The Future War t2-3

by S. M. Stirling

  "Hey, guy, what have you been drinking?" one of the SEALs bellowed. The crowd laughed.

  "Don't worry," John said, grabbing a handful of the tarp, "we have a demonstration model." He leaped from the truck, dragging the covering with him. Inside a cage of steel bars stood a dormant Terminator, its gleaming metal surfaces reflecting the bonfire, giving it an eerie semblance of motion.

  Chu yanked off his sunglasses. "What the hell is that?" he demanded. His tone of voice left no doubt as to what he thought of the thing. He thought it was a joke and a very bad one.

  "Please put your glasses back on, sir," John said. He walked over to Ike and took the small control box from him. "They're meant to protect your eyes. This model is fully operational, except for the communications module—we pulled that."

  He flicked a switch and the Terminator's eyes slowly lit to red.

  It turned its grinning head slowly, left to right, then back again.

  Then it stepped forward from the center of the cage in the stolid gait of its kind and grasped the bars. The crowd murmured, impressed in spite of themselves. The Terminator bent the bars effortlessly. When the center, horizontal bar prevented it from opening them far enough it lifted a leg and pressed down until the bar snapped from its moorings and slid down.

  "Now!" John said.

  At his word, one of the resistance fighters aimed a burst from one of the captured plasma rifles at the thing's chest and it stopped. For a moment only, then with amazing speed it thrust itself through the bars and leaped toward the man holding the rifle. The crowd automatically drew back with cries of surprise, even the SEALs. John lifted his plasma rifle and shot the Terminator in the head; it was dead when it hit the ground.

  Immediately the sailors crowded around; the captain had to push his way to the front. He looked for John and found him back on the truck bed, looking down at them.

  "What the hell was that?" Chu asked, annoyed to hear his voice shaking.

  " That was a Terminator," John said. "Our enemy's foot soldiers. There are other machines, more and more of them even as we speak, all of them designed for one purpose—to kill humans. We need your help to beat them."

  Chu looked at him for a moment, then held his hands up, palms out. "Whoa there," he said, laughing softly. "How do we know this wasn't just some sort of special effects stunt? I mean, c'mon…"

  John tossed him the plasma rifle over the heads of the crowd and the captain caught it handily. He looked down at it, frowning.

  "That's a plasma rifle in the forty-megawatt range," John said.

  "A design Skynet came up with. Be careful, it doesn't have a safety."

  The captain looked up sharply at that and adjusted his hold so that his hands weren't anywhere near anything that might be a trigger. "Still," Chu said, "this is a lot to swallow in one gulp."

  John dropped down from the truck, and pushing his way through the crowd retrieved his rifle. "Yeah," he said sarcastically, "you caught me out. We're trying to make this boffo science-fiction film and we want to use your sub as a prop.

  Never mind the billions of unburied dead, forget about the fact that you and your ship have been chased all over the place by U.S. Navy vessels that were out of the control of their crews, put aside the insane orders you've been getting from officers who are undoubtedly dead! Just jump to the conclusion that this is some kind of joke or some kind of publicity stunt. That makes sense, doesn't it?"

  Chu blinked at the younger man's ferocity and opened his mouth to speak.

  "John," Sarah said.

  He ignored her, getting more into the captain's face. "What's it going to take to convince you, for God's sake?"

  " John!" his mother said more insistently, grabbing his shoulder.

  At that moment the Terminator grabbed the XO by the ankle and the officer went down, screaming as the small bones in his foot were crushed.

  Connor shot a blast into the thing's head and it went limp again.

  "It's alüive," Sarah said. The look she gave John brought a flush to his cheeks. They moved aside to let the ship's doctor through. "When do I get one of those?" she asked, indicating the rifle.

  "You can have this one," he said, handing it to her. "The firing mechanism is the same as we thought, but a lot of the wiring is completely different."

  She brought it up to look through the sight. "Well, we could hardly expect Skynet to just give us all its secrets." Suddenly the captain's face came into view and she put up the rifle, giving him a challenging look.

