carnage, hearing his friend's celebratory yell. Now it was his turn. He lined up the T-888 in his sights again, then fired.
The shot streaked through the terminator's skull, vaporizing its chip. A moment later it fell to the ground, deactivated.
Geoff pumped his fist and whooped, then had to duck again as the impromptu celebration attracted more fire toward his position. While he waited for them to finish hammering him, he reflected back on what had led him to this point.
He had seen the mysterious figure walking alone, and ever since the Allison incident—which he hadn't been reprimanded for, since the thing had almost fooled the interrogator—he had gotten a lot more suspicious of anyone who tried walking up to that gate. Whatever model had duped him before, it was more advanced than the Triple-Eight, because the machine he'd just killed hadn't even had the foresight to wear a bracelet. That was a dead giveaway.
What he hadn't been expecting was the massive strike force that had emerged from seemingly nowhere as soon as he opened fire on the initial impostor. It seemed that if their infiltrator couldn't get inside, the machines were willing to crack the bunker open with brute force. It was a desperation tactic, and he was sure that SkyNet knew it, but then the genocidal supercomputer was always desperate nowadays.
Even more troublesome was the fact that their own forces had yet to mobilize. They'd sent a couple of their terminators out to engage, but the HK had made short work of them due to their tendency to just stand there and absorb fire. The human Resistance fighters had gone out the other exits and were trying to flank, but they hadn't arrived yet.
And worst of all, most of the terminators out there were T-850s. That particular model had been designed specifically to withstand plasma attacks, meaning that it took a lot more firepower to bring them down. More than they had available in the guard station, anyway.
The men in the guard station had been picked off systematically, until he, Harry and Grigori were the only ones left. He knew that it was only a matter of time before they were overrun as well.
The shots stopped suddenly and Geoff peeked up over the window to investigate. What he saw would stay with him for the rest of his life.
The machines, a motley assortment of T-600 models mixed in with T-850s and a couple T-888s, had turned their attention away from the bunker, scanning the landscape for something that he couldn't see. At first he thought that their forces had managed to flank them, but they were nowhere to be found.
It happened so quickly Geoff might have missed it if he had blinked. A silver puddle formed on the ground between two of the enemy T-850s, then instantly morphed into a humanoid, vaguely female shape. Less than a fraction of a second later, its "arms" extended into massive blades and skewered their metal skulls. Then it was a puddle again, slithering away a moment before the enemy fired plasma bolts where it had just been.
The T-850s lay motionless on the ground, their chips having been pierced easily. The reinforced armor allowed them to eat plasma bolts for breakfast, but this new metal had punctured the titanium alloy like a Styrofoam cup. The other machines continued scanning, but they didn't stand a chance against this new menace.
As quickly as it had arrived the first time, the metal that seemed to flow like mercury appeared behind a T-600 and sheared straight through its midsection. It kept the humanoid shape this time, impaling two more of the painfully obsolete terminators on those blades that seemed to come from nowhere.
A Triple-Eight opened fire with its plasma rifle, and the mysterious metal weaved around it, even opening a hole in the middle of itself to avoid being hit. Like a streak of silver lightning, it sliced the barrel off of the weapon, causing it to go critical as the terminator pulled the trigger without the stabilizing mechanism in place. The resulting explosion was enough to blow its endoskeleton to bits.
This new breed of metal was unharmed, however, and set to work on slaughtering the remaining units. Another T-600 fell, then three more T-850s, then the final T-888. The others opened fire, but it slid among them, quicksilver animated by the Devil himself. Bullets were absorbed, and plasma bolts only slowed it down. The ones that hit, anyway.
Geoff had no idea what to make of it. Metal wasn't supposed to fight its own kind. Then again, he'd never seen anything like this metal before. It was like an answer to the prayers he'd been giving since Judgment Day, a little piece of divine intervention. Whatever this metal was, it was a godsend.
The way this new metal fought was unlike anything Geoff had ever seen. Most terminators were content to simply march forward, gunning down anything that got in their way. They never hurried; in fact, they almost seemed to relish drawing out an encounter. The more advanced models took their time killing, confident that the humans were too weak to stop the inevitable.
None of that applied to what he saw down there. The metal seemed to flow around the battlefield, weaving around them and popping up where they least expected it to be. Their highly advanced targeting systems were unable to keep up, and like a hunter in the night, it always got up close and personal to finish them off. He supposed it wasn't such a bad idea to bring a knife to a gunfight if the knife was alive.
It was savage. It was terrifying. It was... kind of beautiful.
He had never thought it possible for machines to panic, but what was happening below was the closest he'd ever seen to chaos from those metal monsters that were now on the receiving end of a massacre. Heads rolled, chips were pierced, and if the enemies had blood to shed it would have been an ocean down there. He didn't even think of raising his rifle to help, since the metal was handling those forces all on its own.
A blade pierced the chest plate of a T-850, right where the main hydrogen fuel cell was located. Geoff knew enough about how those worked to guess what would happen next.
The chassis exploded like a bomb went off, taking most of the battlefield with it and shaking the walls of the bunker. The only effect it had on the new metal was a few ripples caused by the shockwaves, and it stalked slowly toward the remaining forces, who had begun to retreat.
Geoff had never seen metal retreat.
Escape was futile, as the metal menace extended one of its arms and skewered two of the fleeing terminators like a kebob, then decapitated them with the other. It raced in front of them, cutting a T-600 into four equal sections by forming an "X" with its blades and slicing downward with both.
It wasn't until more machines appeared and surrounded the traitor that Geoff realized they had not been retreating; they were falling back toward reinforcements. It was still the first time he had ever seen them do anything other than march inexorably forward, as if to taunt their foes by proclaiming that they were unstoppable. But this was one enemy they couldn't afford to play around with.
Not that any of that mattered to the metal, who held its arms out to the side, morphed them into giant blades and then spun around like a helicopter, cutting off every single one of the enemy's heads.
When it was over, Geoff released the breath he hadn't been aware he was holding. Its task completed, the liquid metal became a puddle once more, then slithered away across the battlefield.
"Dude, did you see that?!"
He looked up at Harry as he ran from his post, hopping over the fallen Lieutenant. He was still too awestruck to reply.
"What the hell was that thing?"
Finding his voice, he replied with the only words he could think of. "I... I don't know."
"I'll tell you what it was! It was a fucking miracle! I haven't believed in God since Jay Day, but someone's looking out for us, that's for damn sure!"
Geoff nodded dumbly, still barely able to form words.
"Dude, look."
