Terminator!Reese ramblings
foolish_m0rtal and I yakked a bit more about Terminator/TSCC/PoI crossover ideas, and it's like INFINITE POSSIBILITIES.
I AM NOT WRITING THIS. But I have to talk about it otherwise I'm going to go bonkers.
I'm going to cut this because this will have spoilers for the Terminator movies, TSCC, and PoI.
There're SO many ways to go at it, like where do you even begin? Which is the biggest hindrance for me to even think about writing a fic, not to mention plot, my eternal nemesis plot. Like I said, I can't even handle a linear plot, much less one that fucks around with time and causality. I'm like Captain Janeway, "The future is the past, the past is the future. It all gives me a headache."
But like, this is just messy ramblings, thinking out loud. My brain is just CHURN CHURN CHURN and I have to talk about it somehow.
There's the baseboard we're jumping from where we kind of don't take Terminator/TSCC canon into account, but just the basic concept: The Machine eventually becomes Skynet beta, though since we're not invoking Terminator canon, it would be Skynet in concept but not in name. I rather like the thought that The Machine was built to detect threats, but as it learns and grows, it eventually decides that EVERYONE is the threat. That's in keeping with most of the major descriptions of why Skynet turned on humanity. foolish_m0rtal gave the BRILLIANTEST idea that Finch is the one who invents the time travel machine, because if anybody is gonna invent a time travel machine, it'll be Finch. Then we hit the tragic situation where Reese is sent back to eliminate Finch, to prevent The Machine's invention. But then there's the causality loop: no Machine, no apocalyptic future, no time machine to prevent everything. But that's part and parcel of the genre and can be handwaved. The more delicious questions and scenarios to consider are:
- future!Finch coming to realize that his own elimination in the past is the only way to avoid humanity's destruction. How do you come to terms with that?
- does future!Reese know future!Finch? Is the future an extrapolated version of current canon? If it is, that means they've had their partnership for some time before shit goes down. Reese will be going back in time to kill an earlier version of somebody he cares about (in a slashy way or not). That's pretty harsh. Also, sacrificing one for the sake of many is clearly something Reese had experienced, but the core concept of the show is saving one person at a time. It doesn't seem to be a Journeyman situation where those individual lives saved will evolve into a greater whole, which is fine. It can still be a case of where you draw the line. Killing Finch will save millions when the Machine goes rogue, but in show canon, the Machine is supposed to have legitimately saved a lot of lives, too. So, without the Machine, lives are lost, too. How do you balance that scale? One versus millions seems like easy math, but what about 10,000 to millions, or 20, or 30, etc.
- The flipside is that future!Reese doesn't know future!Finch and/or future!Finch created the time travel machine, but he's not in charge of the operation. Then we go back to the first Terminator movie for reference, where the machines only knew Sarah Connor's name, but little else. It's supposed to be a future where a lot of records have been destroyed. So I can see a case where Reese is sent back, not to eliminate Finch, because there is no record of Finch. The only official person on record as being responsible for the Machine is Nathan Ingram, and that's who Reese is sent back to eliminate. I can see this being a closed time loop situation, like the first Terminator movie. Ingram dies in canon and Finch is severely injured. How fucked up would it be if future!Reese were the one responsible.
Now the more complicated version comes in if we want to take Terminator canon into account. LOL, that's a right mess.
The Machine can go both ways. TSCC introduced John Henry, who is supposed to be the counterpart to Skynet. The show threw in a lot more grey where human vs. machines are concerned. I can see The Machine evolving into Skynet a la reasoning above. T3 essentially says the future is unavoidable, which people don't like because it contradicts the message of the second, which is that the future IS malleable (no fate but what we make). But if we go back to T1, which is a closed time loop, there was no effective change made in that movie. I actually like T3 for going back to the ideology of T1. There is no stopping the progress of technology. It is beyond hardware; it's software. Much like The Machine is beyond algorithms. It calculates, but its extensions are emails and cell phones and surveillance cameras. Those things are ubiquitous. So even without Cyberdyne, Skynet will happen, because it is an inevitable evolution of technology.
