Members of Clover Compound were shouting at him, at Murphy, demanding answers. But guns weren’t being pointed in their direction. The situation was chaotic, but the danger was defused. He ignored the people barraging him with questions.
“Jenna, stay with Lana,” he shouted. “Get a medic to see to your head.”
“My head’s fine—”
Sato tapped the rank insignia on his shoulder, personal shorthand for “Shut up and follow orders.” Jenna shut up. “Nix, can you find your way back to the high airflow chamber?”
Nix nodded.
“Get up there and keep Mears from exiting that way. Smart, J. L., main exit, ditto.” He turned to Murphy. “Any ideas?”
Murphy extended his hands, waving away the questions coming at him. “Pipe down, everybody. I’ll get to you.” He turned to Sato. “I don’t have a clue.”
“You think he’s going to run for it?”
“Not by any of the main exits. And to go out any of the emergency evacuation tunnels would be to open up a hole Skynet observers could detect.”
Sato shook his head. “Would that stop him? He’s got to admit to himself by now that Skynet knows about Clover Compound.”
“Yeah, but opening an exit that Skynet could see would precipitate an attack, wouldn’t it? I don’t think he’s selfish enough to get all his people killed like that.”
“So what’s he going to do? Where’s he going to go?”
“Probably his office, first.”
* * *
They marched into the office where Mears had conducted his first conversation with Sato. Someone had been there in recent minutes. The desk drawers were open. So was the door to a stand-up locker. Contents of both were disarrayed—papers and office supplies in one, jackets and outdoor equipment in the other—but they weren’t empty. “What did he take?”
Murphy looked over the desk drawer and shook his head. He pawed through the contents of the locker and said, “All his weapons and gear are still here. The only thing that’s missing here is a bottle of prewar sippin’ whisky. From his desk, I don’t know.”
The intercom on the desk buzzed. Murphy punched a button on it. “Murphy.”
“Uh, sir, we’ve had a communication from Outpost Four. They say they’ve found a stray. An injured girl.”
“From where?”
“She’s apparently not sure. They say she’s had a head injury and is still pretty confused. She gives her name as Gwendolyn Drew.”
Sato stiffened.
Murphy gave him a curious look. “Looks like you picked the right compound to start your search,” he said.
“Looks that way.”
There was a little suspicion to Murphy’s expression as he depressed the intercom key again. “Tell the outpost to bring her in, and to tell her she’s got friends at Clover Compound.”
“Yes, sir.”
Murphy straightened from the desk. “What the hell’s going on?”
“Can’t tell you.”
“You come here, wreck the whole order of our compound, hand the reins to me with a little advisory that I’ve got to close the place down and find something else to do after training for years to take charge here, and you can’t tell me?”
“That’s right.”
Murphy cursed. Then he returned his attention to the locker. “He didn’t take his outdoor gear. He’s not trying to run. He’s gone off somewhere private to get drunk.”
“Does he do that often?”
“Never.”
“What are his private places?”
“Well, there was his topside retreat.”
“Which you knew about.”
“Yeah, I knew about it. A second-in-command has to know where his boss is at all times.” Murphy didn’t look repentant. “There’s his bedroom. I sent a couple of guards there. Since they haven’t reported, it’s pretty clear he didn’t go there. There’s this office, and there’s whatever his current engineering project is … but he hasn’t commenced one in the last year. So that’s it.”
“No, no, no. Someplace has got to have some memories for him, someplace he’d want to revisit.”
Murphy thought about it for a moment. “Yeah. Maybe.”
* * *
Sato and Murphy marched down the long, unlit tunnel; only the beams of their flashlights offered any illumination. The place was dusty and silent. Here, more so than anywhere else in Clover Compound, Sato imagined he could feel the weight of millions of tons of stony mountain pressing down upon him.
From up ahead, distantly, came a call. “Good morning.” It was Mears’s voice, cheerful and unconcerned.
Murphy swept his flashlight beam back and forth, trying to spot the speaker. “Raymond, what the hell are you doing down here?”