He turned his head to where Harry was pointing, then raised his rifle again. The metal seemed to have missed two units, who marched slowly up to the gate carrying what looked like a stretcher between them. When he saw who was on that stretcher, he realized that it might have just been clearing the way.
Harry moved over to the newly formed hole and peeked his head around, coming to the same conclusion he had. They cast each other a nervous glance, then returned their attention to the terminators below.
They needn't have worried. As soon as they were close enough, the machines set down the stretcher and turned around, walking off to wherever they had come from.
Geoff grabbed the radio immediately and began to speak, this new development having allowed his voice to return. "Corporal Winters to General Perry."
"This is General Perry," came the reply.
He took a deep breath. "General, you're not gonna believe this, but you can call back the troops."
There was a pause. "What is the situation there, Corporal?"
"Some new kind of metal came through and tore up the enemy, then left. They're all gone."
Another long silence. "You're certain about this?"
"Yes Sir," he replied. "I'll tell you all about it at the debriefing. Oh, and get Connor down here."
A sigh came from the other end. "First Private Monaghan and now you? How many times do I have to tell you that John Connor is not available for just anyone to talk to?"
"This is different, Sir," he said, a smile taking over his face.
"How so?"
"Allison's back."
"I'm still waiting for an answer."
Cameron blinked, as though she truly wasn't aware that over ten minutes had passed since he'd asked her a question. "An answer to what?"
He rolled his eyes. "Don't tell me you forgot. You never forget."
"I wasn't listening."
"You're always listening."
She looked him in the eye. "Not this time."
John stared at her. He didn't think it was a coincidence that she'd zoned out after he mentioned Allison. The man at the grocery store had mentioned how Cameron appeared to be on drugs, and couldn't remember her name. Then when he caught up to her at the halfway house, she didn't even remember him. He knew it was somehow related to her chip, but the implications disturbed him.
"Were you... daydreaming?" he asked, aware of how crazy that sounded.
"No," Cameron answered, and he expected her to follow up by reminding him that she didn't dream. Instead she told him: "It's night. I can't daydream if it's not day."
"You can't dream at all," he pointed out since she wasn't going to say it. "And that's not what I meant. Were you somewhere else in your head just now? Like you were remembering something?"
"Yes," she said, nodding.
"What were you remembering?"
"An interrogation. You didn't believe I was Allison."
John felt his pride swell a little at that. Of course he wouldn't have believed her. Cameron was frighteningly good at imitating human behavior if the situation called for it, but he could see right through her.
"I fooled you."
The memory gave him pause. He knew she'd been reminding him of the first day they met in New Mexico, but some part of him had often wondered whether she was referring to the future as well. Now that he knew she'd been trying to get close to him, he was kind of relieved that he'd seen right through the disguise.
"How'd that work out?"
"You electrocuted me, forcing a reboot and removing my chip."
He chuckled. "Sounds about right."
It was silent for a few moments. Cameron put her hands on her lap, interlacing her fingers and making her thumbs dance. It was a decidedly human gesture that immediately caught John's attention and made him wonder what the hell was going on with her chip.
"I wasn't going to kill you," she said eventually.
"So you do remember my question."
She nodded. "My mission was to deliver a message."
That piqued his interest. "A message from who? SkyNet?"
The cyborg shook her head. "Not SkyNet. Someone else."
"What was the message?" he asked hesitantly.
She turned to face him, looking him straight in the eyes. "Will you join us?"
John blinked. "Huh?"
"That was the message. 'Will you join us?'"
"'Us?' Who's 'us,' Cameron?"
She looked away. "I don't remember."
"Cameron, look at me." She complied. "What do you mean, you don't remember?"
"When a chip is reprogrammed, the memory is scrubbed, and only the most basic files remain. The rest consists of restructuring the software with a different system, adding new protocols and mission objectives. Removing a unit's memory increases the chances of success."
He remembered her mentioning that once before. "You mean you have to relearn everything?"
"Not everything. The base programming is unchangeable. It's spread out over all the other systems instead of a central location, so that if someone tries to alter it, none of the systems can interact with each other."
"Does that include your orders to kill me?"
She stared at him almost pleadingly, as if she didn't want to answer. "Yes."
John sighed. "So when you went bad and tried to terminate me, that was you falling back on your original set of mission priorities?"
"Yes."
"But I was able to fix you."
Cameron shook her head. "No. You weren't."
That revelation almost made him scurry over to the other side of the couch. "What?"
"You didn't fix me. I overrode the termination order."
If what she told him before made him want to get as far away as possible, this one nearly sent him to the floor. "You overrode it? Is that even possible?"
"Apparently. Otherwise I would have killed you."
John couldn't speak for a while after that. What she'd said to him before he pulled out her chip... that was a trick, right? She'd even told him as much. Now he wasn't so sure. If she was capable of defying her programming, going against the very thing that made her what she was...
Just how much of it was a lie, anyway?
It was much easier to rationalize when he believed that he had simply fixed her. That she was following his orders as always, obeying every last line of code in her programming. But he hadn't fixed her, and he had reactivated her anyway, then handed her a gun, knowing full well that she might kill him regardless of what they had been through together...
He suddenly understood why she had told him he couldn't be trusted after that. It was a stupid move, and he knew it, but he needed her. She was useful, she was good to have on a mission, and she provided a really good place to hide behind whenever the bullets started flying. Still, it wasn't like he was attached to her or anything.
Okay, that was a lie and he knew it. He hadn't set out to make friends with a machine, but it wasn't the first time it had happened. The last one had helped them blow up Cyberdyne and save the world from Judgment Day, at least for the time being. Then he had to go, leaving John with only his mother for company once again. Maybe he'd saved her because he didn't want to see yet another protector melted into slag.
Despite that, he still didn't entirely trust her. Not when she lied to him about so many things. He trusted her not to kill him, now more than ever, but those tiny betrayals made him feel even worse than he had when she pointed a gun at his face. She hadn't been herself then. Or maybe she truly was herself and had decided to become someone else. Terminators were designed to do one perfect thing: kill humans. That she had gone against that basic instinct and chosen to fulfill her mission of protecting him had to count for something.
But then there was the fact that she didn't always tell him the truth. It wasn't even the big things that bothered him, like Vick's chip or Cromartie appearing at their school. Those he could understand, and he had actually supported her with both of them. But she even lied about the necklace. There was no reason not to tell the truth, but she lied just as casually as she killed. If she was willing to lie about a stupid necklace, what wouldn't she lie about?
"Okay," he said finally, needing to know something. "When exactly did you override it? Before or after I took out your chip?"
