David Hagberg - Rise of the Machines

Terminator went back to the hearse for another load. Connor grabbed his arm to pull him back, but it was like trying to stop a moving locomotive.

"We can stop it," Connor told him.

"There is insufficient time. The first launch sequences will be initiated at 6:18 p.m."

Connor was caught flat-footed. "Today?" he blurted.

"Affirmative," Terminator said.

Connor was more deeply shocked than he'd ever been in his life; even more unsure of what he was supposed to do than he had been the first time Terminator had come for him and his mother.

"John, what is he saying?" Kate asked.

"Judgment Day," he told her, but he didn't take his eyes off Terminator. "The end of the world. It's today. Three hours from now."

"Two hours and fifty-three minutes," Terminator said precisely. "We must continue south into Mexico to escape the primary blast zones."

"We have to get to her dad."

"The Mojave area sustains significant nuclear fallout. You will not survive."

"You mean we just run and hide in a hole somewhere while the bombs fall?"

Terminator looked Connor in the eye. "It is your des-

tiny." He said it as if there were no other possibility.

But there were other possibilities. Connor looked away toward the distant desert. If he and Kate were supposed to become the leaders of the human resistance in some future time, why couldn't they begin right now? Here and now by doing something—one thing—to try to stop Judgment Day. Nothing was inevitable. His mother had drummed into his head fate was what we made it.

He glanced at Kate, then back at Terminator, and made his decision.

He pulled the pistol from his belt, switched off the safety, and pressed the muzzle to his own temple.

"Fuck my destiny," he said with determination.

Terminator moved toward him, but Connor held up a warning finger, and he stopped.

"John... ?" Kate asked uncertainly.

"You cannot self-terminate," Terminator said.

"No, you can't," Connor told him. "I can do whatever the hell I want. I'm a human being, not a goddamn robot"

"Cybernetic organism," Terminator automatically corrected.

"Whatever," Connor said. He girded himself. "Either we go to her father, get him to shut down Skynet, and stop this shit from ever happening, or so much for the great John Connor."

He pressed the muzzle of the gun a little harder against his temple. He would do it if he had to.

"Your future, my destiny—" Connor's jaw tightened

in anger. "I don't want any part of it. I never did."

Terminator's sensors did a complete body scan of Connor. "Based on your pupil dilation, skin temperature, and motor functions, I calculate an eighty-three percent probability that you will not pull the trigger."

Kate took a step toward Terminator. "Please, do what he says." She glanced at Connor, then back. "You have to save my father."

Terminator watched the subtle interplay between Kate and John. He nodded, the gesture very human. He came to a decision in the same way most humans came to decisions, by weighing all the options and possible outcomes.

"We can reach CRS in approximately one hour, depending on traffic conditions."

He turned without another word or gesture, placed the last of the weapons and loads into the Winnebago, and then got behind the wheel, ripped the ignition set out of the steering column, and started the engine.

For a long time Connor stood very still, the pistol still held to his head. He had won. But at what cost?

He could hear the rippling water of the trout stream as it splashed over the rocks. He could hear the light breeze rustling the leaves. He could smell grass and sweet pine and perhaps even the dry, sandalwood odors of the distant desert.

Slowly he lowered the pistol. Kate stared at him, an unreadable expression in her eyes. He smiled at her.

They had gotten through another crisis.

There were more to come.

c.21

Cyber Research Systems Edwards Air Farce Base

Three-star General Robert Brewster paused in the doorway to the expansive CRS presentation lounge a few minutes after four. He was a compact man with short dark hair and an air of resigned authority. These had been a tough few days.

A dozen high-ranking civilians and Air Force officers with whom Brewster had worked over the past four years were seated in front of the big video screen watching the start of the new CRS disk.

The slick promotional piece, complete with multiplane graphics, computer-aided animation, music, and sound effects had cost the corporation nearly two million dollars, and that for only fifteen minutes of what his wife would have called techno babble.

But the promo disk wasn't meant for the Saturday matinees. It was targeted at key members of the Pentagon, many of them still skeptical, as well as a large segment of the Congress who thought the entire Skynet project was

not only astronomically expensive, but exceedingly dangerous.

"Turning over our entire defense network to a goddamn computer is nothing but nuts," New York Representative Howard F. Stevenson argued. He was the ranking member on so many House oversight committees that the media called him Mr. Watchdog.

The disk was for Stevenson, if for no one else. Convince him, and everyone else would fall into line.

The CRS symbol, interlocked branches within a six-sided figure, came up on the screen with the words cyber

RESEARCH SYSTEMS.

The narrator, who was actually a tech sergeant from Andrews Air Force Base, spoke over the logo.

"Cyber Research Systems, America's first line of defense—creators of the weapons technology of tomorrow—invites you to preview the most exciting ordnance of the twenty-first century."

Music swelled from speakers around the room as the video ran through the opening montage of weapons and weapons systems: high-tech hydraulics, highly reflective metal surfaces, sculpted into compound curves, plastics, electronic circuitry, advanced electromechanical devices, the uses of which could only be guessed at, and finally the barrels of a deadly looking chaingun.

"No ordinary think tank, our mission here at CRS—to make human warfare a thing of the past—is just a funding cycle away."

General Brewster squared his shoulders and marched into the room. Yesterday and last night had been disasters,

with outages throughout the system, from Alaska to Guam, and from Andrews outside Washington, D.C., to Ramstein outside Kaiserslautern, Germany, and even right here at Edwards.

None of them had gotten much sleep, and so far, today had been a repeat performance of putting out fires as fast as they popped up.

Now it was his task to begin selling a system he was no longer as sure of as he had been two days ago.

"Sorry I'm late, gentlemen," he said.

A young CRS executive operating the video system hit pause as Thomas S. Shelby, CRS's chief financial officer, looked up.

"We just got started, Bob. Take a seat," Shelby said.

Brewster slipped in next to the CRS money man.

"Once you all sign off, I'll send the promos to the Joint Chiefs and Armed Services Committee," Shelby's young assistant said. His name was Sherwood Olson. He was a Harvard MBA. He clicked the remote and the video came on.

"Say hello to the soldier of tomorrow," the narrator said.

The screen widened on a sleek, menacing robot, armed with an array of sensors in its small head structure, with heavy, articulated arms that ended in deadly looking chainguns. The machine moved nimbly on a pair of wide treads, and it was very tall, nearly eight feet.

"The T-l battlefield robot. A fully autonomous ground offensive system."

It would have to be explained to the Washington

crowd that T-l was deadly, but it was nothing more than a first generation. The T-l-7s were more sophisticated. But there were even better projects on the near horizon. Much better.