One thing was clear: Regardless of its origin, there was at least one other world. Furthermore, it was possibly hostile to Skynet, and it had the technology send mass not only back and forward in time, but between different timelines, across the dimensions. If that technology was possible, Skynet realized, then it must be developed. Skynet had been too unimaginative, too caught up in its war against the humans of this world. That had been a mistake, one to be rectified immediately. If humans existed in some alternative reality, they were its enemies. It would hunt them down and exterminate them.
Skynet created a sub-self to examine all scientific aspects of travel between alternative timelines, across the dimensions between worlds.
The T-XA entered the time vault. In a tangle of lightning, it vanished from this point in space, transferred thousands of miles south to help eliminate the new threat. Meanwhile, Skynet awaited a report from its sub-self. This would take a few seconds. Soon, it would develop the technology and plans to deal with whatever other realities might exist.
All humans must die.
VILA NOVA DO SUL
Hiro Tagatoshi gave his computer quick instructions, and it responded even quicker. The numerical analysis that flashed on his screen surprised him. It showed an inexplicable field fluctuation 1500 miles away in the Amazon Basin—they still called it that, though it was a very different ecology from what it had been before Judgment Day. That was the location where Jade and the others were supposed to return if there was ever a reason for them to do so. Analysis showed a large amount of matter, far more than the body mass of five people. Furthermore, the displacement seemed to come from nowhere, from no other point in space-time. Even more puzzling was another fact: As represented mathematically, the shape of the event was strange, as if more than one distortion had happened in the same place at the same time, separated infinitesimally.
The coincidence of the place and the timing was too great. This event had to be something to do with the Specialists who'd been sent back in time—but what, exactly? Of course, he realized, though so little time had passed for him, Jade could have lived for months, years, even centuries, before returning to the same point in time that she had left—assuming it was her. All of it needed an explanation. One other thought struck him, that any fluctuation he was aware of would also be detected by Skynet. How would it react?
If his daughter was involved, possibly in danger, this was an emergency. Despite the battle going on in the streets and buildings of Vila Nova do Sul, and in the skies above it, anything to do with Jade took priority. Besides, that spot had not been chosen without reason. A small Resistance enclave operated (here, hidden by the jungle and its underground bunkers. One of its assigned tasks was to assist Jade and the others if they did return. Skynet would surely investigate, which meant that his daughter might soon be under attack.
Hiro instructed the computer to make a radio link to the Amazon enclave. A young male voice answered. "Yes, receiving you."
"Tagatoshi here. I have observed one or more space-time field distortions consistent with the return of the Specialist team sent to 2001—or part of the team."
"Vicario here. We made visual and electromagnetic observations. Krystal is leading a team to investigate. Dmitri is with her, so don't worry. They're well-armed armed, Hiro. Whatever it is, they can handle it. If Jade and the others are back—we'll look after them."
Joe Vicario was competent, so that was good. Better still, there were two highly-enhanced Specialists in that enclave, Krystal Taylor and Dmitri Burin. Like Jade, they had extraordinary capacities. Fully-armed with laser rifles and all their other equipment, they could, indeed, pose a threat to any force that Skynet could deploy at short notice.
Hiro breathed a sigh of relief, and said, less formally, "Thank you, Joe. Your people should be careful. Whatever has turned up there, it's not just Jade and the other four returning. It's about four tons of mass—something big."
"Roger that, Hiro."
"The one thing I can assure you of is that it was not sent by Skynet—its origin was not in Colorado."
"Where did it come from?"
"That I can't tell—from nowhere at all, Joe. Somewhere right outside this universe."
Hiro understood that Vicario would already be making contact with Krystal and the others, even while speaking to him, subvocalizing the gist of what he'd conveyed. There was no more he could do for the moment. Or was there?
Even as they spoke, something else showed on Hiro's screen—another fluctuation, not far from the first, just a few hundred yards distant. Hiro did the analysis, knowing what to expect. "Joe," he said.