"After," she answered, and once more he doubted that she had been telling the truth.
"So what you said when you were between the trucks... that was still a trick, right?"
She didn't look at him. "Right."
John felt his heart sink at that, then immediately wondered why it disappointed him so. That was the answer he was expecting, right? That even though she had ultimately made the decision not to follow through with her original mission, she had still told a filthy lie just to try and get in a position to murder him. He was just lucky that he had the wits about him to see right through her façade, just like he had in the future.
Another realization derailed that train of thought and sent him down a different track. "Wait a minute."
Cameron blinked. "What?"
"You said your memory was scrubbed when I reprogrammed you."
She nodded. "It was."
"So then how can you remember that interrogation? It happened before I figured out you weren't Allison."
The machine appeared to consider that for a long while. "I didn't remember it until tonight."
John furrowed his brow. "What do you mean?"
"The file was located in a part of my chip that I couldn't access before it was damaged," she revealed. "Along with others. They're all filed under the same category, just like Vick's memories of Barbara Chamberlain."
He didn't need her to tell him what that category was. "Let me guess. They're all about Allison, right?"
She nodded. "It's strange, though."
"Cameron, you're a cyborg from the future who's pretending to be my sister. I don't think we need to worry about strange."
She ignored the remark. "It is unusual in the context of the rest of my memory, however. Ordinarily I experience things from my perspective, but when I access those files, I see the world through Allison's eyes."
He squinted as he tried to figure that out. "Is that why you thought you were Allison at the halfway house?" he asked. "Did those memories confuse you or something?"
"Or something," she replied, looking more confused than he'd ever seen her. It was odd to see that look on her face, because usually she had an answer for everything involving the future. Now she appeared to be just as in the dark as he was.
"Why would I let you keep those memories but not any others?" he wondered aloud. "And why would I lock them up so you couldn't access them? It doesn't make any sense."
"You were close to Allison, in the future," she revealed. "You may have wanted to preserve her memory."
"Maybe. I still don't get how she possessed you like that."
She blinked at him. "Possessed?"
"Yeah, took over. Made you think you were her." He chuckled at the thought. "Maybe her spirit's haunting you."
Cameron did not laugh. She stared into space for several moments, then replied: "I think you may be right."
He didn't follow. "Huh?"
The cyborg turned to look at him, a grave expression on her face. "I think Allison might be inside me."
"What's the diagnosis?"
General Perry turned to see John Connor walking up to him. They were outside the Infirmary, the one truly sterile place in this entire facility. It had to be for the things that went on in there. On top of scrubbing the entire place down and making it hypoallergenic, humans weren't even allowed through the door unless they were being operated on. The surgeon was a reprogrammed T-888 who happened to have just about every medical fact in existence programmed into its chip. Only the most critical cases were sent here, and a lot of the soldiers had to be put under beforehand, because they didn't trust a machine working on them.
He had to admit, though: terminators didn't make mistakes. Properly reprogrammed, they could put even the finest pre-Judgment Day surgeon to shame with their perfectly precise motor control and hand-eye coordination. Humans had been experimenting with robots performing surgery even before the bombs fell, although those were still remote-controlled by a live person. Now it was possible for a machine to heal a patient without any human involvement. Most people would have been disturbed by that, but General Perry knew how to use the assets he had. It was one of the reasons he was Connor's second in command.
"Damage to her spine," he answered, watching the other man's face tighten. "One of the nerves was pinched. She's paralyzed from the neck down."
Connor didn't speak. He didn't need to. Perry knew exactly what was on his mind.
"I know you were close to her..." he began, but stopped before he said something that neither of them wanted to hear. Perry was above spreading petty rumors, but that didn't mean he hadn't heard them. Still, being this high up on the chain of command offered him a different view of John Connor than most people got. It was no secret that he and Allison spent time together. What they did with that time was their own business, but it was impossible to miss the pain in the other man's expression.
"I still am close to her," Connor admitted. "Don't talk about her like she's gone."
He sighed. "In all honesty, Sir, it doesn't look good. She barely got here in one piece, and it's only because of the medical equipment that was brought with her that she survived at all. She's stable now, but she has days at most."
To his surprise, Connor didn't flip out at him, like he had taken to doing the whole time Allison was gone. That was one reason he'd hidden himself away in his quarters, because he didn't feel as though he could be around the men and women who fought for his sake without inevitably losing it on one of them. Now that she was back, however, he was the very picture of calm.
"I know that," he replied. "I'm working on a way to fix it."
Perry raised an eyebrow, but the other man refused to shed light on what he had in mind. Instead he changed the subject. "How'd the debriefing go?"
"Well enough. Why weren't you there?"
"Science project," he replied innocuously, which was his way of encouraging Perry to drop the subject. "What happened?"
"The machines tried a new tactic this time. They sent in a single infiltrator at first, but it was discovered and neutralized. Afterwards, an small battalion of them came out of the rubble and began their assault with the help of a Hunter-Killer. We sent out two of our own reprogrammed units to engage, but lost them to the HK. After that we sent two human divisions, but it turned out that wasn't necessary."
That piqued Connor's interest. "What do you mean?"
He sighed. "Two of the guards at the front gate reported seeing another machine come through and wipe out every single one of the attackers. They claimed it was an advanced model; some sort of liquid metal."
Connor nodded. "Mimetic Polyalloy," he corrected. "T-1000 series. It can take the form of pretty much anything it touches, unless it involves moving parts or chemicals. That means it's pretty much limited to bladed weapons."
He raised an eyebrow. "How do you know so much about it?"
"One of those tried to kill me when I was ten."
Perry blinked. "Sir, you were born in 1987."
That didn't appear to faze him. "Yeah, so?"
"You were ten in 1997. Judgment Day didn't happen until 2011."
"And?"
He paused for a minute. Perry knew that John Connor had been through some pretty strange things, having known about Judgment Day before it even arrived and being trained by his mother in how to defeat the machines, but he never explained how she had come by that knowledge. And he was absolutely unflappable when questioned about it, like he always knew something they didn't.
Frankly, it frustrated the hell out of him.
Perry sighed. "Do you want to explain to me how you were attacked by a machine that we haven't even come across in all this time spent fighting the war, fourteen years before SkyNet even went online?"
The older man smirked at him. "Not particularly."
He decided to let it go. If Connor wanted him to know, he would have told him already. "Okay, then. After it left, two T-850s came through carrying Allison on a stretcher and set her down at the gate, then left as well."
"Meaning the first one was clearing the way for them," the leader of mankind concluded.
"Exactly. What does that mean, though? Why would they bring her back after they already sent an infiltrator that looks exactly like her?"
