Chapter 986

Easier Now

Cammy indicated they were going to release natural gas or some other flammable gas and cause an explosion to collapse and burn the building. There was someone hiding inside and they wanted to see if that would bring them out and cause them to show themselves.

The 'gas' hissed loudly in the back room at the cryogenics lab. It sounded as if the room would be full of gas in a very short while. The smallest spark would ignite it. The results would be catastrophic.

There was movement inside the lab area after about thirty seconds. It was the reaction the Metal girls hoped for. Whoever was hiding decided they better get out before the building blew up.

A lone figure crawled out from inside of a work bench storage area. It was a very thin man.

They heard the place filling with 'flammable gas' and knew they needed to get away before it exploded. They wanted to make sure the intruders were gone. They heard them leave. They thought they'd waited as long as they could and still get out alive.

They crouched down on the floor and quickly looked around. They didn't smell the 'gas' yet so they thought that was a good thing. It looked like the intruders weren't around. They thought it was strange that they all sounded like females.

The skinny man carefully stood and looked in the direction of the hissing.

It was the air compressor tank releasing 'air'. It wasn't flammable gas.

Wait….

He knew he'd just been played.

He turned around and looked. There were four armed young women there. He could see one of them only seemed to have a bikini top or colored bra on under her vest. That struck him as unusual. He actually thought it looked kind of Hot.

He wanted to run but there was nowhere to go. They blocked his path. He knew he was busted for what he'd been doing. He thought these girls were from some law enforcement agency. He'd been arrested enough times to know to keep his mouth shut. He remained silent and said nothing. He raised his hands in the air.

Cammy walked up and searched him.

She ripped off his sleeves and looked at his arms. She checked to see if he was a Gray. She found something that was just as disgusting to her.

"These marks are 'needle tracks'. This guy's a drug addict." Cammy said. "I bet he was doing this for drugs or the money to buy them."

Ally was used to dealing with plenty of lowlifes. On Cameron's 'off the books' operations she'd dealt with plenty of them, both in the sex trade and in the illegal drug trade. She wanted some answers so they could wrap up their part of the operation. She looked at the skinny man with disgust.

"Start talking." Ally said. "It better be good and the truth."

The skinny man was nothing more than a doper. He was going to keep silent until he had a lawyer. The court always appointed him one. He would see if he could get the charges dropped first. If not he would see if he could work out some kind of a plea deal, most of the time it was just a slap on the wrist if he agreed to go to rehab. All he ever did in rehab is make contact with other drug users and found out where to go to get additional drugs as soon as he was released. He was used to 'playing the system' and he would play it again. He really thought the liberals in charge were morons.

He was glad the courts were soft on the offenders. He never really understood that since everyone who was brought before them was actually guilty. He'd never once seen an innocent person arrested and brought in for no reason. Most of the people had committed a dozen or more crimes and gotten away with it.

"I wish to remain silent." The doper said.

Holly was a little confused. She didn't normally go on Cameron's 'off the books' operations since her assignment was to watch over Allison in Palmdale.

"Silent?" Holly asked. "He must think we're the authorities."

The smug look on the skinny man's face began to fade. He looked the four girls over in detail. He didn't think any of them looked old enough to even be a policewoman. He was sure someone needed to be at least twenty one to join the police. He really wondered what he'd stumbled into at this point. He'd been on the fringes of some drug gang wars but this didn't look like one of them.

Cammy could see that the doper was confused and didn't understand what was going on. She wanted to help clarify things for him.

"You know the people you've been dealing with?" Cammy asked. "I'm talking about here, not about your drug contacts. I'm talking about the people that were just here. We hunt them down and kill them. Your association with them makes you fair game."

The doper was speechless. He stared at them with wild wide eyes.

Holly wanted to get this part of the operation over.

"I'll kill him now." Holly said.

Holly raised her M4.

The doper realized he was about to get popped. He needed to think fast.

"WAIT!" The doper screamed. "I know things."

Holly aimed her M4 at his head.

"I'll kill him anyway." Holly said. "He looks untrustworthy."

The doper was desperate. He would say or do anything at this point. He could see that they weren't kidding around. He thought the four girls were pretty but all of them had a stone cold look on their face. There was no expression on any of their faces. All he saw when he looked at them was death.

"No. I know stuff." The doper said. "I can help. I swear it."

Hanna gently pushed down the barrel of Holly's M4. She felt they'd made their point that they were going to kill him and he understood that. She hoped it would make him a little more talkative. She needed to agree with Holly though. He looked untrustworthy.

"Start talking." Hanna said. "It better be good."

Cammy listened in her com as CamNet contacted her. She was asked to question the man to see if he knew anything about the girl the Grays kidnapped. She was informed of the evidence on the stained mattress.

She felt the anger well up in her. She wanted answers and she was going to get them.

