As Much as I Ever Could, Part II

[hollycomb]

They leave early the next morning for the mission, Marcus lingering in the room to give Kyle a long kiss goodbye. Kyle follows him out to the hangar and watches, arms crossed, Kate beside him with the baby. Marcus boards a Jeep and waves, and they both wave back.

The mission is dull at first, but becomes quickly exciting as they get further down the coast. Marcus appreciates the opportunity to take down the machines, always terrified that something they implanted in his mind will override and make him turn on the others, but it doesn't happen, and by the second week they're beginning to treat him as if he's semi-human. It helps that he has Blair's friendship; she's already mended the bridges she burned when she tried to help Marcus escape, her infectious laugh and plucky optimism lifting the spirits of the others. At least five of them are in love with her, but none more than Benny, the stocky man who gives Marcus dirty looks no matter how many machines he takes down.

“Do you miss Kyle?” Blair asks Marcus one morning when he's washing his face in a desert stream, the others packing up the camp behind him.

“I hope he's alright,” Marcus says, dodging the question. Blair sits down beside him with a sigh.

“You know what's awesome?” she says, folding her arms into her lap. “Being on the fucking rag in the middle of an apocalypse. It's just an added layer of joy, since tampons are raining from the sky these days.”

“You - you got your -?” Marcus stares, and she smiles.

“Thought you might like to know that. You weren't the only who was worried. We were stupid. I just - got caught up.” She looks away, tugging at her bottom lip, self-conscious. “It was nice.”

“Yeah. Sorry. Wasn't thinking.”

“Is that why - you and Kyle - 'cause you don't want to knock me up?”

Marcus stares down at the water, which is perfectly clear, as if the robots are taking better care of their natural resources than humans ever could, but that's not fair. They don't need as much. It isn't devotion and drive that saps things dry, it's need.

“That would be a good excuse,” Marcus says. “But it's not mine.” He looks up at Blair, and she's all understanding and forgiveness, like always, her eyes soft, face open. He respects her too much to tell her anything but the truth. “I love him.”

“Well.” Blair looks down at her knees. “He's very lovable.”

“Listen, I was in prison. It messed me up.” He winces at this explanation. “It's got nothing to do with you.”

“No, it's alright.” She stands, forcing a laugh. “Just, you know. On the rag. Hormones.” She laughs a little more genuinely. “See, I should have known you were gay, what with my instinct to come over here and chat with you about my period.”

“Well, you had a real reason for that. I'm sorry - I shouldn't have - you're the kind of woman I would have wanted. If I wanted a woman.”

“Oh, it's not just about that,” she says, wiping at her eyes. Her resistance coat is almost as baggy as Kyle's, inherited from some guy three times her size when she outlived him. “I saw it, maybe even the first day we met. You walking through the desert, on your way to getting him back. How stiff you were when I leaned against you. You were taken.”

“It's just - he reminds me of someone I couldn't protect - this kid in prison - Jesus.” Marcus stands and flings the water from his hands. “Sometimes I can't believe my fucking life.”

“You're telling me.” Blair takes his arm and leads him back to camp. He wishes he could do something for her. Find a jumbo pack of tampons, maybe, in a watertight package, perfect condition.

The rest of the mission is relatively routine, recruiting easy since news of the victory at Skynet headquarters has gotten around. Marcus shares a tent with Blair, making most of the guys hate him all over again, but if they think he's sleeping with her, maybe that will buy him some time with Kyle. Some nights he sleeps with his face in Blair's hair, and in the mornings she rubs his shoulders, marveling at how the metal feels like bone. Marcus dreams about Kyle, about showing him the stream with the clear water and following it to a waterfall, bathing him behind its pale curtain, Kyle's bare skin slippery and cool against his. He wakes afraid that he's been moaning Kyle's name in his sleep, but if he has, Blair doesn't mention it. She tries to teach him how to braid her hair and he fails miserably, but his attempt makes her laugh hard, and it feels good, seeing her happy, if only for a moment.

When they return to the base he dismounts in the hangar, looking for Kyle among the crowd that's gathered to welcome the soldiers home. Marcus notices some of the men embracing others in more than a friendly-like way, and he can't believe that he's found another prison that he'd stay in forever just to watch over one of his fellow inmates. He finally sees Kyle running into the hangar, cheeks red with exertion, hands balled into fists, and he jumps onto Marcus so forcefully that he almost knocks him over, laughing as he lets Marcus lift him off the ground.

