Rising Storm t2-2

by S. M. Stirling

  "Is everything okay in there?" Connor asked.

  "Yuh, why?" Clea countered.

  "I thought I heard a scream." Was there something off about the way she was speaking?

  "Oh, uh, that was a cry of frustration," Clea said in Wendy's voice.

  The girl was starting to lose consciousness; her blows made hardly any impact at all and the I-950 studied her closely, watching her face change to an unnatural, and unexpected, indigo.

  "Everything's going fine now, though," Clea said cheerfully.

  John hesitated. Something's wrong, he thought. He didn't know what, but something… "Open up," he said.

  Clea sighed and approached the door. She lowered the girl to the floor and dragged her over by her throat. Looking down, she saw that the human was unconscious and let her go entirely. She wasn't dead yet; perhaps the I-950

  would let her live for a while—she might have more to offer. More than Kurt had, anyway.

  Clea leaned against the door. "You're supposed to tell me something that only you and I would know," she reminded him.

  John licked his lips; that was a good sign. He'd only just told her that.

  "Okay," he said. "Snog's the one in charge."

  What the hell did that mean? "Snog's in charge?" she said aloud. "Get out!"

  That last was a shot in the dark, but humans, especially young ones, tended to take matters of hierarchy seriously. Assuming that's what he was referring to.

  The I-950 stretched her hands, then clenched them into fists as she waited for his response.

  John chuckled, relieved, and stood away from the wall. "Well, it looked that way to me. C'mon, open up."

  "Gladly," the I-950 said.

  John's back slammed against the wall and his gun came up. That didn't sound like Wendy.

  Tricker looked down at the top of the elevator cab and sighed. Then he took hold of one of the cables, grimacing at the grease on it, and swung himself out into the shaft. He crooked an elbow and leg around the rigid steel rope and let himself slide down in a controlled fall until his feet touched the roof of the elevator itself. Kneeling by the repair hatch, he went to work.

  At the sound of footsteps on the roof of the cab, Dieter pulled back into the farthest corner from the hatch in the ceiling. I wish I had something besides a knife, he thought. But the gun was another casualty of his unfortunate midnight ramble. If I was someone I was training I'd kick my ass!

  The hatch cover came off, revealing pitch-darkness above. Von Rossbach hunkered down, knife at the ready, and licked dry lips.

  "Okay, just… just keep it cool," Tricker said. "I've got a gun, I've got the drop on you, I've got the upper hand, and I can get this egg crate moving again. So are you gonna cooperate or do I have to shoot you?"

  Dieter straightened up, his eyes on the darkness above him, and held his hands up.

  "You wanna toss that knife over this way?" Tricker asked. When the knife clattered into the corner he made another suggestion. "Get on your knees, cross your ankles, put your hands behind your head, fingers locked."

  When von Rossbach had complied Tricker dropped lightly down and picked up the knife. He looked it over.

  "Nice," he said. "Okay, what's your story?"

  I hate it when people finally ask that question. Dieter thought. I probably won't answer, or I won't tell the truth, or I'll tell the truth and they don't believe me and then they start hitting me. Why do they even bother to ask?

  "Let me get you started," Tricker said. "You're here to stop the Cyberdyne project, right?"

  Dieter merely looked at him, saying nothing.

  Tricker hunkered down in the far corner of the elevator, gun pointed at the big Austrian. "You're wondering how I know that, aren't you?" he said. "Well, I know who you are. Had to get a second look to be sure, though. You're Dieter von Rossbach."

  Still, Dieter said nothing, though it wasn't easy to hide his surprise.

  "You're an actual playboy," Tricker said with a grin. He looked off into the distance for a moment. "The major and the playboy." His eyes met von Rossbach's. "Now there's a likely combination, isn't it?" He waited a moment for possible comments, then said, "When Ferris admitted that he had a guest that he'd sent away before said guest could be questioned after Cyberdyne blew up, I naturally asked him some probing questions about you. He gave me the hard eyes

  —you know, that look the military get when they're going to be stubborn."