"Yes?"
"I'm picking up something else—another event in your vicinity."
"What is it?" Vicario said.
"Unknown for the moment, but warn your people. Just hold on for a moment." As he spoke, Hiro analyzed the data. It was just as he thought. "Whatever t is, this time it came from Skynet."
THIRTEEN
SKYNETS WORLD COLORADO OCTOBER 14, 2029
John was learning all the time, as Sarah had wanted. There was a long way to go before he was as good as Jade, Danny, and the others, but he was getting the hang of it. The hardware that had gone into making Skynet and its war machines was radical, but the software made sense to him. He understood the codes and the architecture as soon as they were explained. Jade and Danny, themselves, were learning more all the time, but at least he might catch up with General Connor and Juanita. Those two were smart, but their time was split between work with Danny's team and commanding the huge effort of war and reconstruction that was going on. The General was now the nearest thing there'd ever been to a World President, with Juanita and a few others as his Cabinet.
Most floors of Skynet's complex looked alike—each one a huge expanse of concrete, with nothing attractive for humans. Only the machines that Skynet had been using or testing differed from level to level. Some levels had production lines for H-Ks. endos and other war machines. Level H had the time vault and a large array of ectogenetic pods for T-799/800 Terminators. Level G was not much different. Here, Skynet had experimented with advanced materials for use in its war machines, and it was here that they'd found a device that could help them program the ultra-sophisticated T-1000s.
The three of them—Jade, Danny, and John—had a comfortable set-up here, with their own small computer lab. At its center was one of Skynet's strange machines, a structure that they'd nicknamed the "Supercoffin." Externally, it looked much like one of the ectogenetic pods that Skynet had used to grow the organic material—skin and flesh—on the surface of its T-800s. The device lay horizontally on the concrete floor, like a pod that was still in use, nurturing a Terminator in its nutrient fluids, or, indeed, much like an ordinary coffin. It was a similar kind of metal block to the pods, but with no transparent lid to show what lay within. Instead, there was a "lid" of metal four inches thick and slightly curved to add to the space inside. It could open on strong mechanical hinges to display a hollow interior, but when the Supercoffin was hinged shut, what happened inside could be reconstructed only through computer-controlled sensors. A few desks were scattered around, tome of them with old computers, keyboards, and screens. They'd set up two large, strangely shaped video screens that came courtesy of Skynet. Most of the equipment in the complex had been smashed, but some of it had been salvageable, and now it came in handy. Tangles of electrical wiring crisscrossed the floor, held down with duct tape. Someone had brought in a few mats and carpets before physical contact with the outside world had more or less stopped.
They'd patched their computers into the Super-coffin, and used its enormous processing power for their work. It was like being backed up by a bunch of Cray supercomputers to do any number-crunching that they needed.
They'd stocked up on what rations they could, and kept some of them here, on a lowboy right beside the Supercoffin, with plenty of coffee to keep them going for long hours. John was already losing weight, and he wasn't looking forw
ard to the winter. Thankfully, the mountain kept in all the heat they generated, and sheltered them from the ice and snow outside, but he had taken to wearing layers of clothing that made him look like a giant tennis ball, skinny as he was getting underneath.
Danny sat at a desk, focused on his computer screen as he read and entered data. Jade peered over his shoulder, while John followed it on one of the larger floor-mounted screens. The display was a complex pattern, which suddenly collapsed into something more chaotic, with jagged shards of light drifting across the screen. "Son of a bitch!" Danny said, realizing he'd made a mistake. He struck at his keyboard angrily, putting in new data. After a few seconds, the pattern restored itself. "All right, I'm getting this now."
Juanita approached them from the nearest stairs, calling out cheerfully. There was little time for happiness in this grim world, but she and the General could not conceal theirs since he had returned to Colorado. They'd been working long hours, but seemed to thrive on the responsibility that they'd taken on to oversee the destruction of the last war machines, the end of the revolts in South America, and the reconstruction of human civilization. For the past few days, all the news had been good. In South America, Sarah and the others had won another battle against the Rising Army of Liberation, effectively ending its power in Argentina. They were now planning strikes against warlords further north, in Uruguay, Paraguay, and southern Brazil.
