McMillin smiled, though, and gazed out the window.
“Anyway, if they get a hold of you, you’re likely dead.
If the T-1000s or TX-As touch you, they can imitate you.”
“How did you deal with these things in the past?”
“We ran.”
“You can’t do that forever.”
“No, sir. We can’t. We’re not going to.”
Sarah pulled into the parking lot before the row of apart-ments. Two levels, they reminded her very much of her own apartment, back before her life had turned into—what it had turned into. She suppressed a massive attack of nostalgia and studied the other cars, watching the area for about fifteen minutes.
She crossed the lot as if heading for a different unit. She pretended to begin entering one on the ground level, then snapped her fingers as if remembering something. She climbed the stairs to the second level and walked along casually. As she passed the target apartment, she glanced through the windows. Blinds drawn, she saw nothing. The door looked secure. She walked past, to the far end of the row, turned, and surveyed the lot. She saw no one sitting in a car watching, no one standing anywhere within sight doing nothing. That did not mean she was unobserved, but it lowered the chances. She returned to the apartment in question.
She tried the knob first.
The door opened.
With a backward glance at the parking lot, Sarah entered.
It appeared to be a normal enough place. Sofa, two chairs, 172
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coffee table, some wall art—Escher mainly—and a couple of overburdened bookcases. Through a wide archway, the dining room table held a computer and stacks of papers and discs. Beyond that, a kitchen area—
She saw movement—a shadow?—from the back of the apartment. Sarah reached under her jacket and grasped the pistol, stepping forward silently. She reached the edge of the dining room before she noticed the papers spilled on the floor on the opposite side of the table, the partly disconnected cables from the computer, and the sensation of having just made a mistake.
She drew her weapon, turning, and ducked as a fist cut the air above her head. Reflexively, she kicked straight into the man-shape before her, connecting with a satisfying grunt.
But she was off-balance, and staggered back, trying to look around. Two more men appeared from the back bedroom and a fourth stepped out of the kitchen alcove. Sarah tried to bring her weapon to bear on the nearest, but she caught her ankle on the leg of the table and stumbled again.
They surrounded her immediately. A strong grip bent her gun-hand down; the pistol left her hand. She set her feet and drove a fist into the sternum of the one right in front of her, connecting solidly—just as a blow glanced across her forehead, snapping her head back. She crashed against the wall behind her, her assailants moving with her.
For a few moments she felt embarrassed. She was better than this, she had survived combat with monsters. To be taken down by four humans—she knew they were only men—was ridiculous.
Another fist caught her in the stomach. She doubled up, breathless, trying to get a sense of how to fight. She brought her left arm up to stop another punch, followed through by stepping into the blow with a stiff right thrust—
Too many. She dropped to the floor, the side of her face hot with pain.
They were silent. That suddenly frightened her. Professionals.
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I just walked into my death, she thought.
But the final beating did not come.
“Hey!”
Sarah heard scuffling, sharp punches, grunting. Blinking, she scrambled to her feet, immediately searching the room for her pistol. It lay on the floor beneath the table, a few inches from the outstretched hand of an unconscious man.
Before anything else, she ducked under the table to retrieve the .10mm.
In the living room, she saw a fifth man she did not know, finishing combat with two of her attackers. He held one by the right arm, off-balance, and waited for the other to come closer. The fourth man lay against the archway between dining room and living room, back bent at a fatal angle.
The man looked too old to move with such agility. Dark skin, balding, dressed in a stylish overcoat, he appeared to be in his late fifties. Broad through the shoulders and chest, he stood about five feet ten inches, and wore a trim beard showing gray.
As she watched, in a move that seemed casual, almost effortless, he hurled the man he held at the other man, dropping them both into a heap on the floor. Instantly, the older man fell on them. With four precise punches, the fight was over.
Sarah raised her pistol.
He stood, took in the results of his actions, then looked at Sarah.
He smiled. “Ms. Connor,” he said, voice pleasingly bari-tone, surprisingly soft. “My name is Portis. I’ve come from the future.”
“Which one?” Sarah asked, unthinking.
The smile grew. “The most likely one. We should leave here, don’t you think?”
“And I’m trusting you for what reason?”
“I just saved your life.”
“Maybe, but not quite enough.”
“I’m not killing you.”
“Better, but I’m holding a gun on you.”
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“Your privilege, of course. But counterproductive.” He studied her, frowning. “Are you badly hurt?”
“I’ve been worse.”
Pain made itself felt over her torso and the side of her face was beginning to swell. She hoped her right eye would not close, but she was impaired, she knew that. She could feel the first signs of adrenaline afterwash.
“I can help,” Portis said. “If you let me.”
“Before I let you come a step closer, you’re going to have to convince me whose side you’re on. Sorry. I’m old-fash-ioned that way.”
“I understand, but there isn’t much time.”