  He grinned; Dieter stared. "I did some checking on my own and found out zip.

  You know what it says to me when a man with your money has no particular history? It says covert ops." Tricker rose and spread his hands, never taking his eyes off von Rossbach. "So as a professional courtesy I stopped pokin' around."

  He pointed the gun at Dieter. " 'Cause Ferris said you were with him the whole time and I was pretty positive that he wasn't associated with Sarah Connor. And if he wasn't, why would you be? You were probably some friendly government's covert-ops guy, I thought. And why would they be on Sarah Connor's side?"

  He hunkered down again. "Only she has a way of bringing people around to her point of view, doesn't she? And her son disappeared from the base that night, never to be seen again." He stared at Dieter for a bit, then he made a sweeping gesture with the gun. "Until today. Until that very well-trained kid kicked my ass." He stood up, suddenly angry. "That kid is John Connor!"

  "You sound surprised," Dieter said mildly.

  "Wait till you get a look at his face; you'll be surprised, too," Tricker snarled.

  Before von Rossbach could respond he hurried on. "I've read her medical transcripts from Pescadero, you know." He leaned toward Dieter. "Her story is wacky! How come everybody buys into it?"

  Dieter smiled. "Sarah is convincing because sooner or later evidence shows up to corroborate everything that she says. When you shoot someone about fifty times with an assault rifle, until their steel skeleton is exposed and sparks are flying out of their guts and they still keep coming, you begin to suspect that she's been telling you the truth." He shrugged. "Empirical evidence is always the best."

  Tricker just looked at him. "So who are you working for?"

  Dieter shook his head. "This isn't official."

  Tricker nodded judiciously. "Not official, huh? I take great comfort from that."

  He cocked his head. "I know Connor's story about the kid."

  "That I've taken on faith," Dieter conceded. "But once you've met a Terminator, it's much easier to believe."

  "Tell me this—does it bother you that if you succeed in destroying this human-hating supercomputer that John Connor will disappear?"

  Von Rossbach blinked. "I hadn't thought about it."

  "Sure," Tricker said. "If there is no supercomputer then there are no time-traveling Terminators and no need to send some guy back in time to stop one and save Sarah Connor and incidentally impregnate her with the kid who would send

  him back to get killed. Y'know, presumably at some point they start to keep that under their hats or they'd never have gotten a volunteer to come back, right?"

  Dieter shrugged. "It would bother me a great deal to lose John; he's a good kid.

  But I know that he would gladly give his life to save several billion others." He looked up at Tricker. "Wouldn't you?" Tricker shrugged in answer and Dieter smiled slowly. "Yes, you would. You'd consider it an honor."

  With a barely visible smile of embarrassment, Tricker shrugged. "Whatever," he said. "Facedown on the floor, please. Lock your hands behind your head, keep your ankles crossed. I've gotta get this bucket moving."

  When von Rossbach had complied Tricker went to the control panel and inserted a card he'd taken from his pocket into a slot. A panel popped open to reveal a keypad. Tricker tapped out a number and the elevator started moving again.

  "Yeah," Tricker said, putting the card away, "last time I checked, Clea Bennet looked like she was gonna take a great big bite out of your little friend Wendy."

  " What?"
Dieter started to heave himself to his feet. "Wendy is alone with Bennet?"

  Tricker pressed the barrel of his gun into the Austrian's kidneys. "Down, boy,"

  he advised.

  Dieter collapsed. "She's one of them!" he said desperately.

  "A Terminator, you mean?" Tricker said in disbelief.

  "She's not human! Why do you think she has Serena Burns's face? How likely is that?" von Rossbach demanded, echoing Tricker's earlier thoughts. "You couldn't fail to recognize her if you recognized me! She's a killer and her assignment is to protect Skynet!"

  The elevator door opened and Tricker stepped out. "You go first," he ordered.

  Von Rossbach stood up, looked once at Tricker, and took off down the corridor at a run.

  "Shit," Tricker muttered, and followed.