“Marcus, Marcus, Marcus, Marcus-” Kyle says his name about a thousand times, until it sounds meaningless, and he clutches at Marcus like he'll never let him go again. He feels heavier, not so frail with hunger. Marcus moans as he sets Kyle down, running his hands over his sides, feeling no ribs. Kyle beams up at him, and Marcus looks over his shoulder to make sure no one has noticed this little reunion, but they're all preoccupied with their own.

“You been alright?” Marcus asks. He touches Kyle's chin and begins to walk from the hangar, anxious to be alone with him.

“Yeah, have you?” Kyle asks. He's smiling like he doesn't know how to stop.

“Fuck no. Missed you.”

Marcus can feel Kyle's giddy happiness like a star that's close to inevitable explosion, and he's afraid that everyone they walk past in the halls must see it on him, on both of them, how vulnerable they are for this thing they need from each other. He doesn't care. One of Kyle's curls is starting to grow back, flipping up ridiculously over his forehead, and it's driving Marcus crazy, making the walk to their room feel ten miles long.

“Marcus,” someone calls out just when he's finally put his hand on the doorknob, and he could swear he hears Kyle whine in frustration as he turns to see who's called to him. It's Connor, of fucking course. Still in the wheelchair, looking worse than he did when Marcus left.

“Yeah?” Marcus doesn't call him 'sir.' It's a point of contention, and it makes Kyle blush, but Marcus knows he loves it, watching Marcus get away with insubordination, even if he'd never dream of committing any himself, as devoted as he is to the idea of Connor the savior of mankind.

“I need to speak to you,” Connor says. He's pointedly not looking at Kyle.

“Can it fucking wait? I just got back.”

Connor pauses to consider the request. He knows Marcus will put up a fight if he insists, and he looks as if he doesn't have the energy. Connor drums his fingers on the wheels of his chair and coughs a little, weakly, deep in his chest.

“Come see me after you get resettled,” Connor says. Marcus appreciates the vagueness of the request. It could take him days to get resettled, after all.

“Sure,” Marcus says, already pushing into the room. Kyle follows him and shuts the door, and they stand still, beside the mattress, eyes locked, breathing hard, waiting. When they hear the creaky sound of Connor wheeling himself away, disappearing down the hall, Kyle moans and Marcus growls, grabbing Kyle and tackling him against the mattress, his kisses making Kyle squirm and laugh and then gasp.

“I saw something,” Kyle says, panting, rubbing his trapped cock up against Marcus' stomach. “Two guys, in the rec room. They didn't know I was there.”

“They - what-?” Marcus is dizzy with the taste of Kyle, licking Kyle as if to clean him, reclaim him, mark him as his again.

“The - the one guy was sort of braced against the wall, and he wasn't wearing any pants, and the other guy was holding him there, and - oh, Marcus, yeah, right there right there right there - ahhh-”

Marcus is biting at the place between Kyle's neck and shoulder that tastes like heaven and drives Kyle insane, and he's not sure he wants to hear the rest of this story, but Kyle gasps and continues.

“And the one guy was saying, 'oh, fuck me,' and the other guy, he was, he was fucking him, hard, with his dick, and it didn't look like it hurt, Marcus, ah, it looked like it felt so good. I got hard, watching. I came back here and thought about - you - doing it to me - touched myself - came so hard -”

“Shit,” Marcus says, the word burning up his throat, his cock full to bursting just from hearing Kyle talk like this, like he's a little ball of nothing but need, which is how Marcus wants him, really, needing everything Marcus can give him, needing it so bad he feels like he'll die without it.

“You wanna be fucked?” Marcus asks, whispering, his voice so deep that it makes Kyle shudder like a touch would. “You want me inside you?”

“Yes, oh, yes, please -”

“Gonna make you feel good.” Marcus tears Kyle's shirt off and rubs his hands over Kyle's heaving chest. “Gonna make you come so fucking hard.”

“Uhhh, yeah.”

Marcus has to force himself to slow down, beginning to scare himself a little. He gropes around beside the mattress and finds the little tube of lotion that he uses when he fingers Kyle, when he rubs that prostate like a magic button, covering Kyle's mouth with his own as he shouts out his orgasm. No amount of mouth-covering is going to quiet Kyle's screams when it's Marcus' big cock pounding against his prostate, he's gonna come and come and come until he's crying for mercy - but, no, shit, slow down, okay.

Marcus breathes hard through his nose, soothing his hands down the sides of Kyle's face, keeping his eyes on Kyle's, keeping himself under control. Kyle is surrendered, staring up at Marcus with boneless trust, smiling idiotically like he's just been told that he's getting a bike for Christmas.

