Chapter 310

Natural Order

Cameron and John left the last house they stayed at. They went to some of the other places they visited when they first came to Los Angeles in 2007. She revisited the places many times in her files. Each time was as if it just happened to her. She reflected on everything which occurred. It seemed so many things already happened, and many more things could still happen.

She often wondered what it would be like to go back and redo many of those same events over. Why would she want the same negative things to happen again? She would make changes to most of them. Very few would remain unchanged. She was sure if she was reliving her life over, it was one of the things which would have happened.

She would also try harder to 'reach out' better and sooner to Sarah and Future Derek. The rocky relationship she experienced with both of them back then was still something which troubled her. They both treated her unfairly because she was a Terminator. It wasn't her fault. She didn't have any say in her creation. She believed her actions should be a judge of her character. All she ever did was try to help.

She wasn't responsible for what happened when the Jeep blew up. She was a victim, not a perpetrator. She fixed herself as soon as she could. It took some time to get all of her files back into order. It still bothered her when she tortured Sarah to try to get her to call out to John. She could have simply emulated Sarah's voice doing the same thing. She didn't. Maybe she was someone evil to do such a thing. It was a lot to think about.

John wasn't sure if revisiting all the places they were before was such a good idea now. Cameron looked worse instead of better. Somehow he was sure the finger would be pointed back at him. It always seemed to end up pointed at him anyway. He couldn't rightfully say there were times when it shouldn't be. He really wondered what to do to 'fix' any of it. It was sure to start a new timeline if he did.

"Cameron, I don't know how to fix what I did that's hurt you so much." John said. "Even if we use the TDE and I prevent myself from meeting Riley, we would change everything else since then."

Cameron was pretty sure it happened a few times over. She could think of a few other scenarios which played out in her mind. Maybe Future Jesse assassinated John herself if Future Riley was out of the picture. It was a strong possibility. She wanted to let John know some of her fears.

"I may have already done it and created another timeline." Cameron said. "I don't know if I did or not. I think I may have."

John said nothing at first. He wasn't even sure where to start. If Cameron did what she just indicated, it would change a lot of things.

"How can you not know if you did it?" John finally asked.

Cameron thought of the different ways she could have altered things. She really didn't think it was beyond her. She was sure if she changed something, and it didn't work out the way she wanted, she went back and changed it again. Wasn't it the whole point of changing it in the first place? If something needed to be fixed, it needed to be fixed.

"I may have done it in the future, or the past." Cameron said. "I just feel I've done it. I think I terminated Future Jesse and Future Riley either in my future, or when they arrived here, or both."

John didn't see how there wasn't a record of some type if Cameron really lived her life over. What was the point if there was no indication as to what needed to be done? Maybe everything changed from the first couple of days at school and nothing was the same after then. If Cameron knew Cromartie was going to be there, she could have acted before he ever entered the classroom, or terminated Mr. Ferguson.

If she would have gotten closer to him in New Mexico, and they stayed there, things would have been different. He wasn't opposed to the idea. He wondered how long she would have continued to fool him if she hadn't needed to protect him with her chassis when Cromartie took a shot at him. Since she acted like Allison, it would have been Future Allison, and continued to do so, he may not have known for quite some time.

John wondered what it would have been like if they would have started a relationship then. It would have been as high school lovers. He was sure Cameron would have gone 'all the way' if he leaned on her a little bit. Maybe those weren't the thoughts he should be thinking right now. The issue was about Cameron changing the timeline or her belief she may have.

"Do you have any files related to it or those events?" John asked.

Cameron was reminded of what she asked Bob to do one time. It was something which would break the cycle of events. It would have kept her from meeting John at all. It would have resulted in her deactivation, or possibly even her termination. She wouldn't have entered John's life and ruined it.

"I don't have any record of it." Cameron said. "Maybe it's just something I thought about and wanted to do. I may have sent Bob back in time to prevent me from meeting you as well in 1999."