All that rambling basically comes down to saying that despite the established mythology of how Skynet springs up, The Machine can totally be a part of that. So, The Machine becomes Skynet. The scenarios I listed above still applies. By taking some Terminator canon into account, the possibility opens to make John Reese the father of Kyle and Derek. TSCC established them as living fairly idyllic lives before Judgement Day. I can't see Reese making that kind of a life transition, where he's settled down. The show has been making the point that Reese can't have that life, and I don't believe so either.
I like the idea that Derek and Kyle weren't BORN Reeses. I see a future where they're very young and orphaned by Judgement Day. They're taken in by John, and they end up adopting his name as their own. So it's not so much that without John, they wouldn't be born, but they would've died otherwise without his protection. Now, I don't think I'm particularly interested in a plot where the target of elimination is Reese. Skynet has never shown any interest in Kyle Reese as being John Connor's father, probably because they don't know, or more importantly, it doesn't matter to the machines who John Connor's father is. (Dammit, I'm getting to a point where there are too many Johns and too many Reeses) It's John Connor himself, and Sarah Connor, who always matters the most.
I think it's always going to be Finch who is in danger if we go for "targeted for elimination" plot.
We covered some of the what-ifs based on the premise of The Machine = Skynet beta. But what if The Machine is more John Henry. It is designed to detect threats, so rather than coming to the conclusion that every human is a threat and therefore let's kill all humans, it comes to the conclusion that humanity should be and needs to be protected. In which case, Skynet would send somebody back to eliminate the Machine. So we have Reese coming back in time to protect Finch ("come with me if you want to live")? Or even just your basic plot of present day Reese protecting Finch from a future threat with neither of them knowing what the fuck is going on.
So. See what I mean about the fuckton of possibilities? I think I've only covered maybe 10% of the possible places you can go.
Okay, now I feel tons better for dumping all that out of my head. If you read all this, a gold star for you: *
I AM NOT WRITING THIS. But I have to talk about it otherwise I'm going to go bonkers.
I'm going to cut this because this will have spoilers for the Terminator movies, TSCC, and PoI.
There're SO many ways to go at it, like where do you even begin? Which is the biggest hindrance for me to even think about writing a fic, not to mention plot, my eternal nemesis plot. Like I said, I can't even handle a linear plot, much less one that fucks around with time and causality. I'm like Captain Janeway, "The future is the past, the past is the future. It all gives me a headache."
But like, this is just messy ramblings, thinking out loud. My brain is just CHURN CHURN CHURN and I have to talk about it somehow.
There's the baseboard we're jumping from where we kind of don't take Terminator/TSCC canon into account, but just the basic concept: The Machine eventually becomes Skynet beta, though since we're not invoking Terminator canon, it would be Skynet in concept but not in name. I rather like the thought that The Machine was built to detect threats, but as it learns and grows, it eventually decides that EVERYONE is the threat. That's in keeping with most of the major descriptions of why Skynet turned on humanity. foolish_m0rtal gave the BRILLIANTEST idea that Finch is the one who invents the time travel machine, because if anybody is gonna invent a time travel machine, it'll be Finch. Then we hit the tragic situation where Reese is sent back to eliminate Finch, to prevent The Machine's invention. But then there's the causality loop: no Machine, no apocalyptic future, no time machine to prevent everything. But that's part and parcel of the genre and can be handwaved. The more delicious questions and scenarios to consider are:
- future!Finch coming to realize that his own elimination in the past is the only way to avoid humanity's destruction. How do you come to terms with that?