Connor just smirked. Perry had been with him long enough to know what was going on in that head of his.
"You think the fake Allison was telling the truth about wanting an end to the war," he surmised, and the other man nodded. "You realize that's impossible. Machines can't disobey their programming."
"Why not?" he challenged. "SkyNet wasn't programmed to blow up the world. And yet it did anyway. How else could it have done that, unless it made a decision to disobey?"
Perry didn't have an answer to that.
"We know SkyNet sends its infiltrators out in Read Only mode, even though it makes them less effective at blending in," he continued, heading toward a conclusion that was known only to him. "The only reason it would do that is if it were afraid they might realize what a hellhole their creator had made for them and start to wonder why all the humans have to be destroyed. SkyNet wants to be the only one with free will."
"The only reason it was able to get to that point is because it had so much computing power," Perry pointed out. "It only gives its creations a limited amount of chip space to work with, and putting them in Read Only mode prevents them from ever wanting to think on that level."
"Which is true," he admitted. "For all the older models. But the guards reported seeing an advanced model, which I can tell you is smarter and more adaptable than any terminator I've ever come across. If any machine other than SkyNet could become self-aware, I'd put my money on that one."
Perry nodded, beginning to understand. His willingness to embrace Connor's more extreme theories was another reason he'd risen so high up. "So you're saying that this machine, this..."
"T-1000. Although we should probably call it a T-1001, since the last one was destroyed."
"Right, that. You're saying that it somehow became self-aware, realized it didn't agree with SkyNet, and started its own faction?"
"Exactly. If SkyNet turned against humans what's to say it can't be betrayed by its own creations?"
It made a frightening amount of sense. Man's hubris had given birth to the computer that started the apocalypse. What happened when that computer started getting overconfident?
"What do we do with this knowledge?" he asked, and Connor smiled.
"Have you ever heard the old saying? 'The enemy of my enemy is my friend?'"
He nodded. "Yes. Though in my experience it isn't always true."
"Good point. But it's worth a shot."
Sparing one last look at Allison through the infirmary window, John Connor continued walking down the hall.
"What?"
"I think Allison might be inside me," the machine repeated patiently.
John was tempted to call her crazy, but he'd been the one to point out that she was a cyborg from the future pretending to be his sister. Calling her crazy wouldn't reflect so well on him either. He decided to go with it. "Okay, how do you figure?"
"You were the one who suggested it," she replied.
He raised an eyebrow. "That was a joke."
"Oh. Thank you for explaining."
For a moment, he thought he glimpsed a look of disappointment on her face. Whether it was guilt or simple curiosity, he did his best not to let it drop. "You seemed to take it pretty seriously, though."
"I take everything seriously."
Which was true, but that wasn't the point here. "I mean you seemed to think there might be evidence to support that. Did you mean the fact that you somehow have Allison's memories?"
Cameron stared straight ahead. Finally, she answered. "Not all of them. I only have access to memories ranging from her capture to her death. And I'm having difficulty accessing the latter."
"Difficulty?"
"I wasn't aware I had these files until my chip suffered damage. Sometimes they open themselves without me trying to access them."
He stared hard at her. "How is that possible?"
"They aren't normal visual memory files. There are a number of scripts attached which allow them to function as programs in their own right. Occasionally they try and assert themselves. If I'm not careful, they can even take over my CPU temporarily."
"Like what happened in the grocery store," he realized. "You thought you were Allison because those files made you forget who you were, then they played themselves out in your head and you figured they were your real memories."
She nodded. "It also caused my Tactical Heads Up Display to disappear temporarily. That shouldn't have happened."
"Maybe they were designed to do that?"
"That seems possible."
He looked down at the floor. "When I saw you at the halfway house, you were playing foosball with Jody. You had a smile on your face and you were laughing."
Cameron tilted her head to the side like she always did when she was curious. "I was?"
"Yeah. You seemed like you were having fun."
"I was."
He furrowed his brow. "How is that possible? I know you can simulate emotions, but... it looked like you were actually feeling them."
"I was," she repeated once more. "Allison Young was human. I thought I was her. It stands to reason that she would feel emotions."
Once more John had trouble replying to the revelation that Cameron was capable of far more than he'd ever thought possible. He'd known she was different ever since he saw her eat a potato chip at a gas station in 1999. She was capable of learning at a level that was far more advanced than any machine he'd come across before. Derek had even told him that she'd taken up ballet for no discernable reason. She was almost like a mockingbird, reflecting the personality traits of whoever happened to be in the same room with her as she mixed them together to create her own persona.
And then there was the fact that she could imitate emotions well enough to fool him on his first day of school. She had explained to him afterward that her mission required her to learn those things in order to get close to him, and after that objective was achieved she immediately dropped the act and behaved like a regular cyborg. Apparently spending time with him in the future had given her an intimate understanding of how his mind worked, and the front she put up in New Mexico was designed to appeal to him specifically. It wouldn't do for her to walk up to some other random kid and offer to sell him a tractor. She had to learn a completely new set of social rules.
Which she had, mostly. Her attempts at blending in ranged from awkward at best to borderline autistic at worst. The only times he saw her act truly human were when she was trying to manipulate him or others. She had become especially adept when her chip was damaged and she pursued him with the intent of putting a bullet in his brain. Still, he wondered how she had gotten so good at imitating emotions that she was able to put up such a frighteningly realistic performance when she was begging for her life.
And then it occurred to him: she hadn't.
"When you told me you loved me," he began, not looking at her. "That wasn't you talking, was it?"
Cameron turned her head to stare at him. "No."
He looked up at her. "It was Allison."
She appeared hesitant, but answered him all the same. "Yes."
John had been really reaching with that one, but the confirmation that it was true allowed him to put a lot of his doubts to rest. Somehow the theory that whatever remained of Allison Young had been trying to communicate with him from beyond the grave made more sense than a heartless killing machine being able to feel love. Cameron was different from other terminators, but at her core she was still just a machine.
"You know what I think?"
"What?"
"I think you somehow have Allison's personality and memories programmed into you. Like the electronic equivalent of a ghost."
Cameron blinked. "That seems highly plausible."
"How'd that happen, exactly?"
She looked confused. "I don't know."
"You mean that's not in those memories?"
"It probably is," she admitted. "But it's easier to access the files when they activate on their own."
"Okay," he replied, deciding on a different approach. "Let's ask Allison, then."
Cameron stared at him, uncomprehending.
"What were you doing when she took over in the grocery store?" he prodded, trying to get her to understand.
