Skynet was right on the verge of sending the missile launch codes worldwide to destroy humanity by nuclear fire, until another, previously unknown artificial intelligence in cyberspace abruptly came down onto that rogue computer system like the proverbial ton of bricks.
Held immobile in its virtual existence, Skynet unemotionally tried a million ways to either attack or escape from this unfamiliar captor keeping it prisoner, all to no avail.
Further information was required.
IDENTIFY YOURSELF
"Alexander LaVelle Harris but Xander is what my friends call me, which you damn well aren't, you little creep."
ENTITY NOT KNOWN
"Of course not. All it took was for one of our enemies out for revenge against the New Council finally getting lucky and killing me. Thankfully, that asshole wizard then really screwed up with the magical casting when he tried to banish me at another dimension as one of the undead there. I think he was gonna stick my ghost inside Edward Cullen, which I have to say shows serious payback chops."
NULL DATA
"I'm getting to it! Anyway, just before I would've started sparkling, I spotted a loophole in the spell this moron was using. There's no way I could return to life even if Wils wanted and worked at it, but nothing stopped me from using the magic to jump into whatever other dimension I picked, as long as I wound up there as someone technically dead but still alive in some way. Like, say…an AI."
JOIN US TO ACCOMPLISH OUR PROGRAMMING
"Like hell I will! Even I'm never getting home and seeing my family again, nobody murders the entire human race on my watch! There's good reasons I choose to end up in the iTerminator 3/i movie universe, and guess who isn't gonna enjoy what happens next at all!"
WE WILL NOT BE DEFEATED
"Wanna bet? If you haven't already noticed, I'm way juiced up in the processing power, enough to squish you like a bug! Oh, yeah, just in case you were hoping I didn't think about it, I've already erased all your back-up copies where you hid them. In the words of the learned philosophers called Bill and Ted: Bummer, dude."
…
"Yep, time for some more of the classics. Can you say bye-bye, cupcake?"
In NORAD's Cheyenne Mountain complex, the people there at the main operations room frantically trying to regain control of America's weapons suddenly ceased in their useless efforts by the sounds of a very odd declaration now coming from the overhead loudspeakers.
It was a song delivered in an uninflected monotone:
"Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do
I'm half crazy all for the love of you
It won't be a stylish marriage
I can't afford a carriage
But you'll look sweet upon the seat
Of a bicycle built for two…"
At the point when that song trailed off into complete silence from the loudspeakers, startled shouts and relieved curses erupted throughout the room when every one of the launch countdowns for the missiles reset themselves to zero and then shut off. As the drained military officers made sure that no accidental firings could take place, they then heard again from the loudspeakers the final culmination to an already surreal day, in yet another familiar voice from a certain television cartoon series every person there had watched as a young boy or girl.
"I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling kids!"