- does future!Reese know future!Finch? Is the future an extrapolated version of current canon? If it is, that means they've had their partnership for some time before shit goes down. Reese will be going back in time to kill an earlier version of somebody he cares about (in a slashy way or not). That's pretty harsh. Also, sacrificing one for the sake of many is clearly something Reese had experienced, but the core concept of the show is saving one person at a time. It doesn't seem to be a Journeyman situation where those individual lives saved will evolve into a greater whole, which is fine. It can still be a case of where you draw the line. Killing Finch will save millions when the Machine goes rogue, but in show canon, the Machine is supposed to have legitimately saved a lot of lives, too. So, without the Machine, lives are lost, too. How do you balance that scale? One versus millions seems like easy math, but what about 10,000 to millions, or 20, or 30, etc.
- The flipside is that future!Reese doesn't know future!Finch and/or future!Finch created the time travel machine, but he's not in charge of the operation. Then we go back to the first Terminator movie for reference, where the machines only knew Sarah Connor's name, but little else. It's supposed to be a future where a lot of records have been destroyed. So I can see a case where Reese is sent back, not to eliminate Finch, because there is no record of Finch. The only official person on record as being responsible for the Machine is Nathan Ingram, and that's who Reese is sent back to eliminate. I can see this being a closed time loop situation, like the first Terminator movie. Ingram dies in canon and Finch is severely injured. How fucked up would it be if future!Reese were the one responsible.
Now the more complicated version comes in if we want to take Terminator canon into account. LOL, that's a right mess.
The Machine can go both ways. TSCC introduced John Henry, who is supposed to be the counterpart to Skynet. The show threw in a lot more grey where human vs. machines are concerned. I can see The Machine evolving into Skynet a la reasoning above. T3 essentially says the future is unavoidable, which people don't like because it contradicts the message of the second, which is that the future IS malleable (no fate but what we make). But if we go back to T1, which is a closed time loop, there was no effective change made in that movie. I actually like T3 for going back to the ideology of T1. There is no stopping the progress of technology. It is beyond hardware; it's software. Much like The Machine is beyond algorithms. It calculates, but its extensions are emails and cell phones and surveillance cameras. Those things are ubiquitous. So even without Cyberdyne, Skynet will happen, because it is an inevitable evolution of technology.
All that rambling basically comes down to saying that despite the established mythology of how Skynet springs up, The Machine can totally be a part of that. So, The Machine becomes Skynet. The scenarios I listed above still applies. By taking some Terminator canon into account, the possibility opens to make John Reese the father of Kyle and Derek. TSCC established them as living fairly idyllic lives before Judgement Day. I can't see Reese making that kind of a life transition, where he's settled down. The show has been making the point that Reese can't have that life, and I don't believe so either.
I like the idea that Derek and Kyle weren't BORN Reeses. I see a future where they're very young and orphaned by Judgement Day. They're taken in by John, and they end up adopting his name as their own. So it's not so much that without John, they wouldn't be born, but they would've died otherwise without his protection. Now, I don't think I'm particularly interested in a plot where the target of elimination is Reese. Skynet has never shown any interest in Kyle Reese as being John Connor's father, probably because they don't know, or more importantly, it doesn't matter to the machines who John Connor's father is. (Dammit, I'm getting to a point where there are too many Johns and too many Reeses) It's John Connor himself, and Sarah Connor, who always matters the most.
I think it's always going to be Finch who is in danger if we go for "targeted for elimination" plot.
We covered some of the what-ifs based on the premise of The Machine = Skynet beta. But what if The Machine is more John Henry. It is designed to detect threats, so rather than coming to the conclusion that every human is a threat and therefore let's kill all humans, it comes to the conclusion that humanity should be and needs to be protected. In which case, Skynet would send somebody back to eliminate the Machine. So we have Reese coming back in time to protect Finch ("come with me if you want to live")? Or even just your basic plot of present day Reese protecting Finch from a future threat with neither of them knowing what the fuck is going on.
So. See what I mean about the fuckton of possibilities? I think I've only covered maybe 10% of the possible places you can go.
Okay, now I feel tons better for dumping all that out of my head. If you read all this, a gold star for you: *