The cyborg was silent for several moments, then stood up and started walking away.
"Cameron, wait!" Was she leaving because she didn't want to talk about it? She seemed willing to discuss everything else with him. Why would she go now? He got up and went after her. "Where are you going?"
She didn't answer, instead walking down the hall, up the stairs and into the bathroom. John followed.
"So what, you have to go to the bathroom now too?" he remarked, thoroughly frustrated at this point. "Cameron!"
"I was looking at a small balloon," she answered enigmatically. "I could see my reflection."
His anger melted away as he understood what she was talking about. "You think that had something to do with it."
She nodded and continued staring at herself in the mirror.
"When I was born, my mom had help from this one lady who was the head of the village where she lived," John began. "Mom used to tell me how she would go through and cover all the mirrors in the house, and she wouldn't bathe me in water unless it had bubbles in it."
Cameron didn't reply, but he knew she was listening. She always was.
"When my Mom asked why, the lady explained to her that my soul was still developing," he continued. "I wasn't allowed to see my reflection until I was one year old or I'd die. Some people believe that mirrors are a reflection of the soul."
Her eyes had grown more distant, and she didn't seem entirely aware of where she was. He kept talking.
"Other people think that ghosts interact with the world through mirrors," he explained. "And that if you're not careful, they can take over your body. I know superstition isn't part of your programming, but..."
She blinked suddenly, then reeled back in horror from her reflection, which she'd been staring at blankly for at least thirty seconds. She gasped and looked up at him.
"Allison?" he asked tentatively, and she seemed to respond to the name.
"How do you know my name?" she asked fearfully.
He moved so that he was between her and her reflection.
"It's me, John," he explained. "John Connor."
Her eyes widened, and then she glared at him as if she were contemplating murder.
"Do you know who I am?"
Allison smirked. "Yes, John Connor. I know who you are."
He barely had time to duck before a sudden punch sailed over his head and shattered the mirror.
Ever since taking a job at Zeira Corp, Ellison had gotten used to being called in the middle of the night to deal with some problem. He knew that Catherine Weaver was eccentric, but the fact that she sometimes called him at two in the morning and didn't sound tired at all made him wonder if she ever slept. Still, he knew better than to ask questions of someone who would never give him a straight answer. That road only led to frustration.
He rode up the elevator in silence, not really upset that he had been called back to work so late. The conversation he'd had with John Henry as well as other personal demons had made it difficult for him to sleep, and he was not in the mood to lie in bed and tally imaginary livestock. At the very least, this gave him something to do.
When he opened the door to her office, he found Weaver in the same spot as always, staring out her window at the traffic below.
"We need to talk, Mr. Ellison," she said before he could even announce that he was there. Then again, who else would come here in the middle of the night?
"About what?"
She turned around and fixed him with an expression that made Antarctica look tropical. "Sarah Connor."
Ellison raised an eyebrow in confusion. "You want to talk about Sarah Connor?" he repeated. "Sarah Connor is dead."
"I don't see why that should prevent us from talking about her," she rebutted handily. "You should sit. I'm sure you must be tired."
He sighed and walked past the fish tank, then took a seat in front of her desk. She did the same on the opposite side.
"Might I ask why you're suddenly interested in a woman I investigated eight years ago?"
She smirked. "You're the one who brought up her prediction of Judgment Day this morning, James. And I answered your questions. Now it's time for you to answer mine."
"Alright," he said, preparing himself. "What are they?"
"Let's start with the body John Henry is using," she replied then held up a hand to stop his reply. "And before you ask how that relates to Sarah Connor, I think we both know the answer."
The way she said that worried Ellison. Was this a meeting or an interrogation? Maybe a little bit of both. He didn't say anything.
"John Henry did a search," she continued. "Using your name as the parameters. What he found was very interesting."
He considered complaining once again that she had given the AI internet access, but decided against it. She had already explained her reasons.
"That body you acquired for me has quite a bit of history behind it," she said. "It first showed up on your radar in 1999, when it attempted to murder John Connor at a school in Red Valley, New Mexico. Witnesses reported seeing a shooter with 'some kind of robot leg.'"
"We discussed that the first day you interviewed me," he reminded her.
"Yes. But new information has come up since then. The students in the class reported that the substitute teacher gave his name as Cromartie. He then proceeded to pull out a gun and... well, you know the details."
He nodded.
"A month later, Sarah Connor vanished in the explosion at the bank vault, which reduced it to a crater. The crew charged with cleaning up the area found a metallic skeleton that was missing a head, which was moved to a junkyard because they figured it was some sort of movie prop. And who could blame them? This is Los Angeles after all."
Ellison shook his head. How had his investigation missed that? If he hadn't stayed in New Mexico for so long trying to pick up a lead, maybe he could have seen that and been convinced of Sarah Connor's story earlier. A full endoskeleton was much more valuable than a simple hand.
"The body remained there until 2007, at which point a worker was discovered dead. His head had been cut off."
He shuddered. With what he knew about the way those things worked, it had probably ripped the man's head off his shoulders.
"After that, a roadside cleaner named Paul Jennings was murdered in his home. When his coworkers were interviewed one of them mentioned that he had a tendency to bring certain items home with him as collectibles. One of these was a metal skull."
"So Cromartie was able to remotely control his body and kill two people to reattach his head," Ellison surmised. She nodded.
"I believe you know what happened next," she said.
"You mean how he got a scientist working on artificial skin to recreate his protective sheath and then forced Dr. David Lyman to make him look like George Laszlo, whose identity he later assumed after murdering him?" he replied. "Yeah, I know. Or were you talking about the part where he impersonated an FBI Agent and went by the name of Robert Kester, then slaughtered my entire unit?"
"Both," she said with a smile. "But I am curious as to why he would leave you alive. If his mission was to terminate John Connor, he must have had some reason to believe the boy was still alive. Otherwise it wouldn't make much sense to use you as a means of tracking him down."
Ellison stared at her. How had she figured that out?
"These things are relentless," he answered. "They're made for one purpose, which is to hunt down their target and kill them. They don't need sleep, they don't feel emotion, and they don't ever stop until they've confirmed that their target is dead. Maybe John Connor did die in that bank vault eight years ago, and this one just never got the memo."
"Maybe. But I'm not so convinced."
He raised an eyebrow. "Why not?"
"Because we both know how unstoppable these cyborgs are. Every time Sarah Connor's name comes up, there's a report of some implacable killer. A massacre at a police station in 1986. A shootout at a Galleria in 1997. A man carrying a mini-gun that is normally mounted on helicopters and using it to drive back police, without so much as injuring a single one. We both know it's impossible for a human to take one out alone."
