Terminator Salvation: Trial by Fire

by Timothy Zahn

  “Then why did that Theta try to kill me?” Jik asked. “Or are you suggesting it’s pure coincidence that the Theta was running the same agenda as the T-700s out there? T-700s that we know are under direct Skynet control?”

  “I don’t know,” Lajard said stiffly. “But as long as we’re pointing suspicious fingers, I might mention that we’ve only got your word that there even was a hybrid out there, let alone that it attacked you.”

  “Which brings us back to you,” Oxley put in. “We’ve told you about Theta. Let’s hear a little of your story.”

  “Oh, come now,” Jik said reprovingly, a slight smile touching the corners of his lips. “I’m not surprised you don’t recognize me. But surely you at least recognize my voice.”

  “Your voice?” Preston asked, frowning.

  Barnes’s throat tightened. Ever since Jik had gotten the drop on them out in the forest he’d had the nagging feeling that he’d heard that voice somewhere before. Now, abruptly, his brain made the connection.

  Only—

  “Of course,” Jik said. “Jik is just a nickname from my childhood, a name I use when I’m keeping a low profile. It’s a blending of my initials, J.C.”

  He drew himself up, his eyes sweeping the group of people around him.

  “I’m John Connor.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  A stunned silence descended on the room. Their expressions, Blair saw as she looked around, ranged from stunned to hopeful to flat-out disbelievingly worshipful.

  She looked at Barnes. His eyes were focused like twin Gatling guns on Jik, his lips starting to twist into the kind of snarl that usually preceded one of his borderline-suicidal leaps into danger. His eyes flicked to Blair—

  Quickly, urgently, Blair gave her head a tiny shake. Not now, she pleaded silently. Later. Not now. Not here.

  His eyes narrowed in silent, impatient question. Blair flicked her eyes to the ring of armed townspeople surrounding them.

  Barnes scowled. But to Blair’s relief he gave her a small nod and settled back a little into his seat.

  Preston was the first to find his voice.

  “Well,” he said hesitantly. “I... welcome to Baker’s Hollow.”

  “I think what Mayor Preston is trying to say,” Lajard growled, “is what the hell are you doing here?”

  Preston turned an outraged look at the scientist.

  “Lajard!”

  “No, I mean it,” Lajard insisted. “You’ve put the whole town at risk just by being here. Why?”

  “I assume you heard my last broadcast,” Jik said, gazing unflinchingly into Lajard’s glare. “We lost a lot of people in the San Francisco attack. We need replacements, and we need them now.”

  He waved a hand around him. “You—the people of Baker’s Hollow—have managed to survive out here in the wild. Not just survive, but actually prosper. You’re exactly the kind of people we need.”

  He raised his eyebrows slightly.

  “In fact, I’ll go farther than that. We need a new base, preferably something in this part of the country. Baker’s Hollow and the surrounding area may be just what we’re looking for.”

  “What size base are we talking about?” Halverson asked suspiciously. “We’ve got all the population right now we can supply.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Jik assured him. “If we come, we’ll bring our own food and equipment with us. With extra for anyone who joins us, of course.”

  “Sounds wonderful,” Lajard said with only a hint of sarcasm. “In the meantime, your precious Resistance is a long way away, and we’ve still got a couple of Terminators beating the bushes for you out there.”

  “So let’s deal with them,” Jik said firmly. “What resources do you have aside from the guns and bows I’ve already seen? Any explosives?”

  “No.” Preston patted his side pocket. “But we’ve got a little gasoline for fueling our emergency lighters.”

  “How much?” Jik asked.

  Preston looked at one of the other men.

  “Ten gallons?”

  “Closer to twelve,” the other said.

  Jik shook his head. “Not enough. What about chains or study ropes?”

  “We’ve got some chains, but they’re not very long,” Preston said. “We’ve got a fair amount of good rope, though.”

  “Chucker’s bear traps have chains on them,” Halverson offered, gesturing to one of the men across the room.

