Infiltrator t2-1

by S. M. Stirling

  In a minute they’d notice him, tease him about his uniform, and invite him to join the game. And he would. And he’d enjoy himself. But he knew that some part of himself would hold back, would observe and evaluate everyone around him.

  Well, maybe it’s the Terminators. Or maybe it was the way Mom brought me up, knowing I was supposed to save the human race from Skynet. My big fat fucking destiny to save the human race and send my own father back through time to save Mom.

  Maybe it was because he didn’t have a destiny anymore.

  Not that he was going to complain if the world didn’t go up in a ball of fire, far from it. But he was pretty much restricted in what he could do and where he could go. He sure as hell couldn’t go to college in the United States, now, could he? As for achieving even minor notoriety here in Paraguay, he’d have to be very, very careful lest someone from the CIA or something recognize him or his mother and start extradition proceedings. There were a lot of people hiding out here; it Was a pretty easygoing country, and if you had some cash nobody made problems. But it was one thing to let the kids of a bunch of Germans who’d

  arrived in 1946 linger, and another to annoy the U.S. by sheltering a couple of gen-u-ine badass capital-T Terrorists.

  It shouldn’t matter. It should be easy to let go of ambition, especially at sixteen.

  But all of his life John had been told that he was destined for greatness, that he was born to be a hero. Now he seemed destined to run a little trucking company and be a small-time smuggler.

  Definitely a blow to the old self-esteem. A self-deprecating smile tugged at his lips. Poor me, he thought to himself. Saved the world at ten and I’m like, where do I go from here? It’s all downhill. He grinned. John, you have got to get over yourself. I mean, remember what you always thought of dickweeds who spent their time being sorry for themselves.

  Carlos, the youngest of the soccer players, saw him and yelled his name. The others turned and drifted over. Francisco Encinas, the tallest and the gang’s leader, played it cool, looking John up and down.

  “All dressed up,” he said mockingly. “You going to a costume party?”

  John gave him a slow grin. “I just got home in time to see you kick that ball like an old lady,” he countered. “Where’d you pick up those moves? You been folk-dancing again?”

  The other kids chuckled and Carlos did a couple of shuffling steps. Francisco gave him a playful shove.

  “Last time you played with us you spent most of the time on your face in the mud,” Francisco reminded John. “So you gonna play or you gonna talk?”

  John took off his uniform jacket, folded it and put it under the tree, dragged off his tie, and unbuttoned his shirt.

  “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Sarah found him there, still playing, a couple of hours later. She leaned against the tree beside his folded jacket and watched him. He was good— graceful and deadly accurate. Much taller now; he’d be six feet or so when he was grown.

  Taller than his father—but then, he hadn’t grown up scrabbling for food in the ruins of Skynet’s war of extermination. Darker than either of them, hair brown-black and cropped short now; his tanned face was sharp and his chin came to a near point. He’d never had baby fat, but now he moved like an athlete, his shoulders growing broad and legs long. The other kids scrambled to keep up with him. John noticed her and waved; she waved back. He said a few words to the others and ran over to her.

  “You don’t have to stop,” she said. “I’m perfectly content to watch.”

  “Are you kidding? You’ve saved me, I’m totally bushed. They got me up at five this morning and these guys could go on all day.” He grinned at her, panting lightly. “I’m also starved.”

  “Do you want to eat in town?” she asked. “Or can you wait until we get home?”

  “I wouldn’t say no to some empty calories to tide me over,” he said. “But I’d rather wait till we get home for real food. I miss your cooking.”

  Sarah laughed outright at that. “Those are words I never expected to hear.”

  “Don’t sell yourself short, Mom,” he said. “Nobody makes a campfire stew like you do. Nobody.”

  John indulged himself with a banana split, the very sight off which made Sarah’s teeth tingle. But at his age boys had hollow legs and could take the calories.

  Besides, at his school they probably proscribed anything sweet that didn’t come directly from a tree.