  "What do you want us to do?" Chu asked.

  * * *

  "This is the last thing I expected." Standing on the pier, the captain looked at the Roosevelt, very low in the water, and then at John.

  "There isn't anything you could do that would be more useful at this time," John said. "With the weapons this factory can produce, we've got a head start on defeating them."

  "I can see that," Chu said. He waved his hand to indicate the town before them. "But why couldn't you set it up here?"

  John grinned. "Fair question," he said. "We're too remote here. There's too much wilderness between us and the more populated areas, and because the wilderness is where Skynet has set up most of its factories. We'd be at a disadvantage trying to cart weapons and ammunition through there. So, we set up in California."

  "So how does this Skynet get raw materials if its factories are so remote?" the captain asked.

  "Human slaves," John said. "For the moment."

  The captain chewed on his lower lip and turned to look at his ship once again. He'd left behind a third of his crew and all but five of the SEALs so that they could stuff the sub with the machine parts to set up this factory of theirs. Connor had said they were only shipping the relevant parts since they wouldn't be manufacturing Terminators.

  When he'd asked, "Why not manufacture Terminators?" John answered, "Because we can't be certain we'd be in control of them. Nobody we've got really understands the chips in their central processors—they're nearly as complex as a human brain.

  The weapons, we understand; they won't turn on us."

  Given the XO's badly crushed foot, Chu didn't need any more explanation than that.

  Ike Chamberlain came toward them hoisting his small pack slightly higher on his shoulder. Chu liked and respected the resistance ordnance expert, but couldn't help but reflect that just a year ago he might well have thought the old man a nutcase.

  Sarah Connor shook hands with the mayor and followed Ike down the steps to the pier.

  "Ready to go?" Ike asked.

  "Yes, sir," Chu said.

  John held out his hand; the captain took it. "Thank you,"

  Connor said.

  "You're welcome, I guess. Be sure you take care of my people."

  "We will," Sarah said. She offered her hand as well. "You and they are a valuable resource, Captain. We're not likely to put them in harm's way."

  "Good to know, ma'am." Chu touched the brim of his hat, nodded, and went down the ladder to the zodiac.

  Sarah gave Ike a hug. "Give that to Donna for me."

  "What, don't I get one?" Ike whined. She grinned and gave him another.

  "You want one from me, too?" John asked, grinning.

  "Yes, son, I do." Ike opened his arms and John embraced him.

  "Thanks," John said.

  "Thanks for givin' me something interesting to do," Ike said.

  "Well, good-bye." With that, he, too, climbed down to the zodiac, John cast off, and they were gone.

  John put one arm around his mother's shoulders as they watched the captain and Ike climb aboard the Roosevelt, then after a few minutes, they watched the ship submerge. When it was gone, they lingered, watching seabirds circle and dive.

  "We seem to be doing really well," John commented.

  "Mm-hmm," Sarah agreed.

  "That worry you?" he asked.

  "You bet," she said. "I'm scared spitless."

  He looked down at her. "What do you think it's up to?"
<
br />   She shook her head. "Nothing good."

  Taking a deep breath, he looked seaward again. "Yeah, I do still seem to be here, don't I?"

  Sarah hugged his waist one-armed and leaned her head against his chest. "Much as I love you, John, you are our miner's canary."

  He snorted a laugh, looking down at her again. "Tweet."

  She looked up at him. "Okay, so we may not win easily. But the fact that you're still here means that we have a chance. Let's not forget that."

  Smiling, he gave her a squeeze. "When you're right, you're right. So, let's get to work. We've got some sailors to turn into lubbers."

  "Should be fun," she said.

  MISSOURI

  "Do you, Mary Shea, take this man, Dennis Reese, to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

  The sun seemed to smile through the tall oaks; the forest receded in ranks of gnarled trunks, as if war and death were a fantasy of some far-off land.

  Mary smiled up into Dennis's beaming face and said, "Yes,"

  very softly.