  “You have bear traps?” Jik asked, his eyes lighting up. “How many?”

  “I got two that are in decent shape,” Chucker said. “There’s another one, too, but it’s a little iffy.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ll make it work,” Jik promised. “Go get them, will you? The rest of you grab any chain or thick rope you’ve got, plus any tools for fixing Chucker’s traps. Whose house is closest to the river?”

  “Mine,” one of the women spoke up.

  “Bring everything there, as quickly as possible,” Jik ordered. “Along with everyone who has a large-caliber gun and ammo to load into it.” He gestured to Preston. “Mayor?”

  “You heard the man,” Preston confirmed. “Get to it.”

  “Before you go, Connor,” Blair spoke up as the group made a concerted rush toward the door, “could we have a word with you?”

  “Certainly,” Jik said, sidestepping a couple of men as they hurried past.

  “Back here, please?” Blair said, standing up and gesturing toward the bedrooms.

  Jik’s eyes narrowed slightly.

  “Why can’t we talk right here?”

  Peripherally, Blair saw that a few of the men, Preston and Halverson among them, had paused to listen.

  “This would be better discussed in private,” she said as Barnes also stood up.

  “We’re all allies here, Williams,” Jik said. “Whatever you have to say, go ahead and say it.”

  Blair threw Barnes a questioning look. He gave her a reluctant nod.

  “Fine,” Blair said, turning back to Jik. “As it happens, Barnes and I work with John Connor. The real John Connor. You’re not him.”

  The room went utterly still.

  “Excuse me?” Jik said into the brittle silence.

  “I said we know the real John Connor,” Blair repeated. “We don’t know you.”

  “That’s interesting,” Jik said evenly. “Because I am the real John Connor. And I don’t know you.”

  “Of course you don’t know us,” Barnes said. “We just said that.”

  “So what we have here is your classic standoff,” Jik said calmly. “My word against yours.” He waved a hand that encompassed the people around them. “Except that these people know my voice. They know nothing about you.”

  Blair looked around. He was right, she realized. Whatever this scam was he was running, he had Connor’s voice down cold. A voice that these people had probably been listening to for months.

  And if it came down to believing a pair of strangers who’d dropped out of the sky or the man whose exhortations had kept them hoping and working toward a better day, Blair had no doubt which side they would come down on.

  But even if they didn’t know the truth, she and Barnes did. The man was a fraud, and she had to try.

  “We came in a helicopter,” she said, speaking now to Preston and the other townspeople. “If we’re not Resistance, where did we get that?”

  “Could be any number of places,” Jik said. “There are still plenty of gangs out there, some with surprising access to resources. There are also some paramilitary groups in the Rockies that aren’t affiliated with the Resistance. You could be from one of them.”

  “Or they could be from Skynet,” Halverson rumbled, his rifle pointed openly now at Barnes.

  Blair felt her body tense even more. If Jik wanted to get rid of them, tying them to Skynet would be the simplest and surest way to do it.

  But to her surprise, Jik shook his head.

  “I don’t think so,” he said, gazing thoughtfully
at her. “It’s hard to imagine what Skynet would gain by letting them wreck a couple of its Terminators.”

  He turned to Preston.

  “Still, whoever they are, we can’t afford to let them wander around without supervision. Can you assign two or three of your men to watch them while we go deal with those last two T-700s?”

  “I can do that,” Halverson spoke up. “Chris, Trounce—”

  “I’d prefer that Mayor Preston assign the guards,” Jik interrupted. “No offense, but I’d feel better if this was official.”

  Halverson grimaced, but nodded.

  “Sure. Whatever you want.”

  Preston gestured to a couple of the men near the door.

  “Trounce, you and Smith,” he said. “Simple guard duty. You don’t need to tie them up—just keep them in the house. Barnes, Williams, over on the couch, please. Unfasten your gun belts first, if you would.”

  Blair looked around the room. If she and Barnes were fast enough...