  The lab doors opened outward, and as soon as the opening was wide enough John kicked it with all his might. The door hit the tiled wall with a report like a bomb going off. Crouching low, John swung into the doorway and brought his gun up. Wendy lay facedown in a crumpled heap on the floor just inside the door. She was alone.

  John rushed to her side and, putting the gun up, close to his shoulder, looked all around, then reached to turn her over. He couldn't believe that she had fainted, after all she'd been through. He gently turned her over.

  When he saw her face he stood up, bringing the gun into play, and turned to scan the room. All was silent; the lab appeared to be empty but for the two of them.

  But Wendy's face and neck were covered with livid bruises, so someone had been here. Had they left before the door opened, or were they still here? They—

  it must still be here; Wendy wouldn't have been so chipper in her answers wearing these bruises. But he couldn't see a hiding place big enough to conceal it.

  Wendy came awake with a loud gasp and, seeing John, tried to grasp his pant leg as she struggled desperately for air. Her back arched with the effort she made to draw oxygen down her swollen throat, but her panic only made it harder to breathe.

  "Easy!" John said. "Slow down, take long slow breaths."

  Her eyes locked onto his as she visibly tried to take his advice. But it was no good, she couldn't breathe, and in seconds she was gasping again, dragging in huge, whooping breaths as tears streamed down her face. Her hand clenched on his pant leg and twisted the cloth.

  John looked into her eyes, so stunned by her anguish that for a moment he was completely at a loss. Then Wendy arched her neck and he saw that the column of her throat bore a slight dent in the front.

  "You've got to trust me," he said to her as he put his hand on her throat.

  Wendy nodded, her eyes on his. Taking a deep breath, he squeezed on her windpipe and to his great relief it popped back into shape. Instantly her breathing grew easier and she closed her eyes.

  John let out his breath in a huff and went back to scanning the room; still, nothing moved. He'd been so afraid that he would have to perform an emergency tracheotomy on her. John had studied the simple operation and knew its principal points, but reading about it and trying to do it to someone wide-awake and in distress—someone you loved—that would have been hard.

  Wendy opened her eyes and looked at John; he seemed far away somehow, as

  though she was looking at him through the wrong end of a telescope. A halo of black-and-white speckles surrounded him and her vision seemed to grow dim.

  She had to warn him, had to make him erase the program and take the disk.

  Without the second half of the program they'd be doing just the opposite of what they'd come to do. Her hand still held on to him and she tugged on the cloth.

  "Ja…" she said. Almost no sound had come out and her throat burned with a raw agony when she tried to speak. She squeaked and tried to swallow and writhed with the pain. "Ja…" she said, trying again.

  "Don't speak," he warned her. "Your larynx must be damaged."

  Wendy sobbed, then licked her lips and swallowed once more; her lips drew back in a rictus of pain. Stubbornly she took a deep breath and looked at him, willing him to understand her. Wendy formed the word computer with her lips and he looked over at the computer she'd been using. She tugged on his pant leg and he looked back at her. She shook her head, then formed the word erase. John frowned and she tried to say it again. This time when she tried to speak no sound came out at all and the agony surprised a sob from her.

  John winced in sympathy and then he got the idea. "It's okay," he said. "I've got it. I'll take care of it, you just rest. Okay?"

  She smiled at him and closed her eyes, concentrating on just breathing. She heard the soft whir of the disk drawer closing and looked over at the computer in astonishment. She watched as John followed the prompts and finally hit "enter,"

  causing her program to begin downloading directly to the hard drive.

  No! Wendy screamed silently behind him, her injured throat producing an nearly

  silent screee. NO! she shouted in her mind.

  Yes! Clea thought triumphantly from her hiding place behind two mainframe computers. Yessss! She'd better make sure the girl didn't warn Connor that he'd done exactly the wrong thing. Though I like it. She liked it very much.

  Wendy shook her head violently and slapped the floor to attract John's attention.