Sarah felt a wave of dizziness. She wondered just how badly hurt she really was. She focused on Portis. “You know my name.”
“You are one of the three people I came back to find.”
“Three?”
“Your son, John, of course. And a third who is pivotal.”
“A name?”
“Jeremiah Porter,” he said.
“Ah. And what do you want with him?”
“To stop him from creating Skynet.”
Sarah grunted. “You realize there’s an element of melo -
drama in this conversation that makes it kind of hard to take seriously.”
“Certain things are innately melodramatic. It can’t be helped.”
Despite herself, Sarah liked him. “You fight well. Are you modified?”
“I am.”
“Thought so. I could have taken them, you know.”
“Under other circumstances, no doubt.”
“Are they dead?”
He glanced around at the bodies. “I sincerely hope so.”
“They’re human.”
Portis nodded.
“I…” Her vision faded. She squeezed her eyes, tried to focus on him. He had moved. She turned to follow.
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Moments later, she opened her eyes to see Portis leaning over her. She panicked briefly, but her limbs felt clumsy.
He held her arms.
“Lie still,” he said. “You are concussed. Not badly, but enough. Lie still. It will be over in a minute.”
Screwed up good this time, sure it will be over…
She passed out again.
When she came to once more, she found herself stretched out on the sofa in the living room. Her face tingled, and her ribs felt numb. She looked to the left to find Portis sitting across from her, watching. He had taken off his overcoat, revealing an expensive suit of dark gray.
“Better?” he asked.
“What…”
“Nanocoders,” he said. “S
mall colony, self-limiting.
Healers.”
“I’m not—”
“It isn’t a permanent infestation. Not like the ones the advanced Terminators use. We have found problems with those. They tend, over time, to damage the host. So we deploy only short-term, self-immolating ’coders. Within a day or so they will all be flushed from your system. Fortunately, the repairs they effect are more permanent.”
Sarah said nothing, letting the sensations from her body register. She rifled her memory, asked herself questions, checked that she was still herself. But how could she tell?
“It would seem to me,” Portis said, “that this should be proof enough of my intentions. I could have killed you.”
“Depends what you really want. You might need me.
Alive.”
“Paranoia is useful to a point, Ms. Connor. The trick is to know when to let it go.”
Carefully, she sat up. The tingling was fading. She felt strong enough to walk. Her mind seemed clear.
“You say you’re here to find Jeremiah Porter,” she said.
“I’ve been here—in this time frame—for a little over six 176
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weeks. I’ve been searching. I believe the young man living here is the one I’m looking for.”
“His name is Robert, though.”
“That’s probably not true. There are some irregularities in his records. But I would need to talk to him to certain.”
“You sound like a cop.”
Portis shrugged. “In a way, I suppose you could call me that.”
“I don’t recognize your name.”
He blinked at her. “It’s what I’m using now.”
“What was it before? Or then?” She snorted. “I never have figured out how to talk about the future. What’s it like when you come from?”
He looked uncomfortable. “I don’t recall my name.
Something in the transfer to the past, I don’t know what happened. I understand what you mean about time and linguistic referents. It’s all right to talk about them in the past tense, since they are all conditional and may be left behind as a consequence of events taking place in the present. When discussing a personal history, what has gone before, whether in the future or the past, is always a previous occurrence to the one living it, so past tense is good for that as well. As for what it is like when I came from…that is a long conversation, and perhaps should be carried on elsewhere.”
Sarah stared at him, uncertain what to think of anything he had just said.
“I understand your confusion,” he said. “I am being very honest with you, Ms. Connor, because I need your help.
There is insufficient time to build trust in the normal way.
You are here, so you must be aware that Skynet’s agents are hunting Jeremiah Porter. Many so named are already dead. It is important we find him before they do. Our search is the same, and largely for the same purpose. It is important that Jeremiah Porter not be taken by Cyberdyne.”
First the Specialists, now this, she thought wryly. The universe has no right to ask this much trust from me.
She glanced around the apartment. “They were here to 177
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gather up his work. We should take the computer and the documents.”
“I’ve already packaged them up.”
On the dining room table waited three neat piles—computer, discs, and papers.
“How long have I been unconscious?” she asked.
“Ten minutes.”
She took in the bodies still lying on the floor around them. “Which way did you come in?”
“The front door was open.”
“We should leave the back way.”
“Agreed,” Portis said.
She fished a pen from her jacket. She tore a strip from the cover of a magazine laying on the coffee table and scribbled an address. “Go there,” she said, handing it to him. “Take the discs and papers, I’ll take the computer.”
He stood, and waited till she got to her feet. Satisfied that she would be all right, he went to the table and gathered up the box of discs and tucked the stack of papers under his arm.
Sarah checked that her pistol was loaded and back in its holster, then did a quick survey of the apartment for any signs of her presence. Other than the bodies, nothing would point to her unless someone saw her enter the apartment.
Satisfied, she grabbed the computer and followed Portis out the rear entrance.