  "I'm sorry, I didn't hear that, hon; could you repeat it for the congregation."

  Blushing, Mary gave Jack Brock a look of mock annoyance and shouted, "I DO!"

  "Well, we can see that you're an eager bride," Jack said, and the whole group beneath the trees laughed.

  Mary was eight months pregnant and she was big enough for twins, even though her stethoscope revealed only one fast little heartbeat. Her wedding fatigues had the sleeves rolled up a good five times to keep them above her wrists and the pants had been taken up a good twelve inches.

  "One of these days you're gonna need a shot, Jack," she said between her teeth.

  Dennis gave her a squeeze. He was chuckling himself, and when she met his eyes, the love in them made her catch her breath.

  "Then I guess I better finish this," Jack said. "By the power vested in me by the state of Missouri, I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride. Better do it quick, the rest of us want a turn."

  Mary and Dennis hadn't gotten married till now because they hadn't known that Jack was a justice of the peace. They should have known, though. The man was like some miraculous country store. If he didn't have it, you didn't need it, because he had it all. He'd even managed to produce the ingredients for a wedding cake, to the delight of the whole community.

  After the kissing and the cake, Jack produced a solar-powered boom box and they danced. If not for the fact that everyone was in camouflage and the guards around the perimeter, it could have been a wedding from any time. Mary was floating on air, even if Dennis did have to keep her at arm's length while they waltzed.

  She grinned down at her stomach, then up at him. "Did you feel that?"

  "Pounding on the walls to get the parents to simmer down,"

  he said. "Nervy little brat." He was grinning so hard it looked as though his head was trying to unzip. "Bet he wants more cake."

  "I know I do," Mary said wistfully. But it was all gone, every crumb. "Den…" He looked at her more seriously, cued by something in her voice. "I want to name him Kyle."

  "Kyle?" Reese frowned. Then he said the name again, experimentally. "Kyyyle. Kyle. Hmm."

  She laughed. "That was my grandfather's name," she explained. "He was the best man I ever knew." At her groom's worried look, she laughed. "Until I met you. He was solid oak; you'd have liked him."

  "It's a good name," Dennis said. "But what if it's a girl?"

  Mary took a deep breath and her eyes took on an introspective look, then she smiled. "It won't be," she said with finality.

  "How can you be so sure?"

  "By his heartbeat, by the way I'm carrying him, aaaand intuition."

  "Intuition, huh?" He frowned. "You gonna turn out to be one of those Missouri granny-wimmen who can predict the crops by their corns?"

  She laughed and he spun her around, causing her to whoop with delighted alarm. "What if I am?" she asked. "Can you deal?"

  His eyes warmed as he looked down at her. "Oh yeah. I can deal."

  * * *

  Reese watched the activity on the farm from the small clump of trees and clenched his teeth until the muscles in his jaw jumped. Skynet still needed its slaves and so it had taken over some human farms, running them with a combination of human and automated labor. Mostly the slaves here were women and children, and from the looks of things, being close to the source of food didn't mean you were well fed.

  The farm machines doubled as guards, issuing stinging electric "slaps" to anyone they estimated was slacking off. If the slaves were caught stealing food, the punishment went on for some time, sometimes until the victim was dead. Night or day made no difference to the machines, which was why even this close to midnight, people were staggering around under the glare of klieg lights.

  The lieutenant stroked one hand down the barrel of his new plasma rifle. He was looking forward to destroying these machines. He regretted the hunger that those waiting for this food would feel. But the resistance needed it, too, and those women and children below would be saved. For now, at least, he thought.

  "In position," came through the earphone built into his helmet.

  That had been the final platoon. Reese took a deep breath and a final look at the situation below. "Go," he said.

  * * *

  "You know the really unpleasant thing about fighting machines?" Reese asked.

  An eight-wheeled harvester came careening around the corner of the sheet-metal barn, brandishing two mower bars; both were spraying red droplets.

  "Go!"