  She didn't even see Clea rushing toward her with inhuman speed and she barely felt it when the I-950's foot crashed down, crushing her throat and shattering the vertebrae in her neck.

  John turned to see a beautiful woman raise her foot high and bring it down on Wendy's throat. He heard the terrible sound of things breaking within her and watched the light fade from Wendy's eyes. For a long moment he stood frozen, utterly stunned with horror. He lifted his eyes to meet the gleeful smile of the female Terminator.

  Clea was almost upon him before he brought up the gun; before he could fire her foot flashed out, kicking the gun from his hand hard enough to break two of his knuckles. The gun went flying and Clea reached for Connor's throat. He leaned back just far enough that she missed, and struck at her throat with a straight hand blow. The I-950 knocked it aside easily and tried to close with him.

  If she could only get her hands on him she could tear him apart. Reaching back, John picked up the keyboard and smacked her in the face with it. She stepped back slightly and shook her head. Somehow that had surprised her; she'd expected better of the famous John Connor.

  John moved away from the computer table, trying to get some space between

  him and the Terminator; his eyes found the gun and dismissed it. It was too far away. He risked going for the knife in his boot.

  Clea watched him, and when he moved so did she. It was evident that he was going for a weapon and she wouldn't allow that. Stepping lightly, she twisted herself to deliver a flying kick. John ducked under it and grabbed her leg, twisting it and bringing his fist down, intending at the very least to tear ligaments.

  But the I-950 was both stronger and more flexible than a human; she wrested her leg from his grasp and spun in place, managing a body blow that knocked him on his heels, staggering backward, with a look on his face that told her he was in pain. Instantly she followed up her advantage, rushing toward him, intent on his eyes.

  John staggered back, breathing carefully and with no little difficulty. He felt nauseated from the kick to his stomach and he almost stumbled over an office chair. Yanking it in front of him, he held it like a shield as the Terminator tried to close with him. Part of his consciousness looked desperately around the room for something to use as a weapon, while the rest watched the Terminator and tried to counter its every move. Computer labs, unfortunately, seemed to lack much in the way of combat-ready items. The best he could hope for was to make it to the door and perhaps escape to a better-supplied lab.

  Clea was nonplussed by the great savior of humanity's methods. This was what would defeat Skynet? After a few feints were thwarted by the stupid office chair, she simply grabbed it and tore it from his grasp.

&nbs
p; John turned and raced for the door. Clea swept out her leg and tripped him, then sprang erect and moved in for the kill. As she leaned toward him John flipped

  over and swept his leg up; his booted foot connected with her jaw and the I-950

  fell, momentarily stunned. He scrambled to his feet again and turned to run.

  Before he could take a step she grasped his pant leg and pulled him toward her.

  Pivoting, John kicked her again and she let go.

  But only for a moment; before he'd gone far she was on her feet again and running after him. Catching up; she shoved him and he hit the wall beside the door hard enough to knock the breath out of him. As he slid down, Clea approached; she grabbed the front of his shirt and swung him around.

  "Did you think it would be that easy?" Clea asked, grinning. She drew back her fist for a fatal strike. While he struggled for breath, watching her. He brought his own hands up.

  Wait a minute, he thought. I can't die yet— the war… But it was impossible to care, because Wendy was—

  "Hey!" Dieter called from the doorway.

  Clea turned her head, snarling like an animal, just as Dieter threw his knife. It hit her high in the center of her back, cutting her spine and slicing into the great artery that fed her heart.

  She dropped onto her back on the floor, where the knife held her body in an arch; her eyes found von Rossbach with a hate-filled glare.

  "Chill out, Bennet," Dieter said grimly, coming into the room.

  The I-950 coughed once, spraying blood, then closed her eyes and stopped

  breathing.

  John looked once at Dieter, then rushed to Wendy's side. He dropped to his knees, his mouth open in a silent "Oh." Tears poured down his cheeks unheeded as his hands hovered over Wendy's motionless body. He couldn't seem to keep his eyes from her horribly misshapen throat and he felt an answering pain in his own.