“I've got to stretch you, first,” Marcus says. “Get you open wide for me.”

“Guh, yeah.” Kyle laughs, drowsy, hiccuping. “I love it when you talk during this.”

“God - you - just stay nice and relaxed, like this, like you are now. And if it hurts, we'll just wait it out.”

“Wait it out,” Kyle repeats, nodding solemnly. “'Kay. Marcus?”

“Yeah?”

“Virginia played some music for me and Star while you were gone. It made me cry. I thought of you.”

Marcus kisses Kyle, his hand spread open between Kyle's legs, not touching anything in particular, just holding him steady, pressing over the hottest part of his body.

“I saw this stream,” Marcus says. “It was so clear. I couldn't believe it was real. Not here, not in this world. It was like looking at you. Can't believe you're real.”

Kyle moans and Marcus kisses him for a long time, touching the beginnings of that curl over his forehead, pulling it softly through his fingers as he rubs between Kyle's legs, getting him ready, relaxing him even further, drinking down Kyle's little gasps. He feels like they've both got wings now, like they've left the world for the sky.

Being inside Kyle is like touching the perfect cold of that stream, something Marcus' mind can't fully contain, even with all its enhancements. His dual nervous systems struggle to keep up, the neatness of his robotic processes going berserk, sparking and overloading with unbearable pleasure, and with something else, too, something that breaks him irrevocably, but that's Kyle, it's Kyle that does that. Kyle with his stunned exhalations and pinched little moans, his fingers on Marcus' ass as he guides him in deeper, his hips shifting, eyes fluttering shut.

“Marcus,” Kyle whispers, and Marcus doesn't have to ask him if it feels good, because Kyle's whole face is flushed with the answer, his lips soft and swollen, fat pupils so dark, cheeks damp and pink. Kyle's body is throbbing slow around Marcus' cock, feeling him, opening for him, and still so goddamn tight.

“It's - it's -” Kyle whines a little at the effort to come up with words for this. He touches Marcus' face, tracing gentle fingertips over his freckles.

“Paradise,” Marcus says. He rubs a finger over Kyle's swollen bottom lip, could lie here all day and just touch him while he pulses like a heartbeat around Marcus' cock. “Closest we're gonna get.”

“Yes, oh.” Kyle arches as if a wave has broken inside him, and he pulls at Marcus' ass, but Marcus can't get any deeper, so he slides out a bit, then back in, slow, making Kyle sob and nod and pull at him again.

“That's good,” Kyle moans, drawing out the good in a way that makes Marcus laugh a little, because fuck yeah it is. He does it again, and again, picking up the pace at Kyle's urging, their bodies sliding together slickly as they flush hotter and hotter, both of them panting out choppy breaths. Marcus thinks of hearing a Frank Sinatra record when he was kid, late at night at his grandparents' house, shuddering and feeling as if he'd heard a prophecy about his future, one that he only now understands: Someday you will feel good enough to know why it hurt to hear this song. When Kyle comes Marcus hears the swell of the orchestra, that sound that seemed to promise something as it sent goosebumps across his skin. He pushes his own orgasm deep into Kyle, his face buried against Kyle's chest and his shout coming out high-pitched and desperate, as if it's been wrung out of him, two big hands around his waist, but those are Kyle's legs, squeezing hard.

Afterward, the world is different, like the way things are after a heavy rain, a change in the quality of the air, the smell of trees and the color of the light through the clouds. There are no trees and no clouds here, air that never moves, but it's all being filtered through something new, and Marcus didn't think it was possible for Kyle to look sweeter or more fragile, but here it is, everything impossible coming true. They leave a little distance between them on the mattress, still breathing hard, reaching across the empty space to touch each other almost nervously.

"So I want to hear these songs that made you think of me," Marcus says. Kyle grins.

"Every song did," he says. "I don't remember the names. I want to see that stream that looks like me."

"I'll take you there. I think about taking you away from here every day."

"Why? It's not so bad here."

"It could be, though. It could change so quick. There's - something dark. I don't know. Come here."

Kyle scoots into Marcus' arms with a groan, so spent that he's basically spineless, flopping against Marcus, who feels weak with exhaustion himself, but he still manages to pull Kyle to him and wrap entirely around him, legs curling into it, shoulders hunching onto Kyle's. He feels, for the first time since he found out what he is, as if something other than the machines has a hand in what this body is capable of.

"I think we did it better than those guys I saw in the rec room," Kyle whispers. He's blushing. Marcus kisses every inch of his face, understanding this stupid impulse for the first time in his life, the need to frantically press lips to skin, to try and communicate something incommunicable.