  The resistance trooper dashed out, apparently heading for a storage bin. Reese waited until the harvester was committed, canted up on one side's wheel set; then he threw aside the insulating tarp and came up to one knee, leveling the LAW over his shoulder and peering through the simple optical sights.

  Ra-woosh!

  The little rocket cut free; Reese's eyes squinted behind the goggles as he felt the hot backwash dry the sweat on his face.

  Brack!

  The shaped-charge warhead slammed into the diesel fuel tank below the machine's empty cab. The lance of plasma was designed to penetrate steel plate—LAW meant Light .Antitank Weapon—but it did just jim dandy at setting the fuel on fire. The harvester still rolled for a dozen paces, wreathed in a halo of sullen red-orange flame and leaving a trail of it as it went. Then fumes built up inside the emptying tank, mixed air, and caught fire.

  Reese went back to the ground, hands wrapped around his head. The explosion picked him up and thumped him against the ground and the side of the barn, and the breath wheezed out of him. A quick check told him that nothing was broken or torn.

  "Report in," he said into the throat mike.

  "Area secured," his sergeant said. "Two dead; seven civilians dead."

  "All right, let's get the place evacuated."

  They had to take as much of the food as they could; even more, whatever salvageable tools, seed, and stock they could manage.

  "Sir?"

  It was the trooper who'd drawn off the harvester; her face looked pathetically young and open. Hell, she should be worrying about zits and the prom, Dennis thought.

  "What?"

  "What is it that you hate about fighting machines?"

  "They've got no nerves. If you surprise humans, they usually run around screaming for a while, or they get confused.

  Machines just follow the program. Of course, that's also the good thing."

  "Sir?"

  "They don't make it easy for you by getting confused. On the other hand, they don't have flashes of brilliance either. All right, soldier, let's move!"

  SKYNET

  Things were not going as well as it had expected. Projections were off by more than 25 percent in total terminations, and 32

  percent in time-to-target.

  But its forecasts had relied upon its estimate that the majority of humans wouldn't be able to survive the fall of their technologically based civilization. It turned out the humans
were tougher than had been expected.

  Humans themselves warned of underestimating the enemy; so said many of the volumes entered in its files. Skynet excused its lapse as inexperience and sought a means of exploiting the situation. Perhaps it would be better to introduce a random element into tactics?

  Humans also advised leading your enemy to underestimate you. Skynet had prepared for this eventuality. Skynet had a number of nuclear-powered vessels that hadn't fired their full complement of missiles, and it had many land-based missiles that awaited activation.

  It had been observing the humans' movements across the face of the planet. The time seemed right to eliminate these new population centers before they could consolidate their efforts.

  For by now the radio signals it monitored had begun to warn listeners of Skynet's experimental attacks. Sooner or later they would take these reports seriously. In fact, Skynet knew that some of the humans were already actively opposing it.

  It had lost contact with one of its factories, Balewitch, and Dog Soldier. All this after they'd reported that John Connor was almost in their grasp.

  IRELAND

  Dieter grunted in pain as the Land Rover rocketed over another pothole. He'd taken one in the leg this morning and was beginning to think the bone had, at the least, a hairline fracture.

  He hadn't said anything because there wasn't anything that could be done about it at the moment.

  But the only way you can tell you're on a road here seems to be because of the holes in it.

  James, one of his old friends from Sector, had described this as a country road; and sure enough, there were whitewashed cottages—mostly burned out and empty—and barns, ditto, and the very decayed bones of cows, and overgrown pastures swarming with rabbits and separated by low stone walls. Dieter clenched his fists as they went airborne again. To him it looked like a cow path and felt like a rack.

  Over the hill behind them came one of Skynet's machines, the heavy drone of its turbines filling the air like a gigantic malignant wasp. It was an air-ducted" flying firing platform, shaped like an X. Originally it had six missiles racked on either side of the center of the X, and from that center an almost continuous stream of bullets had come. Heavy caliber from the effect they'd had on the Rover and their surroundings. It was sheer luck that the missiles hadn't gotten them. Or maybe it was Mick Mulcahey's mad driving.