"Where's the girl?" Cammy asked.

The skinny man remained silent.

Cammy was irritated at the doper's silence

"Where's the girl?" Cammy asked sternly.

The skinny man looked away. He shifted uneasily.

That act caused Cammy's anger to grow. She was done fooling around and trying to be nice.

"Where's the girl?" Cammy asked forcefully.

Cammy moved up and grabbed him by the neck and lifted him off the floor. She was going to get some answers one way or another.

"TALK…." Cammy commanded. "You know something. You WILL tell me everything. I'll know if you're lying."

Cammy would beat the man to a pulp if she needed to.

"Where's the girl?" Cammy asked again.

Hanna, Holly and Ally were all updated by CamNet as well as to what occurred at the old supermarket and the evidence that was found in the sleeping quarters of the Grays. Each of them was now as angry and upset as Cammy was.

Cameron wondered what she would find when the vats were opened. She didn't know if she was about to 'let the genie out of the bottle' or not. She was aware of what happened 'in some future' with Mrs. Weaver's experiment. Mrs Weaver had been unable to program the Liquid Metal Terminator that she'd created. It was highly unstable and unpredictable. She didn't think the Skynet forces would be able to do any better if they attempted to create a Liquid Metal Terminator in current timeline, the present.

She went over to the work area and looked at what was on the workbench.

Cameron opened the vat that she'd closed earlier. It was the one that the man was working with when she'd first entered.

Bob looked around and set a large flat container next to her and backed up to cover the area. Gail and Sheila stood ready.

Cameron carefully dumped the vat into the large container.

There was a cloud of vapor over the liquid.

Cameron looked around and picked up a pair of tongs. She cleared the vapor with her hand to see better. Her vision spectrum picked something up in the misting liquid.

The stripped and shivering man was back among the couscous. He moaned and then looked around. He seemed very confused as to what was going on.

Cameron looked over at the man with disgust. She wanted some answers from him.

"Sheila, find out where the girl is." Cameron said. "MAKE him talk. Do whatever is necessary and do it now."

Cameron knew asking the Gray about what they were doing for Skynet was a waste of time. She figured they'd have better luck getting answers about what happened to the girl or whatever female captive that they'd had tied to the bed in their sleeping quarters.

Sheila reached down and picked the man up and lifted him up off of the ground. That produced a shrill scream. She carried him over to a corner like that and dropped him to the floor. She was sure that she felt a couple of ligaments rip loose during the carrying process. The shrill screaming stopped. She started her interrogation.

Cameron picked up the silvery mass from out of the liquid nitrogen with the tongs and placed it on the workbench. Bob and Gail stood back on each side of her. They were unsure what they all looked at. It didn't look like anything good.

The object was small but they didn't know what it was capable of or would do once it started to thaw out. Someone from the Skynet force decided that the only safe way to transport it was in liquid nitrogen. That was a warning that all of them planned to heed.

Savannah was going through some paper receipts when she heard the shrill scream. She thought Sheila started on the interrogation. She figured there were only a few things that would produce a scream like that. She wondered if the man was now a eunuch. She really didn't care what happened to him. She wanted him to suffer for what was done to the girl.

She looked at Cam and Jim who were going through all the personal belongings of the men looking for clues.

Neither one of them looked in the direction of the scream. They seemed unaffected by it or its implications. Maybe that was the best thing to do. They'd all been on some of Cameron's 'off the books' operations at some point. If one of those operations involved sex traffickers there was usually some form of 'punishment' before the perpetrator's termination.

Savannah decided to tune it out and went back to searching for anything. She knew these people's actions were what sealed their fate, not her or their team.

They would merely administer the sentence that the Gray earned by his own actions.

Savannah briefly thought about 'those eyes' that looked at her as she strangled the female Gray before. Right now she didn't care. They didn't bother her at all. She shrugged her shoulders and kept searching. She felt that the enemy received what they deserved.

John and John Henry watched the monitor. It was hard to tell from the body cam footage what they were looking at.

"Can you tell what Cameron has?" John asked. "What is that thing?"

John Henry wasn't sure what he looked at. He thought it was small but he didn't know how deadly or dangerous it was. It appeared that Cameron used quite a bit of caution in her initial contact with it.

"No. I don't know what it is." John Henry said. "It may be some form of Liquid Metal. It's very small."

John knew there were two interrogations going on. Most of the audio track wasn't being sent to his equipment. He figured they would be brutal. He wanted to hear how they were conducted.

"I can't hear the interrogations." John said. "I think I should be able to hear them."

John Henry tried to be as diplomatic as possible. He was sure that both of the interrogations would become very violent before they were finished. He knew that Sheila conducted the interrogation inside of the freezer with the Gray. He was pretty sure how that was going to end sooner or later. If Sheila wanted to work on him for some 'special treatment' he was pretty sure it was going to be later. That was unless the Gray expired before she was done.