“Visiting old friends.”
Finally Murphy’s beam caught Mears. The old man was sitting, a tall whisky bottle in his hand, and at first glance it looked as though he’d recently lost both legs at about midthigh, but it was a trick of topography and lighting. As Murphy and Sato got closer, it became clear that Mears was sitting on the far side of a hole, dangling his legs. The shaft, easily a dozen feet in diameter, appeared to descend straight down into the rock.
Finally Sato spoke. “So that’s Satan’s Hole.”
Mears raised his bottle, his expression merry, and knocked back a slug of its amber-colored contents. “It is. But it’s not as sinister a place as most of the people here make it out to be. I really only put two people down there over the years, mostly in the early days. Jake Kinney and Lawanda Beeker. They wanted to take control away from me, wouldn’t compromise, wouldn’t leave.” The old man shrugged. “I loved ’em both. I killed ’em both. My way or the highway, and all that. But they weren’t as good as you, Sato. Or maybe I’m just too old to fight off the coups anymore. Hey, that’s far enough.”
Sato and Murphy stopped advancing. They were now ten paces from the near lip of Satan’s Hole, and Mears was on the far lip, facing them.
“I don’t get it, Mears,” Sato said. “Why’d you run off if you were just going to sit down with a drink? You could have done that in your office without all the exercise.”
“I just told you. My way. My way. You ordered me to hand over control of the compound on your schedule, at your convenience—well, I didn’t. You couldn’t make me. You don’t order me, ever. I win. You lose. Still…” Mears shrugged. “I don’t plan to make things any harder than necessary. Murph, I wrote out a confirmation of my abdication and your appointment. I left it in the bottom airflow chamber in the main control cabinet. It should smooth out the succession.”
“So, what now?” Sato asked.
“I retire. I’ve been retired for thirty minutes. Feels pretty good. Now I take my ball and go home. You familiar with that phrase, Lieutenant?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s the kind of thing people who don’t like to compromise used to say. No compromising, no sharing, no bending.” Mears held the bottle toward them as if intending to hand it to them. He grinned. “My whisky.” He dropped it. It fell for long seconds, and then there was the distant sound of glass shattering. “Hey, Lawanda, Jake, have a drink on me.”
There was strain in Murphy’s voice. “Raymond—”
“No, please. Don’t waste my time. I have an appointment. One thing, though. Tell that girl I really did like her. She can have anything of mine she wants. What she doesn’t want goes to you, Murph.”
“Don’t—”
Mears pushed off. He seemed to hang there in the air for a moment, his eyes big, evaluating these two lesser officers one last time, and then he dropped out of sight.
Sato and Murphy rushed forward. But even before they reached the lip, there was the sound of a distant impact from below—a meaty blow. Sato thought he could hear crunching and breaking noises mixed in.
They shone their flashlights down Satan’s Hole, but the beams were not strong enough to reach all the way to the bottom.
c.11
The Scalpers gathered at the main entrance, huddled together by their dune buggies, away from the entrance guards and the vehicle mechanics, who spoke in hushed tones about the day’s events.
To Sato, the situation seemed a little tense and emotional, but did not speak to him of danger. No one was shooting angry stares their way. There was curiosity, there was finger-pointing … there was no desire for vengeance that he could see. On the other side of the chamber, Murphy stood in a gathering of subordinates, issuing orders to each in turn, dispatching them on various errands. He was inarguably in charge now.
Sato shook his head. It was one of the advantages of dealing with control freaks like Mears, he decided. They did run tight organizations and left behind very clear lines of control.
“How’s your head?” he asked Jenna.
She shook her head, a vigorous gesture. “Hard Mediterranean skull, like they’ve been making for millions of years.”
“Too sturdy for anything to penetrate,” Nix said.
She gave him a half-amused look that promised payback. “J. L. needs to say goodbye to Lana.”
“I did,” J. L. said. “I told her she ought to put in for a transfer to Home Plate or somewhere. I keep thinking they may give her trouble here because she was the boss’s woman, a nonworker.”