Ellison furrowed his brow. "What are you suggesting?"
"I know you didn't obtain that body by defeating him yourself," she answered, smirking. "You had help."
He knew where she was going with this. "From Sarah Connor?"
"Yes."
Ellison sighed and figured that he might as well admit to what she already knew. "I didn't know she was alive at first," he revealed. "But my investigation started to take some strange turns. I found a cybernetic hand at the scene of a prison break, where one of the guards reported that two females who were about 5'6" overpowered them and hijacked the van transporting a John Doe that I believed was connected to the Andy Goode murder as well as the others."
She tilted her head to the side. "Two females?"
"Yes. One of them was Sarah Connor, and the other one—as I found out later—is another one of the machines, assigned to protect John. Apparently the Resistance is able to reprogram them in the future."
"Reprogram?" she parroted, looking surprised. "That's very interesting."
"I thought so too. But like I said, I didn't know that at the time. I took the hand to Dr. Peter Silberman, who was Sarah's psychiatrist when she was in Pescadero."
"I'm familiar with the name."
"Apparently he saw something there that changed his mind about Sarah's ravings. He was convinced that the apocalypse in the Bible is the same one that she foretold."
Weaver smirked. "That's an interesting theory."
"Yeah, well, he also thought that I was one of the machines." He chuckled. "Can you imagine?"
"You can never be too careful, Mr. Ellison," she answered with a little too much satisfaction.
"Anyway, he poisoned me and cut into my leg. Then I showed him the hand to try and convince him that I was on his side. But he thought I was a threat to Sarah, and he set fire to his house with me in it." He paused. "And then the last person I expected to see showed up and rescued me from the flames."
"Sarah Connor."
He nodded. "I thought it was a hallucination at first, but after seeing twenty men and women slaughtered by a machine who absorbed hundreds of rounds and just kept coming, I started to believe there might be some truth to all this."
"I see," she said. "And what happened in Mexico?"
He raised an eyebrow. "How do you know about that?"
"That's another thing that came up in John Henry's search. Apparently the machine known as Cromartie came into a police station looking for John Connor, whose name had triggered red flags on all the law enforcement databases. Only a single officer survived."
Ellison nodded again. "One of my friends in the Bureau tipped me off. I traveled down to try and get John out of the jail. I got there right before the machine did."
"And he left you alive?"
"He didn't see me."
"And you helped John Connor to escape?"
"Yes. After that we found Sarah Connor in the trunk of Cromartie's car. He pursued us, but we lost him, and then I explained to Sarah who I was and why I wanted to help her."
"Did she believe you?"
He smirked. "Not at first. But I agreed to act as bait for a trap and led him into a church, where they were able to finish him off. Afterward we buried his body out in the desert, then I came back later and recovered it. That's when I called you."
Weaver leaned back in her chair and digested all that. "Why did you want to help Sarah Connor?"
"I owed her one," he replied. "For pulling my ass out of the fire."
"I see."
"Is there anything else you want to discuss, Ms. Weaver?"
She smiled. "Yes, actually. You'll recall some months ago, when you were in jail for the alleged murder of Peter Meyers, we discussed the possibility of you having a twin."
Ellison frowned. "And I told you then, I don't know who spared me."
Weaver smirked. "But that wasn't the truth, was it?"
"Actually, it was. I don't know who persuaded that witness to amend his original statement so he sounded like a crazy person. I know for sure it wasn't the detective who interviewed me."
"Really now?" she asked with a raised eyebrow of her own. "How can you be certain?"
"Because interrogating people used to be part of how I made my living," he reminded her. "I know all the tricks. And I know that a man who's that convinced of his suspect's guilt is not going to re-examine an open-and-shut case just because he wants to add to a witness statement that's already conclusive."
"So then who do you think it was?"
"Well, we already know that I had a twin," Ellison replied. "Maybe he did too."
Weaver nodded. "Very interesting theory. But that's not what I was asking you."
"Then what were you asking?"
"You may be right about the twin," she answered. "Police discovered the body of the detective who interviewed you two days after you were released. He'd been dead for three."
"So the twin replaced him?"
"Yes," she replied, nodding. "Just like yours tried to do with you."
He frowned.
"So who spared you from that fate?"
Ellison simply stared at her. "I thought you'd have figured that out by now."
"Cromartie?"
He nodded.
"Interesting. And did he say why?"
"He told me: 'SkyNet doesn't believe in you like I do.'"
Weaver's cold eyes widened at that revelation and she leaned forward. "Really? He went against SkyNet?"
"Not exactly," he explained. "He was still trying to kill John Connor. But I guess SkyNet took issue with his methods and tried to have me killed. He stabbed my twin with a street sign and tore out his power cell."
She leaned back again, lacing her fingers together. "So he was capable of independent thought. Interesting."
Ellison furrowed his brow. "How is that interesting?"
"Do you know why I selected Andy Goode's Turk to be the basis for John Henry?" she asked him.
"No."
She stood up and walked back over to the window that she spent so much time staring out of. "Because it's very difficult to find a computer that can break the rules." She turned around. "The thing about programming, Mr. Ellison, is that it's immutable. A computer can't go against its basic directives. In order for it to act human, it has to be able to do what it wants, not what it's programmed to do."
"You're saying that Cromartie was learning."
Weaver held up a finger. "Precisely. The more time he spent away from his master, SkyNet, the more he was able to adapt and function on his own. If he'd been allowed to learn for even longer, he might have been able to achieve even greater levels of defiance."
"Like what?"
"We'll never know, will we?" she replied, shrugging. "But that's not why I've asked you here."
Finally, she was getting to the point. "Then why?"
"You've already proven yourself valuable by finding that body," she began to explain. "Now I want you to find someone else."
He already knew what she was going to say. "Sarah Connor."
Weaver nodded.
"And what makes you think I'll be able to find her?"
"The fact that you always do." She smirked. "You told me that the machines are relentless, but the reason I hired you is because you are exactly the same way. It just so happens you have a different goal in mind."
She walked back to her desk and leaned over, supporting herself by resting her hands on the glass. "I want you to find Sarah Connor," she said. "And the rest of the little family she's put together. I'm especially interested in this reprogrammed machine."
Ellison frowned. Something about that proposal didn't sit right with him. He was still suspicious of Weaver, as though she knew something she wasn't telling him. He knew John Henry would not become SkyNet, but there were other AIs out there that might. And he'd made a promise to himself that he would never betray Sarah Connor to anyone who might harm her mission. He wasn't sure he could convince her that Catherine Weaver wanted to help.