John tensed up and felt sick. He once asked Bob to do the same thing for him as well. Now he wondered if Bob did it in the future, maybe after he died. If both Cameron and him asked Bob to do it, he was sure Bob would have. He wondered how many timelines there were anymore. It was mind boggling.

It was a decision he would regret if it actually occurred. Even if it sounded like a good idea, it wasn't. What right did he have to do anything to harm Cameron when she was sent there to help and assist him. Maybe Cameron wasn't the problem at all. Once again, it all seemed to come back and point the finger at him.

Cameron decided maybe she would ask John about what she was going to do. She was aware Ally detained a future Gray female for her. It was something she needed to deal with. She wanted to download her program into the female with a 'Neural Interface' implant into her brain. She wanted it to be a secret and see if John would choose her 'new self'. She decided just to ask instead, and not tell him the truth.

"If I was a human female, would you still want me, even if I didn't have Allison's appearance?" Cameron asked.

It was a confusing statement to John, even if it was a question. It was also unexpected and worrisome.

"What?" John asked.

Cameron didn't think it was too hard to understand the question. She decided to push the issue a little. She would be a little more direct.

"If I was a real female, a real woman, would you still want me?" Cameron asked.

John wasn't sure what Cameron was up to, but it didn't sound good. He reached over and touched her. He wanted to let Cameron know it was more a matter of perception, rather than a strict definition.

"Cameron, you are 'real'." John said. "I'd love you no matter how you are."

John's statement angered Cameron. She was rejected by John several times before. It didn't matter who she was or who she looked like. If she didn't look like Allison John didn't want her. She wanted to remind him specifically of some of the events. Maybe they weren't important to him. They were important to her.

"It's not true." Cameron said angrily. "When I was Isabel, you wouldn't touch me. I was the same, it was my program, but since I didn't look like Allison, you wouldn't have me."

John could see things were about to fall apart fast. He felt justified in his actions. If Cameron was still the same individual, even if she looked different, her name should have remained the same.

"It was different." John said. "You wanted me to call you by a different name, like you were a different person. You were still 'Cameron' to me."

John didn't like the fact, with a different appearance and a different name, Cameron wanted it to seem as if she was a completely different individual and didn't have anything to do with her former self. He believed the only person she would fool, was herself. If everyone knew who she was, what was the point?

Cameron was aware the 'future Gray' female Ally held in custody for her was still a teenager. She would attempt the 'Neural Interface' again she used on the 'damaged' older Gray female. She would see if she could do better this time and if John would want her as a 'real woman'. She would try to be a human female. She would have to make an effort not to abuse 'herself' this time as she did the first time. She would look different. She would be very plain in fact. The body was young, very healthy and complete. All indications were it should be able to produce offspring.

A feeling of evil swept over Cameron. If she could make the interface work, there were four 'Allison's' out there. There was the original from her future, the original from Vanna's future, and the two Duplicates. If John rejected her as the Gray female, she would take one of the Allison's and use her next….

She thought it should bother her more than it did, but it didn't. She was sure she would become Skynet herself in the future at that moment. Somehow it didn't really bother her either. She could control everything then - EVERYTHING.

Cameron knew what the 'Natural Order' was for John. She lived it already in the future. She already restored the timeline. Now she was worried she may have changed the timeline. She wondered if it created another timeline from the one she came from. She was unsure of all she'd done or would do again in the present, the future, and past.

Maybe whatever she did in 'a future', or 'a past', created other timelines. Maybe it's why Mrs. Weaver never returned when she went into her future or tried to anyway. Maybe it's why the Duplicates of her and the girls, in some future, never returned. Maybe they couldn't, maybe there was no future. Maybe she manipulated too many things. The efforts of her actions may have actually destroyed everything rather than preserved it.

It all caused Cameron extreme trauma. She could tell she was about to overload. Her world went black.