“Did you apologize to her?” Jenna asked.
J. L. looked offended. “What for?”
“For saying that she was dumb as a box of hair.”
“I didn’t say it to her.”
“Yeah, but you were thinking it every moment you were with her. Up until the point that she was smart enough to save our butts in the mess hall.”
His sigh signaled defeat. “Yeah, you’re right.”
“You won’t have the opportunity this time,” Sato said. “Just as soon as we’ve had our first meeting with the she-toaster from hell, we jump in the buggies and clear out. We can’t let her be here long enough to pick up the news about Mears’s death or anything else.”
Jenna turned her attention to the far side of the chamber, to the huge concrete door that remained resolutely shut. “Are they going to bring her in here?”
“Uh-huh.” Sato checked his watch. Arrival could be in two minutes or twenty. “And remember, we’re the only ones here, Murphy included, who know what she is. Anyone not up to the task of driving hundreds of miles with a Terminator in your backseat?”
Jenna the Greek offered a little shudder, but no one spoke up.
“Okay,” Sato said. “Just remember, this is a life-or-death deception. And remember that we have no idea of the extent of her sensors and that she might be able to plant remotes, microphones, something like that, to spy on us even when she’s off at a distance.
“What this means is that, starting the first moment we meet the girl, we’re doing live theater. And we have to remain in character from that point until the team down south bags her. No private communications by whispered word, written note, or glance. If she’s in one buggy and you’re in the other, don’t talk about her being a T-X. We have to assume that she’s listening to us at every point and that Skynet has a spy satellite trained on us for every mile. Is anyone not up to the job?”
No one spoke. Everyone looked as though he wanted to.
“Good.” He clapped his sniper on the back. “Smart, I have a special assignment for you. For the next couple of days, at least until she makes it clear she wants you to quit, I want you to flirt with Gwendolyn.”
Smart blinked at him. “Sir, I mean this with all respect. Are you out of your mind?”
“Nope. Think about it. Four red-blooded Resistance men traveling in the company of a good-looking young woman who hasn’t already told them all to go to hell. Somebody would hit on her. Correct?”
Smart looked more than a little uncomfortable. “Correct. But not me.”
“Yes, you. I’m the team leader and authority figure, I can’t do it. J. L. is dreamy-eyed over another girl right now; I doubt he could pull it off.”
The youngest member of the team looked offended. “Hey.”
“And Nix, well, being Nix, he wouldn’t take no for an answer, even from a Terminator. I need someone who’s going to be stiff, self-conscious, and easily put off—and that’s you.”
Smart sighed. “Is this the kind of praise you put in our performance reviews?” Then a new thought crossed his mind. “Oh, my God. What if I make a pass at her and she accepts?”
Sato considered it, then laughed. “Improvise.”
Jenna frowned. “Lieutenant, wait; this thing is going to fall apart at the start. They’ll bring her in here, the dogs will go crazy, she’ll know her cover is blown, and there’ll be bodies everywhere. How do we keep that from happening?”
“We don’t,” Sato said. “We don’t have to. Skynet would never have sent her to be picked up and brought in to a compound for this deception if it weren’t sure she could pass for human … even to the dogs. If that were going to be a problem, she would have found some other way to hook up with the Resistance, such as meeting us out on the road. Of course, the idea that she could fool dogs is bad news in and of itself. Good thing Skynet can’t manufacture T-Xs at any sort of quick rate.”
There was a flurry of motion among workers in the entry chamber. Two security men trotted to their station against one wall to pick up their assault rifles, to reassure the dogs waiting there. A woman in the same uniform ducked into a side door, beyond which, Sato now knew, was installed the equipment that allowed monitoring of exterior cameras, opening and closing of the armored main door. Murphy issued final orders and waved goodbye to Sato, then departed with his final group of subordinates. Now the chamber was empty of people except the Scalpers and essential security personnel.