John’s cell phone chirped as the car pulled into McMillin’s driveway.
“Talk to me,” he said when he saw the number on the screen. “Where the hell are you?”
“Heading back to the office,” Sarah answered. “What’s your problem?”
“You, turning off your phone.”
“Later. Right now you need to come back here. We have a visitor.”
“I’ve got another issue. Related. I’m at Dennis McMillin’s home. Seems we’ve had our first ugly encounter with 178
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Cyberdyne.” He quickly summarized what McMillin had told him, finishing with the information about Porter and McMillin’s daughter.
“I just left their apartment,” Sarah said. “People were there. If McMillin has the resources, he might want to send someone over to clean it up. Four bodies. John, they were human. Something about this—”
“Maybe they’ve only got so many Terminators to spare.
What do you mean we’ve got visitors?”
“Visitor. One. Guy named Portis, claims to be from the future. I believe him. He reminds me of the specialists. He came here to find Jeremiah Porter.”
“Small timeline. Look, when you get back I want you to get on the line to Reed and bring him up to speed. We need to find out what Cyberdyne is doing and how they’re doing it.”
“Be careful,” she said.
The connection broke. John put the phone away and told McMillin about his daughter’s apartment.
“Greg,” McMillin said to one of the men in the front seat.
“See to it, will you?”
“Yes, sir.” The man opened his own cell phone and punched into a number.
They entered the sprawling house.
“Do you have household staff?” John asked.
“Butler and two maids, plus a chauffeur.”
“They should leave. Take some time off, a few days, till we deal with this.”
From a room to the left, Paul Patterson emerged. Upon seeing them, he relaxed visibly.
“Paul,” McMillin said. “Where’s Deirdre?”
“Here, Dad,” a woman’s voice called from within the room. A moment later, she stepped into the hall, carrying a shotgun cradled in her left arm.
McMillin hugged her briefly, then held her at arm’s length. “You’re all right?”
“Fine,” she said. She glanced at John. “Who’s this?”
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“This is…Sean Philicos,” McMillin said, catching himself.
“Mr. Philicos, this is my daughter, Deirdre.”
Deirdre caught the hesitation in her stepfather’s voice, but said nothing. She nodded to John. “Mr. Philicos.”
“Ms. McMillin.”
“Deirdre.”
“Sean.”
Patterson approached John. “Gant was there.”
“So Mr. McMillin informed me. You all right?”
“Sore arm,” Patterson said, “a little unnerved.”
“Understandable. First encounters with Terminators are usually fatal. If you survive, the next most common reaction is unnerved.”
“Terminators,” Patterson said. “Just what in hell is a Terminator?”
“That is a long story. First, is there a Jeremiah Porter here?”
Deirdre’s face gave her away as she stared at John.
“In that case,” John said, “I’d like to meet him.”
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&nb
sp; Portis pulled into a nearly vacant parking lot next to a liquor store. He drew a stack of papers into his lap and began skimming the pages. Most contained scribbled notes, half-completed thoughts and equations, nothing conclusive. But on a few he found well-reasoned constructs, fluid lines expressing ideas Portis recognized. Good work.
He removed several pages, folding them and placing them in his overcoat pocket, before continuing on to the address Sarah Connor had given him. She did not trust him, not yet, nor did he expect her to. That would require more work.
He needed her—and her son—to trust him. It might be simpler to just infect her with a batch of ’coders, but where it concerned people like the Connors he was constrained.
There were rules. He did not know what he would have to do to convince them, but a start would be showing up where she expected him.
The apartment bothered him. He did not recognize it. The part of his memory closed off demanded a sense of familiarity. Deja vu, or possibly in some cases presque vu, accompanied many of his actions, the places he had seen since arrival. He did not know the implications of his peri-odic bouts of near-remembrance, whether it had to do with the timeline or his past life or both, and not knowing dis-181
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tracted him. But he had no such sense in the apartment—and he believed he should have.
He followed an internal map of L.A., pulling into the neighborhood around the Connors’ office. Within a few blocks, the area changed from trendy, upper-middle-class shops and bistros and nightclubs to a transitional community, residential mixing with more modest businesses.
The streets rippled with life, people gathered around shops, on corners, loud music from beautifully rebuilt antique cars, the smells of cooking, hot plastic, and asphalt, Spanish and English spoken and shouted, mingled here and there with smatterings of Vietnamese and Korean. Portis slowed, surprised by the lushness, the chaotic near-harmony, the vivid colors.
He was surprised Sarah Connor had let him leave with the papers and discs—but then, his hands had been encumbered more than her own; she only carried the laptop.
He had led the way out of the apartment and had no doubt she could draw and fire far faster than he could turn around on the narrow back stairs. Tactically, she had managed their exit deftly. He had lost sight of her on the parking lot.
His best chance was complete honesty. But he was not sure he had that to give.
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