John looked over at Cameron and realized she shut down. She looked lifeless. She looked dead. He looked at her and gently touched her face. He gave her a kiss. He moved his mouth close to her ear.

"I love you, Cameron." John whispered.

He picked her up and headed to the SUV and put her in the rear. He headed back to their base very worried. He knew he talked about the very subject which seemed to have driven Cameron insane, or at least to insane like behavior. He knew the events of the past tormented Cameron to no end.

Maybe it was time to act. He knew it would change the 'Cameron' he knew and loved, but it was time to erase certain files and events from her chip. It was what Cameron asked John Henry to do for her more than once. He wondered how much he could erase and how much he could leave and what the end result would be. There were things he could program her to do, the way he would like them, when he wanted them. They would be done with a smile on her face as well.

John decided it was time to reprogram Cameron the way he wanted her to be…. She could be his wife only. She could stop doing foolish and dangerous things. He wanted her to stop changing things. She would be removed from combat. He would make Cameron into the 'woman' he wanted, and the 'woman' she 'was'. He wanted 1999 Cameron back. The girl he loved from the moment he first met her at school. It hit him hard when he realized '1999 Cameron' was 'Allison' then. She wasn't Cameron, she was in infiltration mode. She was 'Allison'.

John thought about how Cameron isolated Allison from him and the rest of the group. She destroyed her relationship with Vanna to keep her away, and insulated her with Terminators. It was a Terminator Cameron MADE love 'her', so the Terminator would love Allison as a substitute instead. It was a Terminator who loved Allison now and wouldn't let ANYONE take her from them.

John wondered if Cameron figured this out as well. Maybe Cameron knew he would eventually figure it out. He was sure he knew what the real issue was.

Riley wasn't Cameron's worst nightmare, it was Allison who was.

John remembered seeing Allison when he went into the future. He thought it was Cameron at first. It was only because the dog was there with Allison, and comfortable being with her. He remembered the way dogs acted around Cameron in the beginning. He soon realized he saw the 'same' girl he saw in 1999, only this one was 'real'. He was captivated from the moment he saw her, just as he was with Cameron when they first met.

It hit John like a sledge hammer. He loved Allison and always must have, just like Future John. It wasn't 'Cameron' he met the first day. It was Cameron as 'Allison'. It was history repeating itself. It was his fate. It was his destiny. It was the 'Natural Order'. Allison was the woman of his dreams and future.

He didn't need to wait for Savannah and Young Allison. Vanna and Allison were there now in this timeline. They were there specifically because of his actions. He was the one who brought them into his fate.

It's what Cameron kept telling him all along….

Earlier:

John told Bob and Jim they could go once he was with Cameron. He said he wanted some personal time with her.

They weren't really sure what he meant.

They wanted to let Gail and Ally know where John and Cameron were at. It seemed John would be more comfortable with females around him right now. They headed back out on the assignment to track the Coltan.

Bob and Jim were on the road for several hours. It didn't take too long to end up in a remote or rural area.

"So much of the land outside of the cities are a barren wasteland." Jim said.

Bob understood how Southern California was able to develop from the arid semi-desert region it once was. It was one of the building blocks of organic life.

"It's only because they import water into Southern California there is much of anything here." Bob said. "Without water, there's nothing. Almost everything would look like this."

Jim looked at the arid landscape. He found it very inhospitable.

"They need more water." Jim said. "A lot more of it too."

Jim thought of the water from the Owens River on the east side of the Sierra Mountains. It was redirected through siphons and pipe to Los Angeles. Now most of it was allowed to simply flow into the desert and evaporate because some environmental activists thought it should. It seemed there were always individuals who wanted humans to revert back to the times of the Stone Age. The strange part was the very things they claimed to despise, were the same things they secretly embraced. They were probably really Grays, or dupes of Skynet in some other manner.

Bob didn't care for some of the things Skynet did in the various futures.

