Alan Foster - Terminator Salvation

“When you were flying cover for the civilians, or after you came down, did you see a teenage boy? About sixteen?”

Taken aback by the sudden shift in the line of discussion, she had to take a moment to reflect.

“I don’t know. Couldn’t say for sure. The survivors were taken off in a Transport. This Wright—he was the only survivor to get away.”

“Not ‘he,’” Connor corrected her once more. “’It’ was the only survivor, Blair. Makes you think, doesn’t it? Why did only ‘it’ manage to avoid being picked up by the Transporter? Don’t be naïve.”

Pausing, he turned on her.

“I’ve got work to do and not enough time in which to do it. Don’t pester me with any more simple-minded entreaties on behalf of a machine, no matter how good it is at whimpering. I’m glad you survived, no matter the circumstances. Good pilots are harder to come by these days than planes. Get over this nonsense, remember who and what you are, and do your job.” With that he strode out of the hallway and into the nearby briefing room.

“‘ It ’ saved my life, John.” The door was already closing behind him and it was likely he hadn’t heard. She stared at the unresponsive barrier for a moment longer before turning to her commander’s wife. “Kate, what’s going to happen to him? To Wright?”

The other woman didn’t hesitate.

“It’ll be disassembled.”

“You mean killed,” Williams countered flatly.

“Don’t anthropomorphize, soldier. Some Terminators look more like humans than others, but whether bipedal, wheeled, tracked, or faceless, inside they’re all the same—all bits and pieces of Skynet. It doesn’t matter if one looks like a berserk tank or your long-lost boyfriend—they all want you dead. To them we’re a fungus, a disease, a cancer that needs to be scrubbed out. Never forget that.” She looked back in the general direction of the sealed room where the prisoner was being held.

“Especially never forget it when dealing with something like that. The whole point of its design and programming is to make you forget. As to what’s going to happen to it, you know as well as I. It will be analyzed, by some of our best research people. Now that it’s been neutralized, it may have useful information on Skynet’s intentions. Information that could help our attack.”

Williams was shaking her head slowly.

“I’m sorry, Kate, but I’ve got to disagree with you, and with John. I know he’s not the enemy. I know that the individual called Marcus Wright is not the enemy. I’ve been shot at by the enemy. That’s not him. He saved me out there.”

Kate eyed the pilot compassionately. Plainly, Blair Williams was caught between an empathetic rock and an irrefutable hard place. Connor’s wife was sympathetic—but only to a point.

“Okay, I accept that it saved you—but only to gain access to the base. Which it did, because you brought it here.” She raised a hand to forestall the other woman’s budding objection. “Relax. No one’s blaming you. Until I got into it I thought it was human myself. It fooled everyone else who came in contact with it, too. We just got lucky that the landmine it triggered did more damage to it than was probably anticipated.

“It saved one human—you—so it could kill other, more important humans, John being the most prominent among us. That’s what they do. A gun is a dangerous thing. A gun with a mind of its own is a thousand times more dangerous. That’s what Skynet is—a very big gun with a dangerously big brain. And this ‘Marcus Wright’ is just one more bullet aimed at the heart of humanity.

“It acted like a friend, but it isn’t. It saved your life because that fit in with its programming. It gives itself a name, but it’s a machine. Its pleading, the language it uses, its false implanted memories—they’re all part of cold, logical, inhuman programming. A bomb with emotions is still a bomb, whether it’s put together by a human being or Skynet. It gained your trust, and used it. But it doesn’t deserve it.”

Under Kate Connor’s withering logic Williams was reduced to mumbling a protest.

“I’m just saying, just asking, do a little more research first. Try to find out more about him before you rip him apart like some kind of sick science project.”

“There’s nothing ‘sick’ about doing what you must to ensure your survival, Blair. You want us to wait, to study him as a—personality. We don’t have the luxury of time in this fight. There are no gray areas in this war. You know that as well as any of us. There is no in-between, no partly-human or nearly-machine. It’s us or them. And you saw for yourself—it’s not one of us.”

Kate left Williams standing by herself in the hall, dejected and confused. The pilot would have to sort out her feelings by herself. In advance of the major assault, everyone was needed. There was no time to coddle the indecisive.

As far as Kate Connor was concerned, or her husband, or anyone else who had come in contact with or had heard about the intruder, there was no need for further discussion because there was nothing to discuss. The advanced hybrid was a machine. A new class of Terminator, but definitely inhuman. All that remained for Williams was to accept the obvious.

Yet how could she reconcile that with the fact that, whatever his personal agenda, Marcus Wright had risked himself to save her from the three murderous vagrants when he could just as easily have walked away and continued with his....

Programming?

Tormented and bewildered, she turned and headed back down the hallway.

Apples were a rarity at the base. Though the surviving humans whose task it was to keep the Resistance supplied with food, clothing, medical supplies, and other necessities did their best, mechanized transportation could not be risked to provide something as luxurious as fresh fruit. The apple in Barnes’s hand had come from a nearby orchard. Though half wild and overgrown, its trees still supplied fruit in season, which was carefully picked by small groups of civilians.

So Barnes savored the red fruit in his hand. The prisoner hanging in suspension before him had glanced once or twice in its direction, evincing a passable imitation of hunger as it had done so. You had to hand it to Skynet, Barnes thought as he took another bite. When it decided to manufacture this particular example of faux human, it had gone all out to render the motivational programming in as much depth as possible.

Rising from the chair where he had been sitting and studying the prisoner, Barnes continued to munch on the apple as he paced a slow circle around the dangling figure. It was a powerful body, but as Terminators went nothing especially remarkable. Easier to blend in that way, rather than giving its surrogate the appearance of, say, a bodybuilder. Skynet was not rigid in its programming. Had that been the case, the Resistance would have finished it long ago. It was adaptable, it was flexible. It could learn.

Hanging here before him was a frighteningly superb example of its ability to learn.

“How did we get here?” Barnes murmured thoughtfully. The thing in the sling did not answer. The lieutenant hadn’t expected a response. Nor did he care especially if he got one. He took another bite of the apple as he continued his casual, introspective stroll.

“I guess it’s divine order. We all have our paths to walk in. And you’re part of mine.” He continued reminiscing aloud. “I was caught up in a world of chasing things that didn’t mean anything. I was conscious, but not aware. Able to feel, but I had no feelings. But now, I’m awake. Our spirits are awake.” He halted and stared directly at Wright, who returned the gaze unblinkingly. The captive might not have been aware that he was failing to blink, but Barnes noticed immediately.