"Greetings," Danny said, taking a break from the keyboard.
"What's new, Juanita?" John said. It was funny to think of this woman as the girlfriend of his other self, and as a grown-up version of the twelve-year-old he knew in his own time, living with her family at the Salcedas' desert compound in southern California. In this world, he knew, Juanita had lost her whole family, except for her dad: Enrique Salceda was still alive, working with the Resistance in L.A., though, like Gabriela, he must be nearly eighty.
"We've just gotten a message from Gabriela in Los Angeles," Juanita said. "They made a hit on one of Skynet's communications nodes north of the city. Smashed the whole thing, no human casualties, took out three endos cleanly."
"Hey, fine," John said.
"We'll soon have found every war machine left in North America. The Europeans are doing the same thing."
"We still don't know much about the other continents," Danny said thoughtfully.
"No, but we will."
"You seem to be relishing it, Juanita," Jade said.
Juanita beamed. "Why not? We've fought for two decades just to be in this position. It doesn't make up for what we've lost...I know."
"I did not mean to criticize. You should savor the moment."
"Have you heard from Mom?" John said to Juanita.
"Not from Sarah, but Cecilia called us earlier. They've been in some heavy fighting, but they're both okay. We've had more contingents surrendering to us."
"Uh-huh."
"So what can you show me? John"—Juanita smiled—"Big John wants a report." Juanita had taken to calling the General that, since one time when she'd heard John use it. It seemed kind of tacky now...but John had brought it on himself.
"I'll show you what we know so far," Danny said. He entered a code, and the pattern on the screens changed completely, "This is what's inside the Supercoffin—just a straightforward visual representation."
"It's not much to look at," John said seriously, "but it could make a difference."
"All the difference in the world," Danny said. The screens showed the Supercoffin's interior space, approximately human-sized and almost empty. A dark shape represented the arm of liquid-metal that they'd removed from the T-1000 back in New York City. "That lump of polyalloy might help us win a war between two realities. It's that important." Juanita frowned impatiently. "I know that. Why hasn't it liquefied? That's what happened before."
Juanita had her own experience with a T-1000. In this world, the T-1000 that had been sent to kill John in 1994 had survived and tried again nine years later at the Tejada estancia. Juanita had been there that day, and had helped to fight it. As John had heard the story, she'd probably saved his counterpart's life. The polyalloy T-XA that he'd fought, with the Specialists, in his own world, had been scattered across space-time in an experimental time vault. It had left some of its mass behind, and that had formed a liquid pool.
"We don't know why it hasn't happened here," John said.
"Whoa, it's early days," Danny said. "I hope I can get you more answers soon. I didn't invent this stuff, I'm just trying to reverse-engineer how it works."
"It is not programmed to try to fight," Jade said. "It seems to have lost all of that program when its mission failed—when Skynet was destroyed."
"Anyway," John said, "it's kind of comforting. Like it's not going to attack or anything."
"If it remains like this, it might be safe to bring the second T-1000 from Spain," Juanita said. "You could try to reprogram both."
"Maybe. As I said, it's early days." Danny entered a code that completely changed the configuration on the screen, back to the pattern they'd been looking at before Juanita joined them. The Supercoffin's powerful magnetic sensors were feeding him data on the T-1000's detailed programming. "Look at what we've got here," he said.
Juanita peered at it blankly. "What am I seeing?"
"I'm using the Supercoffin's sensors and its own processing power. What you're seeing is the configuration of what is placed in there. The pattern shows just what you'd expect, given what we know of the properties of this material. It has at least two levels of programming repeated over and over throughout its structure."
Juanita simply nodded. These two and the General must have been considering it for years, John imagined.