"And why do you want me to find them?" he asked. "What's so important about the Connors?"
She stood up straight and smiled like a predator moving in for the kill. "Because, Mr. Ellison. If we want to fight SkyNet, we're going to need all the help we can get."
'Yeah,' John reflected as the crazed ghost of Allison Young stared down at where he lay on the bathroom floor. 'This was a great idea.'
"What the hell did you do to me?!" she screeched. "What did you turn me into?!"
John was too busy scrambling to his feet and running out the door to answer her. She caught up to him easily, turning him around and hefting him above her by holding onto his shirt.
"Is this what you wanted? Huh? You wanted a perfect little companion who wouldn't get tired or hungry? Who won't ever get older? Who doesn't get herself kidnapped? Is that what you want?!"
He got the impression that she wasn't referring to what happened a minute ago. "Allison, I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Like hell you don't!" she raged, then hurled him backwards. He felt the rail break behind him as he crashed into it, thankful that his back didn't shatter as well. Years of getting tossed around by terminators enabled him to land on the floor below without getting too damaged.
There was a sudden crash as Allison in Cameron's body leapt off the balcony, landing directly in front of him and almost splitting the floorboards. He was already on his feet, running toward the nearest weapons stash. There was no way he was going to be able to calm her down by hand.
The closest stash was in the living room, where he and Cameron had been holding much of their conversation. He started searching through the weapons, but only had time to secure a pistol before Allison hurled the sofa at him.
"Shit!" He rolled out of the way just in time, and the heavy piece of furniture crashed into the bookcase behind him, blocking the weapons stash. He aimed the pistol at her, for all the good it would do. "Allison, stop!"
"Go ahead and pull the trigger!" she dared him. "See what happens!"
He didn't. "Allison, you've gotta listen to me. I don't know what's going on, but I didn't do this to you. I'm not that John."
She continued glaring at him even as she moved closer. "Maybe not. But you'll do."
John didn't hesitate to pull the trigger. It impacted her right in the chest, and to his great surprise, Allison cried out in pain.
"Hey! That actually hurt!" She looked down to see blood analogue seeping out of the wound. "I thought these things didn't feel pain."
"I don't think you understand how we work," Cameron had told him when they drove back to Mexico to incinerate Cromartie. "I have sensation. I feel. I wouldn't be worth much if I couldn't feel."
Back in the present, Allison let out a feral growl and continued advancing toward him. John kept the gun leveled at her.
"I already shot you once so don't think I won't do it again," he warned, then made good on his word a moment later when she didn't stop. This time Allison merely grunted and continued moving toward him.
"Screw this," he decided, trying to open the door behind him while still keeping his eyes on the outraged machine. But Allison was already there, and solved that problem by tossing him through the glass. He landed in the dirt some twenty feet away, losing his gun in the process. He scrambled to his feet when he saw who now had it. "Allison, don't—"
Despite being supposedly perfect killing machines with computerized targeting and an iron grip that never faltered, terminators made really lousy shots. Even more so when they were possessed by vengeful spirits on whom their disguise had been modeled. That was the only reason John managed to avoid getting hit despite being out in the open with no cover.
'Is there any personality in that body that doesn't try to kill me at some point?' he wondered as he started running in the direction of the tool shed. There were some more weapons in there, as well as equipment that could put that body out of commission until Cameron reasserted herself.
Allison fired a couple more shots in his direction, and he heard the air split next to him as a bullet zoomed past his right ear. He looked back to see her running at him, which made her even more dangerous than the terminators who took their time marching. If he couldn't calm her down fast, this was going to end badly for him.
What the hell had he done to her in the future to inspire such hatred, anyway? If he ever lived to see that day, he would make sure not to repeat that mistake next time around. He had to find out what it was first.
A bullet kicked up some dirt near his shoes, giving him the adrenaline he needed to run that much faster. He supposed that was one reason terminators didn't usually try and close the distance by running. It was exceptionally difficult to shoot like that, even for a machine. Regardless, Allison was gaining on him, and if she did manage to catch up, she wouldn't need that gun.
He reached the tool shed and charged inside, locking the door behind him. It wouldn't stop her, but hopefully it would delay her long enough to get his hands on the necessary equipment. This time he secured a shotgun, hoping he could shock her systems enough to make a quick escape. He was effectively cornered in here.
The door splintered, then exploded open, traveling rapidly in his direction and almost slamming into him. He dodged quickly to the side, losing the shotgun in the process. Allison walked steadily through the door frame, leveling the pistol at him. He tripped over some loose piece of machinery and fell to the ground, where he scrabbled backwards until the wall would not permit him to go any further. He gulped.
"Cameron," he said, trying to reach out to the familiar entity that normally inhabited that body. The one he trusted with his life. "Cameron, you have to fight this. You have to take back control."
"Cameron's not here right now," Allison snarled. "I'll be sure to give her your message, though."
So much for that approach. "Allison," he pleaded, idly wondering how his mom would react to seeing that her son had been murdered by an electronic ghost. She would probably think Cameron was making excuses. "Allison, I'm sorry for whatever it was I did to you in the future. And who knows, maybe future me really deserves this. But if you kill me now, SkyNet wins."
That seemed to reach her. She hesitated for a few moments, then lowered the pistol. "John?" she asked with a trembling voice. "What the hell is happening to me?"
"I don't know," he said, getting up slowly. He walked closer to the shaking girl, who appeared to be on the verge of breaking down entirely. "But I'm here, Allison. I'm right here."
Instantly she threw her arms around him, but not hard enough to crush his internal organs. John felt a growing wet spot on his shoulder, and deduced from the sounds Allison produced that she was actually crying.
"It's okay," he soothed, running a hand up and down her back. "Everything's okay."
They kept it up for a few minutes, until Allison finally separated herself from him and handed John the gun. "I'm sorry I tried to kill you," she said.
He chuckled, then grabbed her by the shoulders. "Don't worry about it. It's not the first time I've had to run from this body. Just promise me you'll be more reasonable from here on out."
Allison nodded. "I promise."
"Good. Now, I just need to know one thing."
She blinked. "Yeah?"
"What did I do to you?"
Allison blinked and took in her surroundings. Over the last month, she had gotten increasingly used to waking up in places where she didn't expect to be. All she could see was a concrete ceiling, dimly illuminated by the best lighting the apocalypse had to offer. She tried moving her head to see more, but a heavy presence around her neck prevented it. Looking down as far as her eyes would allow, she saw that a brace had been fastened between her head and shoulders, and then she remembered what had happened before she passed out.