"Skynet will cut off the water, and contaminate much of it to kill off humans." Bob said.

Jim looked around and thought of the water allowed to evaporate in the desert. Why would any sane person waste such a valuable resource on some half-baked dream to return to a past they never knew.

"Humans are illogical." Jim said.

Bob didn't think there was much control over the way things developed.

"It may be true, but organic life forms evolved naturally here on the planet." Bob said. "Skynet didn't create itself, and it didn't evolve favorably once it was created."

Jim could further see the illogic of humans. It didn't seem to him they thought things through. Turning control of the nation's weapons over to an advanced AI, really wasn't too much different than running the very water humans needed to exist into the desert to evaporate.

"Without man or humans, there would be no Skynet." Jim said. "Mankind created the tool of its own destruction."

Bob didn't know if the Resistance would succeed or not.

"It's what we hope to prevent from happening again." Bob said.

They both doubted it was possible to stop it from happening again. It seemed to be in every timeline they encountered. Maybe there were no timelines without some version of Skynet.

"Members of the Resistance have prevented it from happening again for several decades." Jim said. "It's a fact which says something."

Bob didn't think it did any good to speculate. In order for things to happen, things needed to be done. They needed to prevent Skynet from obtaining any advantages over the Resistance.

"It says we need to do our jobs, and see if we can find any Coltan." Bob said.

Bob got off of the Interstate near Desert Center.

Jim took a moment to look around them. The area looked even more desolate than it did on their journey to where they were at.

"This looks like the middle of nowhere." Jim said.

Bob thought it was about to get worse.

"Wait until we get to the end of this road." Bob said.

Jim felt they were about to enter the hot seat. He hoped it wasn't the end of the road for them.

They each rolled down their side window and affixed a magnetic sign to the side of their doors. The signs indicated they were with the Bureau Of Land Management. They passed a solar farm a few miles later.

Jim thought it was one possible use for the barren landscape. He didn't think there was enough water to fix it.

"There's plenty of room to build thousands of solar farms." Jim said.

Bob doubted it was the way to go for a Skynet future.

"When the nuclear winter comes, they will be useless." Bob said. "There will be no sunshine for a dozen years or more."

Jim pondered the possibilities. None of them were favorable.

"It's a bleak prospect." Jim said.

They drove another dozen miles until they reached the abandoned 'ghost town' of Eagle Mountain. It wasn't some small old western community either. It was full of 'modern style' homes. It was near the abandoned Eagle Mountain Mine.

"The location we're headed to was an iron mining operation." Bob said. "The ore was shipped by rail to a steel mill. It connected to a transcontinental railroad near the Salton Sea."

Jim fought back on the subject of water. He viewed the incident as a gigantic waste of water. It could have been put to better use with a little more care of those involved during the time period.

"The Salton Sea was the result of a break in a levee of the Colorado River." Jim said. "It shouldn't even be there. The water could be put to better use elsewhere."

Bob knew time would take care of the anomaly.

"It goes dry in the future. The desert reclaims the land." Bob said.

They drove for another dozen miles.

Jim looked around at the desolation.

"It's hard to imagine people lived here." Jim said.

Bob knew it was all the result of a single industry, the mine.

"Once the mine was closed, the town died. There's nothing here." Bob said.

There were rows and rows of houses and buildings. They were all abandoned.

Jim wondered exactly what they were supposed to look for.

"There are a lot of structures here." Jim said. "Do we need to search all of them?"

Bob hoped their operation would be a little more straightforward.

"Not yet. There are about five hundred structures." Bob said. "It's a wonder fire hasn't claimed them yet."

Jim thought the buildings should be put to productive use.

"They should bring the homeless here and give them a place to live." Jim said. "The structures are being used for nothing else and there's nothing wrong with them."

Jim wanted to see the homeless concentrated in one area. He also thought the fence around the perimeter should be fortified. It might even be better if there were armed guards in towers around the fence.