"Once what the men know is determined, you'll receive a report." John Henry said.

John felt it was more than that. He saw the body cam footage. He wanted to make his official position known. It wasn't one of Cameron's 'off the books' operations. This was a Resistance matter.

"One of those interrogations I don't agree with." John said. "You know I don't approve of that."

John Henry didn't think that John would have much control over what happened with either interrogation. He certainly knew that he wouldn't. He wasn't even going to mention anything to anyone himself. He figured the only person there who would be able to do anything about what was happening inside the freezer was Savannah. She currently was elsewhere as the interrogation was being conducted. He didn't know Savannah told Cameron to make sure that Sheila 'worked' on the Gray. He decided to stick with the pertinent information.

"It's important to Cameron that the fate of the girl is determined." John Henry said. "If the girl isn't already dead, they may still be able to 'recover' her."

John wondered what condition she would be in at that point. Then again the girls from the future all 'recovered' and moved on with their lives. It was a different environment but they all made it. Maybe the difference there was that it happened to every female. It was simply the way things were.

"I get it." John said. "I still don't like it."

None of the Terminators liked it either, except Sheila. The subjects didn't always survive the questioning when it was done Terminator style.

"Nobody does." John Henry said. "Some are more reluctant than others to talk. Either way they will be terminated."

John was aware not everyone worked for Skynet, even if they were an unwitting dupe. It was possible for the Skynet forces to manipulate other people into doing their bidding who didn't even know Skynet existed. The situation with the Syndicate casino was another indication of how people could be manipulated to serve Skynet and not even know it. All they knew is they were being leaned on by Syndicate thugs.

"What about the guy at the lab?" John asked. "He sounds like a drug user, not a Gray."

John Henry felt assisting Grays with dubious activity was a pretty fine line.

"He is a collaborator and a loose end." John Henry said. "He'll most likely end up as a Scavenger or a Gray. I'm actually surprised that he hasn't been terminated yet."

John thought it was simpler than that.

"He just wants a fix." John said. "Once people get addicted to dope, they'll do anything to get their fix."

CamNet informed John Henry that is what the doper would receive. He would be overdosed on his own drugs and left there. He didn't share that information with John.

"Perhaps we should concentrate on the truck and where it goes. The teams will notify us of anything relevant." John Henry said. "These things take some time to play out."

John watched what he could. He was most concerned with whatever it was that Cameron was 'playing' with. It looked to him that she was waiting for whatever it was to thaw out so she could 'mess' around with it in some fashion.

Samantha watched over Riley and Precious. Derek was called off after dinner. She was aware why.

The dinner was done and the dishes were washed and put away.

"Do you wish for me to go into standby?" Samantha asked.

"I was going to take a shower." Riley said.

Samantha decided to wait until Riley was finished.

"I'll tend to Precious." Samantha said.

Samantha was aware Riley started to undress and it wasn't in the bedroom either.

She was unsure what was about to happen. She hoped that Riley didn't expect her to shower with her. She wanted to find out exactly what was going on.

"Is this what you normally do?" Samantha asked.

Riley hadn't really thought about it. Privacy was never something she grew up with. Everyone just did what they needed to do. It was no big deal really.

"I'm sorry." Riley said. "Sometimes when I'm in our quarters I don't get dressed much. I've been wearing a bathrobe the last couple of months most of the time. I wasn't thinking."

Riley felt tired and lacked energy for the last few months of her pregnancy. She hadn't done much better after Precious was born. Some days all she wore was a bathrobe and nothing else. She wasn't going out to do anything and it was easy to put on. She usually tied the front of the robe with the cloth belt but not always. What was there to hide that anyone hadn't seen before? She was just a female, like half the people on the planet. What was the big deal? No, really what was the big deal?

Samantha wondered if Derek did the same. Maybe she was infringing on their lifestyle.

"It's not a problem. You must always remember my limitations. I don't wish to be deactivated." Samantha said. "I take it Derek does the same thing around the quarters?"

Riley felt a little embarrassed at how lazy she'd become. It was more than just being lazy. It was because she always felt so tired and out of it recently. She thought about it a little bit more. It was about being lazy. The other things were just excuses that she used so she could be lazy. Now she felt bad about herself.

"I guess we'll have to wear more appropriate attire now." Riley said. "Most of my clothes didn't fit anymore anyway. Any of the ones Sarah still had from when she was pregnant with Jan were too small for me. Growing up in the Wastelands and tunnels there wasn't much privacy. It's not even something you think about. Everyone has a body. You just hope that someone doesn't notice yours and decide they want to use it for two or three minutes. It happened and it happened a lot."

Samantha wanted to ease Riley's mind some.

"I understand." Samantha said. "It doesn't bother me. Nudity means nothing to me. I'm a machine."