  “Mmmm,” he said around a mouthful of whipped cream. “I’ve been imagining this since yesterday.”

  “Is it good?” she asked.

  “Mmm-hmm. Almost as good as I remember.” He licked the back of his spoon as he looked at her. “You aren’t much for sweets, are ya?”

  “Not ice cream, for some reason,” Sarah agreed.

  “But otherwise you’re so rational.”

  She laughed at that, and then smiled at him.

  “I’ve missed you.”

  “Missed you, too, Mom.”

  He waited until they were driving home to tackle some of the things that were on his mind.

  “Do you mind if we don’t go camping for a while?” he asked.

  “How long is a while?” she asked. “I wanted to go to Ciuidad del Este before the end of next month. I’ve got a few appointments and I thought we could hit Parque Nacional Caaguazu for a couple of weeks or so and then swing up to the city.” Sarah shrugged. “We can go camping anytime, I guess. Why?”

  “Luis Salcido’s family is having an asado to welcome him home from school and we’re invited.”

  “Both of us?” Sarah asked. She was surprised and warily pleased. The Salcidos were a fairly prominent family in the area but they’d never been more than polite to her.

  “Yeah,” John said. “Luis and I really hit it off this semester.”

  Sarah thought for a moment. “He has a very attractive sister, hasn’t he?” she said at last.

  “Am I that transparent?” John asked with a grin.

  “Transparent? As in obvious, self-evident, unsubtle? Nah!”

  “Unsubtle? Moi? I never even looked at Consuela last year.”

  “She wasn’t worth looking at last year.”

  “Harsh, Mom. True, but harsh.”

  Sarah grinned; she’d missed bantering with him.

  “So when is this asado?” she asked.

  “Next Saturday.”

  “No problem,” Sarah said. “I couldn’t get away myself before then.” Maybe he doesn’t want to go camping, she suddenly thought.

  They’d always done some wilderness stuff to keep their skills sharp, or maybe just to keep from getting bored. But John was getting older now; he was of an age to want to make his own choices about how he’d spend his time. And who he’ll want to spend time with. I suppose it’s more healthy for him to want to spend time with his friends and cute girls than with his mother. The proper thing to do, she supposed, was to let him choose the time and place for their trip, if he wanted to do it at all.

  “Can we bring Luis along when we do go?” John asked, watching her face.

  “Absolutely,” she said, relieved. “Provided his folks don’t object.”

  “If we wait a bit and let them get sick of him first, they shouldn’t.”

  Sarah chuckled. “You know too much about human nature for a sixteen-year-old,” she observed, only half kidding. “You guys figure out where you want to go and we’ll do it.” Sarah gave him a brief glance and a warm smile. “It’ll be fun.”

  After a moment she asked, “Does he have any equipment?”

  “I doubt it,” John said. “They’re not much for the great outdoors in his family. I suspect his mother thinks camping is déclassé.”

  “I suspect his mother thinks I’m déclassé,” Sarah said.

  John shook his head. “I doubt she knows what to think of you, Mom. I mean she’s lived in Villa Hayes all her life. To her you’re the ultimate in exotic. Like, wow, you can drive a truck!”

 
; “That’s so unfeminine!” Sarah drove on, grinning.

  John gave her a weak grin. “Fortunately, she’s not invited.”

  “What about Consuela? She invited, hmm?”

  “Well, Mom, while that would make my vacation and while she’d certainly be more than welcome, I think it’s more likely that her parents would adopt me. Or even you.”

  Sarah laughed and shook her head. “They do protect their girls.”

  “Mom?” John said after a moment. “Didja ever notice how we both say ‘they’?”

  She glanced at him.

  “I mean”—he shifted around in his seat until he was facing her—

  “wherever we are we’re not… native, I guess. Not in the States, not here either, not anywhere we lived. There’s us and there’s them. When do we get to be a part of them?”

  For a few moments Sarah looked straight ahead and just drove. Then she

  shrugged and tipped her head a bit.