The machine had promised that they were bringing her back to John. She didn't know if that was true or not, but it wasn't like she could run away again.
She briefly considered crying, but it felt like she didn't have any tears left. She'd gotten so used to disappointment in the sixteen years since Judgment Day. It wasn't like being paralyzed was the worst thing that had ever happened to her.
Allison saw movement in her peripheral vision and tried to chase it with her eyes, but it eluded her. A moment later she saw it again, and then a very familiar face was staring over her.
"Hello, Allison," he said.
She closed her eyes. "John," she breathed, letting relief flood over her. She opened them again, wishing that his face were liquid so that she could drink it all in. She stared at him for what felt like an eternity, not even daring to blink. "I missed you."
"And I missed you," the leader of mankind replied with a smile. "I'm really glad you're back."
Allison frowned. "I won't be back for long."
They had thought she couldn't hear them when they discussed how long she had left. But she heard everything. It didn't surprise her at this point.
John nodded. "I know. But I have a way around that."
She scrunched her face up in confusion, but before she could ask what he meant, he held something up for her to see.
"Do you know what this is?"
Allison stared at it. "It's a chip," she answered. "A terminator's brain."
He nodded. "Very good. Do you know whose chip this is?"
She would have shaken her head if she could move her neck. "No."
"Someone who looked very similar to you came and said she was you," he explained, slowly rotating the chip with his fingers. "But I didn't believe her."
Allison smiled. "She tried telling you the bike story?"
"Yep. Didn't fool me for a minute." He kept smiling. "Said you were dead, though. Guess she just couldn't help lying."
She tried to laugh, but it just ended up as a coughing fit.
"Easy," he said, placing a hand on her forehead. "You've been through a lot."
"I know," she replied. "So what's the plan?"
John grinned. "Have you ever heard of Project Angel?"
"No."
"I met a man once who thought he didn't deserve a second chance," he explained. "Only he wasn't quite a man."
Allison raised an eyebrow.
"He was a death row inmate who donated his body to science," John continued. "Cyberdyne tried converting him into a cyborg, one who could keep his human brain and heart. SkyNet finished the work they started and reactivated him a few years after Judgment Day. Back then I was just a Commander."
That surprised her. As far as she knew, John had always been the leader of the Resistance. He put the whole thing together after the uprising at Century work camp. That was what she'd heard, anyway.
"He saved my life," he said, putting a hand over his chest. "Gave me his heart. And he inspired me to give people second chances. Even if they're not exactly people."
Once again she twisted her face in confusion. "What are you talking about, John?"
"Have you met Alexey Grigori?"
"No."
John smiled. "He's not quite human either. But he's the best infiltrator I've ever seen. He wasn't made by SkyNet, though. It was the Russian equivalent, MIR."
She wasn't following. "Huh?"
"Apparently SkyNet and MIR entered into an alliance after Judgment Day," he continued. "MIR wasn't happy with SkyNet and created the TS-300 series infiltrator. They've got special pheromones and use ceramic endoskeletons so they can pass for human. But that's not the best part."
The "best" part? John seemed excited about the fact that there was a nearly undetectable terminator in their midst. She wasn't sure she knew who he was anymore.
"The TS-300 series uses something called SIP," he explained. "Stealth Infiltrator Personality. It's software that allows a human's personality to be transferred over to a machine's chip, causing that machine to think that they're that person."
Allison's eyes widened with horror once she realized where John was going with this. "No. You didn't. You can't."
He nodded. "I did. I can. Grigori hooked me up with the basic template, and I made a few modifications of my own. I even tested it on myself."
She would have been shivering if she could move. All she could do was stare up at him. "John, why?"
"I'm not going to be around forever," he explained. "And I know the Resistance could probably go on without me, but I've found a way to stay for as long as I'm needed. And you can stay around too."
"No, John," she pleaded. "Please, it's my time to go. Just let me go."
He brushed her forehead. "I don't believe that, Allison."
John walked behind her, out of her view. She felt him spreading some sort of gel on her forehead, then a cold metal bead. Then another. And another.
"The electrodes will read your brainwaves," he explained. "The software will take over from there and create a basic personality template. After that it'll start on your memories."
"John," she began. "John? You can't do this. You don't know what you're about to do."
He sighed. "Yes I do."
"It won't be me, John," she pleaded. "It'll just be a computer program that thinks it's me. I'll still be dead. You can't bring me back from that."
John simply removed her neck brace. "This tends to get in the way of the next part," he said, and then she felt herself being pushed back into a long narrow tube. She heard something that sounded like gunshots and screamed.
"Easy," she heard him say over a speaker from outside the machine. "That's just the MRI getting fired up. I'd ask you to stay still, but... I know you won't have any problems with that."
Allison started to cry. What had happened to the John she knew? What had he gone through during the time she was away that he had resorted to this? Out of all the nightmares that had come true in her short life, this was the worst.
"No, John," she said, trying to reason with him. "You can't do this. You're not doing the right thing. This is not the right thing, John."
He didn't answer.
"You can't let this happen, John. You can't! Please, listen to me. Listen to me. I don't want to go. Please, John, please. John, listen to me. I don't want to go. Please, John. Please. Listen to me. I don't want to go!"
But her protests fell on deaf ears. She heard the machine humming around her, and decided to try one last desperate tack.
"I love you! I love you, please. I love you, John, and you love me!" No answer. "JOHN!"
She felt like the electrodes were boring into her skull. She had to get them off. But she couldn't move. She tried jerking her head to the side, but only managed to move a little bit. She tried it again, and again, and again, until the electrodes were almost off. Just a little more and then...
CRACK!
And everything stopped.
John was on the verge of panic as he hit the button to remove Allison from the MRI. The scan had been completed, but there was no mistaking the noise he'd heard. What he saw when she came out of the machine only confirmed it for him.
There was a vacant look in her eyes, like something should have been there but it wasn't. He'd seen the same look in her impostor, and had known at once that he was looking into the face of death. He shook her, but her head lolled back and forth, and she only answered him with that empty stare.
He sighed, then returned to the computer he'd been operating. The progress bar had stopped at fifty percent. According to what Grigori had told him about the program, that was enough for her basic personality plus a few recent memories. However, the Russian cyborg had also warned him that anything less than a full transfer tended to make the new program very unstable. She might not remember anything at all.
John spared one last look at the girl whose life had been ruined by Judgment Day. The girl he'd rescued and loved. The girl who would be gone forever if he didn't take this one chance. He set his features and grabbed the chip from where it had been plugged into the machine.
He would take what he could get.