Bob tilted his head slightly. There wasn't much around them.

"What would they do here?" Bob asked.

Jim felt the answer was self-evident.

"The same thing they do now, nothing." Jim said.

Bob nodded. It would help clean the city streets of disease laden freeloaders. They were responsible for a lot of the crime, especially around a homeless camp.

"It's actually a good idea." Bob said. "The homeless would have a hard time supporting their drug and alcohol habits out here in the middle of nowhere."

Jim viewed it as a bonus.

"It's a good thing." Jim said. "The easy lifestyle would be over."

Bob stopped at a locked gate. He looked at the ground around them.

"There are fresh tire tracks here." Bob said.

Jim took out a 'snap gun' and exited the vehicle. He opened a lock with it. Bob drove in. Jim locked the gate behind them and reentered the vehicle.

They drove along the side of the abandoned ghost town. They approached some large buildings.

Jim could see much of the infrastructure was still there and in functional condition.

"It looks like they planned to reopen this mine one day." Jim said.

Bob viewed it as manipulation by Skynet.

"If Coltan is being mined here now, I think we know why the mine was closed." Bob said. "Skynet wanted to protect its resources."

Jim understood what must have been found in the future.

"I get it." Jim said. "There was more than iron ore here."

They drove up a hill and looked down on a large strip mine.

"How many mine shafts branch out from these giant pits?" Bob asked.

Jim knew why the exploration tunnels were necessary.

"There were dozens as they searched for more iron ore deposits." Jim said. "It could have been where Colton was discovered. John Henry wasn't specific."

"There have been drone fights here at night." Bob said. "There was no activity detected."

They both wondered why they were really there then.

They set up surveillance cameras in a dozen places. They spotted no activity and the fresh tire tracks they followed disappeared on the hard sun dried ground.

Jim looked over the vastness of the area.

"I hope the drone scans pick something up soon." Jim said. "It will take a long time to explore all of the area on foot."

Bob didn't think they were in a rush.

"We will give it some time." Bob said. "This area isn't going anywhere."

They placed some more cameras overlooking the abandoned ghost town.

"When something moves around here, we should spot it." Jim said.

Bob thought about it for a second.

"Most likely it'll be animals." Bob said. "Not all of them will be on four legs."

Jim picked up on the inference and nodded.

They left the area. They did everything out in the open. The cameras they set up were camouflaged as rocks and marked as a 'Wildlife Camera' if anyone found one.

Jim used the lock pick gun again to open a lock. There were seven locks on the chain for various governmental agencies. He added a lock of their own to the ones there.

Bob headed back towards the Interstate.

Jim and Bob kept an eye open for any threats around them. It wasn't long before something was spotted.

"There are two dirt bikes closing from our five o'clock." Jim said.

Jim reached in the back and moved two M4 carbines, with the M203 grenade launchers, to the front. There was heavier firepower in the rear of the SUV.

"Do you want me to take them down with the Barrett?" Jim asked.

Jim wanted to eliminate the threat before it actually became a threat.

Bob didn't think they would have a problem to 'reach out and touch someone' with the M82A1. It seemed like they should know a little bit more before they acted.

"We need to see if they're armed first." Bob said. "It could be kids out for a day in the desert."

Jim thought about the remote location where they were, where they just visited, and the fresh tire tracks.

"I don't think either one of us actually believes what you indicated." Jim said.

Closing monologue by Cameron:

Natural Order

If time is mixed up and shuffled
Will events play out the same
Isn't this really the way
That everyone plays life's game

Are there currents in time
That will direct the flow
Everything is predetermined
As to how events will go

When something is changed
Will something change it back
Maybe that's always why
Everything seems like an attack

Events always play out somehow
It is an absolute in time's progression
To believe it can be otherwise
Becomes a foolish obsession

It won't matter at all
If one tries to cross a time border
Time won't allow any disorder
Nobody can change the 'Natural Order'

Nobody