  “I dunno. I guess when we feel comfortable with the people around us.” She shook her head”. “There’s no easy answer to that one, John.” Sarah flicked a glance at him. “I wish there were, hon. But there isn’t. Although”—she wrinkled her forehead—“and don’t take this the wrong way, all right? But it is common for people your age to feel alienated.”

  John rolled his eyes. “Mom! Cut me some slack here, okay?”

  “What I mean is that your feelings of alienation might be more pronounced right now and that you should take that into consideration. Even if everything in our lives was perfectly normal…”

  “You mean if my father wasn’t from the future and we’d never even heard of Terminators, never mind had to run for our lives and save the future?”

  She tightened her lips. “Yes,” she said evenly with a quick sidelong glance.

  “That’s what I mean. You know where I’m going with this?”

  “Uh-huh.” John sat forward again and waved a hand. “It’s one of those phases I’m going through.”

  “No, that’s not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is that the situation may be more painful because of a phase you’re going through.” After a somewhat hurt pause she said, “I’ve never brushed you off, John. I’m not about to start now.”

  “I know, Mom. I just wish—” He stopped, too tired to go on.

  “I wish, too, hon.”

  They were almost home when he brought up what was really bothering him.

  John watched his mother from the corner of his eye while he pretended to look at the road ahead. She looked worn. Her face had settled into a sort of irritated-looking softness. The result of trying to look blank while playing against the odds for half a lifetime, he supposed.

  He turned to look out at the passing landscape. Since the Terminator had shown up, revealing the truth of his mother’s lonely struggle, he’d been in awe of her strength. Now, with the future assured, thanks in large part to her efforts, he was watching that strength crumbling away from lack of purpose. He understood, and sympathized. How often had he lain awake contemplating a future that held no particular place for him?

  Frustration, loneliness, and sheer boredom were taking a toll on both of them.

  Sometimes the urges they prompted in him frightened him. But his mom seemed to actually be giving in to those urges. If there was one emotion he’d always recognize in himself and in others it was fear, and right now he was genuinely afraid for his mother.

  So the question was—too scared to do anything about it? John shifted in his seat.

  Was he willing to watch her slide down that same slippery slope that beckoned to him out of fear, or misplaced empathy?

  “How long have you been drinking?” he asked abruptly.

  Startled by the suddenness of the question, Sarah’s mouth opened. She closed it without speaking and they drove on for a full minute in silence. She could feel

  his eyes on her. “Since I was about fifteen,” she said. “That’s when I had my first beer.”

  “You know what I mean, Mo—”

  She turned to look at him, frowning. “John, don’t try to parent me, okay?”

  Hastily turning forward to steer the Jeep around a major pothole, she went silent for a minute. “Today it just sounded really tasty to me to have a little cana in my iced tea. I don’t do it every day and it wasn’t that much anyway.”

  “Mom, it almost knocked me off my feet!”

  With a grin she said, “It is potent. But there was maybe a tablespoon in there. I don’t do it all the time, but once in a while I like a little. Where’s the harm?”

  Sarah glanced at him. “I don’t get drunk, John, if that’s what you’re worrying about.” yes, that is what I’m worrying about. Aloud he said, “When did you start drinking it?”

  “When did you drink enough of it to recognize the taste after one swallow?” she countered.

  “Hey, I’m a teenager. We have our ways.”

  Sarah sneaked a glance at him. He was trying to be cool, but she could see he was uncomfortable and unhappy. “I had a really bad cold last winter, it just wouldn’t go away. One of the drivers brought me a flask and said to add it to my tea. It’ll clear it right up, he said.” She turned to John. “And you know what? It did.”

  “Musta been that pure alcohol running through your veins,” John muttered. “Or maybe it was the nicotine.”

  “Sheesh! No smoking, no drinking! Do you want me to join a nunnery or hire a chaperon?”

  He looked at his lap, and then returned to staring out his window. “Sorry, Mom,”

  he muttered.