  But it was already too late. Three others besides Halverson had their guns up and aimed now. She unfastened her gunbelt and lowered it and her beloved Desert Eagle to the floor.

  “What if they make trouble?” one of the guards asked as Barnes reluctantly set down his own weapons.

  Preston looked at Barnes.

  “You’re not going to make trouble, are you?”

  “Not yet,” Barnes said, his voice dark as he eyed Halverson. “Maybe later.”

  “Just take it easy,” Preston advised. “Don’t worry, we’ll get this all sorted out later.”

  “If there is a later,” Blair warned.

  “Is that a threat?” Halverson demanded.

  “There are two T-700s out there,” Blair reminded him coldly. “You don’t need any threats from me.”

  She crossed to the couch and sat down at one end. Barnes took the cue and moved to the couch’s other end. Preston and Halverson gathered up their guns and packs while the two guards pulled chairs over to the big window and sat down, their rifles cradled in their arms.

  “We’ll be back soon,” Jik promised as Preston and the remaining townspeople filed out the door. “I suggest you take the opportunity to get some rest.”

  He paused in the doorway.

  “And if you think you can come up with a better story,” he added, “you might want to do that, too.”

  A moment later he was gone.

  “What now?” Blair asked quietly.

  Barnes gave a long, measuring look at the two guards.

  “We wait,” he told her. “For now.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Kyle had taken over point from Callahan, and had led them slogging through the underground ruins for another hour, when he rounded a particularly large slab of concrete and saw a light in the distance.

  It wasn’t much of a light, no more than a sliver of hazy yellowish glow, more oozing than actually shining, coming from the ceiling fifty meters ahead.

  But in that first minute Kyle didn’t care what kind of light it was. It was light, and after hours of straining his eyes in utter blackness it was like a breath of clean air or a long swallow of cold water.

  They’d found the Terminators’ tunnel again.

  Which meant that they’d found the Terminators.

  There was a rattle of gravel as Callahan and Zac came up alongside him.

  “That the tunnel?” Zac whispered.

  “Probably,” Callahan said. “Okay. Extra quiet from here on.”

  Keeping extra quiet turned out to be easier than Kyle had expected. The light, dim though it was, gave enough illumination to show them a little of the uneven ground they were crawling across. They covered the fifty meters more quickly, and more quietly, than most of the previous several hours’ worth of travel.

  From the positioning of the light when Kyle first spotted it, he had guessed the opening was only a meter or two above the level of their floor. What he hadn’t known was that the passageway made a sharp dip halfway along their path before leveling off at a new, lower level. When they reached the light, it turned out to be over three meters above the floor, nearly a meter out of reach.

  The good news was that the opening was similar to the one they’d used to escape the tunnel all those hours ago: a gap between the tunnel floor and the wall of debris beside it. Like the other opening, this one also had an angled field of broken masonry below it, tricky but not impossible to climb.

  The bad news was that the opening was far too narrow for even Zac to get through.

  For a minute they stood together looking up at it, listening to the rhythmic footsteps as the Terminators continued their endless march back and forth to the tunnel face. The marching seemed to go on for longer than it had before, and Kyle wondered uneasily if Skynet had thrown more T-700s into the project. Implying that the breakout was indeed imminent.

  Finally, the muffled thudding faded away. Callahan waited another few seconds, then drew the other two in for a close-huddle conference.

  “Thoughts?”

  “I think we’re near the front of the tunnel,” Zac whispered.

  “How do you know?” Kyle asked.

  “Because those Terminators were going both directions,” Zac said. “One group coming up empty-handed, the other passing them with their loads.”

  “Ah.” Kyle hadn’t detected the difference in direction himself. But Zac had shown several times already that he had the best hearing of the group.

  “Sounds like they’re gone,” Zac went on. “Let me climb up and see if I can see anything.”

  He started to step away. Callahan, still holding onto his sleeve, pulled him back.

  “I’ll go,” he said firmly. “I’m a better climber, and that slope looks tricky.”