Moments later, the far wall swung open, almost silent, on its pivot. A group of three people entered on foot. Two, a man and a woman, were in the dark blue uniforms of Clover Compound and carrying full outdoor kit and rifles. The third, wrapped in a blanket that concealed everything but her face and the shapeless dark green pants she wore, was Gwendolyn Drew.
Sato concentrated on keeping his face still, his emotions buried well below the surface, but reality itself felt as though it were slipping away from him. He knew the woman was fiction, but here she was in the flesh. Well, in the artificial, made-of-liquid-metal flesh.
The woman looked uncertain, confused, and raised a hand against the blare of lights from the chamber’s ceiling. The security men approached with the dogs, and Sato could hear them tell her to extend her hands. She did.
Both dogs sniffed at her. One stepped back and wagged its tail. The other looked up at its handler and whined uncertainly. Neither barked. That was the acid test.
The security men relaxed, leading the dogs back to their ready position, and Sato approached. “Gwendolyn?”
Her attention snapped to him. She continued to look uncertain and gathered the blanket more tightly around her. “Uh-huh,” she said.
“I’m Christopher Sato, Lieutenant, Resistance 1st Security Regiment. You probably don’t remember me, but we met once when you were a little girl.”
She shook her head. “I don’t—Lieutenant, I don’t really remember much of anything.” Her voice was mellow, mature for her apparent years, a little subdued. Sato would have bet his left arm that it was based on existing recordings of Sarah Connor, perhaps from the years she was incarcerated in a California mental institution.
“How’s that?”
“I remember falling. When I woke up, there was blood all over a rock, and the creek I was next to had washed away most of my gear.” She touched her left temple. “Beyond that, I don’t remember much, except my name, and the fact that I needed to get to Home Plate.”
Sato nodded. It was a good cover story. Amnesia was never as commonplace as the twentieth-century entertainment media had suggested, but it did happen, and Sato himself had known people who’d had short-term or long-term memory loss, particularly related to injury or other battle
trauma. And this story would keep the woman from making potentially deadly errors of fact during the trip to come.
He reached for her. “May I?”
“Sure.”
He touched her head where she had indicated, carefully running his fingers along her temple and in widening circles around it. Her skin moved in a natural way under his touch, and he could feel a bony ridge where one shouldn’t be beneath her skin.
At this distance, he could smell her. She smelled like snow and wool blanket, and beneath those odors was a faint but distinct taint of human sweat.
Amazing what they can do these days, he thought.
He stepped back. “You’ve taken quite a hit. I suspect there’s a little calcium buildup against your skull. Are you having any trouble with blurred vision, dizziness, ringing sounds?”
She shook her head. “Not after the first few days. I feel good. I just wish I could remember things.”
“Well, I’ll tell you what. My job is to deliver you right into the hands of your uncle John. I suspect that seeing him will jar those memories right back into your head.”
“That would be wonderful. I hate, I really hate not remembering.”
Sato smiled to cover the sudden revulsion he felt. “We were actually ready to leave when we got the word that you’d been found. So we’re set to go. Do you want to see a medic? Need anything to eat?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine. I don’t even have any belongings to get together. I can leave any time.”
Are you feeling the machine equivalent of excitement? Sato wondered. Hydraulic fluids coursing through your tubes a little faster than normal, now that you’re really on the track of John Connor? Her face didn’t give away any such emotion.
“All right. Gwendolyn, this is Sergeant Vandis, Sergeant Smart, Corporal Friedman, Corporal Larson. We’ve already got a standard-issue field pack for you in the dune buggy.”
“Thank you,” she said. “It’s great to be in friendly hands again.”
Sangre de Cristo Mountains, New Mexico
Paul turned the key in the ignition and the dirt bike roared into life. The high-pitched roar of the 292cc engine echoed up and down the concrete ramps that made up what the workers were now calling Mechanics’ Alley, drowning out the sounds of socket wrenches, welding torches, and mechanics’ curses. Paul twisted the throttle, causing the roar to swell and diminish in an archaic machine song of the open road.
Terminator 3--Terminator Hunt Page 15