  Sarah rolled her eyes. “Sweetheart,” she said quietly, “we have to rely on each other, and we have to take care of one another. But that will go easier for both of us if we don’t try to micromanage each other’s life.”

  John slid her a sardonic glance, which she couldn’t appreciate because she was focusing on the increasingly rough road. This from the woman who sent me to military school, he thought. Where micromanaging lives is what they do all day, every day. Have you no shame, Mom?

  John stifled a sigh. He’d just have to watch her. He thought this behavior was new, but couldn’t be certain. Their camping trip would be the perfect opportunity to find out just how far it had gone. A few weeks in the wilderness should dry her out nicely.

  Sarah lay in bed, smoking and thinking, staring at the rough plaster of the ceiling and watching the smoke rise in curls through the moonlight. Thinking that this would be one of her last cigarettes until John went back to school. Thinking about the girl she had been and wondering what kind of woman she’d be now if Kyle Reese and the Terminator hadn’t come into her life.

  Just lately she’d been sincerely regretting the loss of that girl, even while she winced at how clueless she’d been.

  Why me? she wondered for the millionth time.

  With an impatient grimace she stubbed out her cigarette. Such thoughts were a waste of time. She knew she should fight the impulse to indulge them. But she was so isolated here that it got harder and harder not to wallow in self-pity.

  She punched her pillow and turned to a more comfortable position in the bed.

  Self-pity had never been one of her flaws before. And heaven knew she had reason to be happy. She was safe; more importantly, John was safe. The future, as far as she could tell, was assured. They had a nice comfortable life here in Villa Hayes. They didn’t even have to associate with much in the way of lowlife, except smugglers—and smugglers were quite respectable, in Paraguay.

  A nice, comfortable, deadly dull, boring, empty life. She sighed. The girl she’d been would probably have found this life very fulfilling. She wished she could somehow achieve that attitude. She also wished she could have a little glass of cana to help send her off to sleep. But John’s obvious distress stopped her. The craving she was feeling right now stopped her.

  She’d be a fool to have come so far only to lose everything to demon rum. The only thing left in my life that means anything to me is
my son. I will not lose his respect. So she’d just have to get used to going to sleep the natural way.

  At least she didn’t have the nightmare anymore. For a moment she ground her face into the pillow as the thought brought back the images. The searing flash of white light as the bomb ignited, the burning bodies bursting apart as the blast

  wave struck them, her own body reduced to bones, yet still alive…

  Now when she had nightmares they were mostly of the asylum. Certainly that was nightmare enough for anybody. That creepy asshole Douglas and his nightstick ratcheting against the doors at night, that was always a part of it.

  I hope I crippled the bastard, she thought. Killing was altogether too good for him.

  And Dr. Silberman with his feigned compassion and understanding. Sarah grinned as she thought about the way she’d last seen him, pressed up against the wall with his mouth hinging open as the fluid form of the T-1000 went through the lockdown bars.

  I wonder how long it took him to convince himself that what he’d seen was some sort of “mass hallucination” What a paper that would make.

  Go to sleep! she ordered herself. Not surprisingly that didn’t work. With a sigh she got up, put on her robe, and went out onto the portal, the tile cool under her feet, the night alive with the sound of tropical insect life. She was startled momentarily to find someone out there.

  “John?”

  “Hi Mom, can’t sleep?”

  “That’s my line.” She sat beside him on the swing. “I know you’re worried about me,” Sarah said. “No need. A word to the wise, as they say. If it worries you, it’s gone. Okay?”

  He let out a long sigh. “Thank you,” he said simply.

  “No problem.” Well, it might be, but it would be her problem. No reason for John to know anything about it.

  They sat in companionable silence for a while, enjoying the soft, spring night.

  “Think you’ll be able to sleep now?” she asked after a while.

  “Yeah.” John was surprised to realize that he did think so.

  “Me, too. Let’s go in and hit the hay.”