  The slope was every bit as difficult as Callahan had anticipated, and even with Kyle and Zac standing on either side to brace his arms and legs there were times where he nearly slid back. But finally he was there. Carefully taking hold of the edge of the tunnel floor, he pulled himself up and peered through the opening.

  He held the pose for about half a minute. Then, easing himself back onto the debris, he climbed back down.

  “We’re at the front, all right,” he told them when they were huddled together again. “There’s a stack of eight bags along the wall that look like satchel charges.”

  “They’re not right at the tunnel face?” Kyle asked.

  “No, about three meters back,” Callahan said. “There’s still a bunch of debris right at the face, so I’m guessing they’ll still be lugging and hand digging for a while longer.”

  “Where’s the light coming from?” Zac asked.

  “There are a bunch of small holes in the ceiling,” Callahan said “The light’s pretty diffuse, so I’m guessing it’s sifting in through another layer of broken concrete.”

  Kyle grimaced. He’d been hoping the light meant another big crack in the tunnel ceiling. They might have used an opening like that to get out, or at least to signal the rest of the Resistance people up there.

  “So that’s a dead end,” he said.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll figure out something,” Callahan said. “At least we’ll have some light if we can get up there.”

  “How are we going to do that?” Zac asked.

  “Not sure,” Callahan conceded. “The wall beside the gap is a single slab of reinforced concrete—you can see the rebar sticking out. There’s no way we’re going to move it.”

  “What about the tunnel floor?” Kyle asked.

  “Well, it’s not too thick, and I didn’t see any rebar,” Callahan said. “Probably used to be a roof or a wall that didn’t need to hold up a lot of weight.”

  “A non-load-bearing wall,” Kyle supplied, remembering Orozco talking about things like that while they poked around some of the ruined buildings back in Los Angeles.

  “Right,” Callahan said. “On the other hand, it’s getting stomped on by T-700s all day, so it can’t be that flimsy. It’s also a litt
le crumbly at the edge, so we might be able to make the hole bigger.”

  “Sounds good,” Zac said. “I’ll take first shift.”

  “That’s okay,” Callahan said, digging into his pocket. “We can start with my knife. When we wear it down we’ll shift to Reese’s, then we’ll just have to use whatever else we can find.”

  “Wait a second,” Kyle said suddenly. “This won’t work.”

  “Sure it will,” Callahan assured him. “It’ll take awhile, but—”

  “No, I mean we can’t do it,” Kyle said. “The Terminators will see the hole get bigger each time they go by.”

  There was a brief silence.

  “You’re right,” Callahan muttered. “Damn.”

  “So what do we do?” Zac asked anxiously. “It’ll take forever to go back to the other hole.”

  “No point in doing that anyway,” Callahan said heavily. “The Terminators are bound to still be watching the conduit. I suppose we could try backtracking and see if there’s an opening we missed.”

  “There wasn’t anything,” Kyle asked, peering up. The underside of the tunnel floor was hard to see in the reflected light coming from the opening. But even so—

  “Probably not,” Callahan agreed heavily. “But it’s all we’ve got.”

  “Maybe not,” Kyle said, pointing at the ceiling. “Is that a crack up there?”

  The others looked up.

  “You mean that line angling across there?” Zac asked, his pointing finger tracing out the path.

  “Looks like a crack to me,” Callahan agreed. “But if you think the Terminators will notice the gap getting bigger, they’ll really notice if a quarter of the path they’re walking on disappears.”

  “Right, but only if we’re the ones who bring it down,” Kyle said. “What if we just deepen the crack enough so that the next batch of T-700s breaks through? Maybe Skynet will assume it had too much stress and gave way by itself.”

  “Of course, if it doesn’t assume that, we’ll have a whole mess of Terminators down here hunting us,” Callahan pointed out. “But it’s worth a try.”

  He looked upward again.

  “You’re not going to be able to reach the crack from the slope. I guess that means you’ll be standing on our shoulders.”