Riley looked Samantha up and down, she thought Samantha was a knockout.

"When I look at you, I find that hard to remember." Riley said. "You look like a human female to me. I can tell you that you're very beautiful. You're different from any of the girls here but you're just as beautiful as they are.

Samantha was pleased to hear that but none of it mattered. She decided to spell it out some.

"This sheath will be Resequenced." Samantha said. "I'll appear differently soon. The change will happen over the next few weeks."

Riley wondered about that and what all would change. She wondered how 'deep' the changes would actually go.

"I heard about that." Riley said. "Will 'everything' change?"

Samantha was well aware that no part of her sheath would be identical to the way it was now. Every detail would be different.

"Everything will be like the new donor's DNA that I use." Samantha said. "That's the whole purpose of using the donor's DNA to copy the subject that we're going to replace."

Riley went off to take her shower. On the way there she thought how cool that would be to be able to change her appearance. Everything would be different and 'new' on her. She could look like anybody or nobody. She was pretty sure if she had the ability to do that that she would change her appearance every six months. Wait. If it only took two weeks to Resequence a Terminator's sheath, she might even do it every other month. She would start with all of the females at the Resistance base and in Palmdale. It excited her to remember what Isabelle and Metal Summer looked like.

She realized that she was in the shower now and touching herself as she thought about all of the different females that she could look like. She would be sure to do with each one of their sheath's what she was doing now with herself. She was surprised at how quickly she 'finished'. She thought she would do that more often when she pleasured herself.

Samantha updated with John Henry and CamNet for any relevant developments. Instead of going into standby, she would go on patrol. There was no active threat but the base was short on Terminators. Being a Terminator was her true calling, not a babysitter. She was pretty sure she was as much of a bodyguard for Precious as she was a babysitter.

She called Jesse to see if she was going to come to the room next door. Jesse said she would come in case she was needed. Claire asked to come also. Claire wanted to check in on Young Allison and work with Summer on her music lessons for an hour. Jesse said she would come to the room first.

With Jesse there, Samantha would feel more comfortable about being on patrol. She liked it when there were others, other than Riley, to help watch over Precious.

Riley finished up in the bathroom and came out dressed.

"I can get some of my clothes back on now." Riley said. "I still need to burn off some of this fat. I think I 'let myself go' some."

Samantha thought it was best not to comment on that revelation. Her programming indicated it was a sensitive issue among all humans but especially more so for females. Age and appearance was another factor that seemed to cause a lot of issues with humans. Again it was especially females who had issues with such things. She wasn't really sure she understood why. If something was factual, it was factual. What was wrong with that? She decided to move the conversation along.

"Jesse will be next door soon." Samantha said. "I'll go on patrol around the base. You're to call me immediately if there's any problem. Claire will join Jesse in another hour. ASK the girls for any help you need. They want to assist you. I will return every nineteen minutes to check on what's happening."

Riley felt depressed again. She felt a little better after her self 'finish' in the shower. The euphoria of that event had already worn off.

"I feel like I'm a burden to everyone." Riley said. "I'm sure they all wonder why they need to help me. Everyone has their own life to live. I really don't know what to do."

Samantha didn't believe that statement was correct. Her observation of everything that happened around the Resistance base and regarding Precious was different from Riley's summation.

"Do your friends and 'family' act like this is a burden?" Samantha asked. "You'll do fine. I have confidence in you."

Riley did think things were a little more under control now. She'd felt a lot less stress once Samantha began to assist her.

"Thanks." Riley said. "Things seem a little easier now. Thank you for helping me."

Samantha understood she was newly created but she possessed programming that was long standing from several Terminators.

"We all help each other." Samantha said. "We're a team."

When Jesse arrived and checked in with Riley and Precious, Samantha left.

Samantha checked in on Sarah and Jan, then on Summer and Claire.

She followed up on Kyle and Derek, then with John and John Henry.

She then went to check on Vanna and Allison. They were going to watch Summer when Claire left.

Everything at the base seemed secure.

Samantha started her patrol. She would need to time it so she could repeat everything three times per hour. Every nineteen minutes she would return to the nursery and check on Precious and Riley. She would stay for one minute unless longer was necessary and resume her nineteen minute patrol again.

She asked to be filled in with all the details about what was happening on both operations as she conducted her patrol. It would alert her to any problems that might happen later on. She also reviewed the drone footage around the Resistance base on her phone.

Easier Now

What has more value
Things that are given
Things that are taken
Or things that are stolen

Maybe the things
For which one has yearned
Are the most valuable
When they're earned

People like to cut corners
Because they're lazy
Maybe it's because
Everyone's a bit crazy

When it comes to love
Maybe it's the same
There's soon plenty of blame
Does it really matter the name

There are those who wow
Maybe even consider a vow
Does it matter anyhow
Are things harder or easier now

Nobody