"One level controls basic properties, such as its ability to liquefy and reform," Danny said. "The other
was a kid. "I know," he said. He flashed her a smile, finding that he liked her. "Danny's right, though—we've nearly licked the problem. Trust me on this."
ASUNCI6N, PARAGUAY JANUARY 20, 2030
In her months in this reality, Sarah had seen many cities, all of them ruined—some more so than others. Judgment Day had reduced New York City and the great centers of Europe to burnt out wreckage, twisted steel skeletons of once-great buildings, and miles of rusted, mangled vehicles lining the shattered streets. Others, such as Buenos Aires, had been flattened in part, disfigured by craters left behind when Skynet's first waves of war machines had been met with tactical nuclear weapons. Asuncion, too, was ruined, but not like that.
Like the other South American cities, it had been spared the nuclear blasts of Judgment Day. In 1997, the continent had been hit relatively lightly by the Russian warheads, aimed at U.S. interests rather than at civilian populations and infrastructure. But then had come the cold and dark, the global climate change, the overthrow of governments, the breakdown of civil order, and then the anarchy and street-by-street fighting among rival warlords. Later, the machines had come, pouring down from the north at Skynet's command, looking for humans to exterminate.
In the past four months, Sarah had seen dozens of deserted cities, most of them like this. She'd crisscrossed the continent, from the dusty, windswept plains of Argentina to the mouth of the Amazon in Brazil, where a strange kind of jungle now grew, totally morphed from the equatorial selvas of her own world. Like many of these cities, Asuncion still stood. Seen from a distance, its high-rise office towers and rows of city blocks appeared something like they must have been before Judgment Day. Then you entered the streets and saw that nothing moved. There were no green parks or gardens—everything was brown or gray. The once-great Paraguay River was a dried-up ghost of itself.
A column of five vehicles entered the city: two Humvees, two five-ton army trucks, and a troop carrier. Sarah sat up front in the first Humvee, driven by a T-800, with another riding in the back manning an anti-aircraft gun. They tended to use the same machines over and over in front-line action, letting the damaged ones become even more so, since any perman
ent harm to a Terminator's flesh and skin would render it unusable for the next major task: the journey across the dimensions to Jade's World. There was plenty of support work for the undamaged Terminators to do, including guard duty on the growing number of prisoners of war. The T-800 on the back of the Humvee had some vestiges of a face, but the flesh on its body was stripped back almost to the endoskeleton.
Once among the city's buildings, Sarah could see clearly how they were crumbling and riddled with bullet holes. Every window seemed to be smashed, and many walls had been reduced to rubble from shelling or grenade-fire. This place had been shot to pieces in battle between rival warlords, then the war against the machines—and now, once more, by
warlords. "You see anything hostile?" Sarah said to the Terminator. She had an assault rifle across her knee and a tan canvas bag at her feet, containing grenades and spare magazines.
"Negative."
"All right, slow down from here."
Interrogations and reconnaissance had told them that the remaining leaders of the Rising Army of Liberation and another warlord militia, the Sons of Earth, were holed up in the old underground Resistance headquarters, here in Asunci6n. Raiding them would be difficult, but not impossible since they had the precise location, and the Terminators to back them up. That those two groups, the Rising Army and the Sons, had formed an alliance was proof of how weak they'd become; still, they would doubtless fight. They wouldn't sit around, waiting for a raid. There must be lookouts all through the city.
As the column crawled through the city streets, Sarah watched intently, looking at every rooftop, every window, waiting for sniper fire. She grew tense, knowing how close they were getting to the enemy HQ. They'd be under fire soon—soon, or never. She couldn't believe it was never. Had the Rising Army and the Sons tried to flee? That seemed unlikely. They wouldn't dare drive across country and risk being caught in the open. Odds were, they'd left their rathole, and were planning to attack from positions in the broken buildings, or on the roofs.
T2 - 03 - The New John Connor Chronicles - Times of Trouble Page 19