"We did," Marcus says. "Goddamn right we did."

*

Marcus wakes up feeling as if he forgot something, like he left an oven on somewhere in the past, when such a thing would matter. Kyle is curled up against him, deep asleep, and Marcus watches him breathe for awhile, the way his side moves with it, the way his lips have gotten chapped as they dried out overnight. He licks against them, wanting to soften them up, and Kyle moans weakly, his eyes cracking open. He smiles at Marcus and scoots closer, hiding his face against Marcus' neck.

"You're not sore, are you?" Marcus asks.

"No." He can feel Kyle's smile on his skin. "I feel different, though. Good."

There is something different about him; his voice is deeper, maybe just from such a good sleep. Marcus sighs and pets on him for awhile, wanting to live in this aftermath forever, just breathing in the smell of Kyle, which is a little sharper now, a little more like the smell of Marcus' own skin, metal and engine oil mixed in there somewhere.

"We should get up," Marcus says, but he doesn't mean it, and Kyle seems to understand this. He just sighs and goes soft again in Marcus' arms, sinking back into sleep. Marcus holds him tightly, thinking about all the things in this world that would hurt Kyle without even knowing what they were doing, what they were destroying. He wants to be Kyle's armor, to close around him and stay there always, or maybe to only let him out when they're in this room together, where he can peel Kyle's clothes off and rediscover the pale, soft miracle of his skin, untouched except for where Marcus has worshipfully caressed him.

"I saw a bird once," Kyle says, out of nowhere, maybe talking in his sleep.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, a bird. It was gray. Kind of fluffy, really skinny legs. This was when my dad was still alive. He started crying because he thought it was the last one of its kind, and he thought it looked confused, or sad, or something, like it didn't have anywhere to go. He tried to pretend like he wasn't crying, but he was. It was the only time he cried, I think. Maybe he cried when my mom died, but I can't remember that far back."

Marcus knows he should contribute something to this conversation. He hasn't even thought about his own parents in years, since jail, since those days when he would go to Bible study with Andy, for the donuts that the Baptists brought.

"Somewhere I bet there's a bunch of birds," Marcus says. He wants to ask how Kyle's mother died, but then he feels like he basically already knows.

"I think so, too!" Kyle lifts his face, suddenly wide awake. "Canada, maybe?"

"Sure. That seems like where they'd go."

"My dad said they used to migrate to Mexico for the summer. Like taking a summer vacation. Big flocks of them. He told me there was this horror movie where they were evil, but I don't think that would really happen. Though I guess they do eat each other. Don't they? Sometimes?"

"I guess. I think they all eat each other eventually. Animals. That movie wasn't scary at all, that one about the birds."

"You saw it?" Kyle sits up a little, excited.

"Some of it."

"Tell me about movies."

"Well. Most of them sucked. But sometimes they were great."

"Like when?"

"Like -- The Godfather. That was my favorite."

"Why? What happened? What does godfather mean?"

"Godfather was this thing where, when you had a baby, you picked someone to kind of, like, I don't know, give it presents and stuff? I didn't have one. But this was an Italian family, see --"

"Italian, like the country, Italy."

"Right."

"Me and my dad used to find 'Italian style' stuff when we were scavenging. Italian style croutons. They were too stale to eat. Smelled kind of good, though."

"Yeah, they have good food. Had? Is there an Italy anymore?"

"Who knows? I don't think so. Maybe. So what happened in the movie?"

"Well, they're a crime family, see, this family that the movie is about, and -- oh, hell, I don't know, someone shoots their father, so they retaliate by killing this cop and this guy who ordered the hit on their dad, but the goody-goody brother has to do it, and then he has to go into hiding, and he marries this really gorgeous chick but then they kill her, too --"

"Wait, who kills her?"

"The rival families. See, they're all trying to get control of the crime scene in New York, and the one family wants to sell coke, but Vito -- the dad of the main family -- he doesn't want to --"

There's a knock on the door, and Marcus is sorry to be interrupted, both because he and Kyle are completely naked and because it's kind of fun, watching Kyle's face as he listens with interest to the plot of The Godfather. It occurs to Marcus that they've still got a whole hell of a lot to talk about.

"What?" he calls, hiding Kyle against his chest again.

"It's me," Blair says. "They're having a little party out here, to celebrate us getting back. Just wanted to see if you guys wanted to come?"

"What's a party?" Kyle whispers, so Marcus figures they should go.

They dress, Marcus half-wishing that they could shower first, but kind of glad that they'll show up as they are, smelling like each other, like sex. Blair is waiting for them outside when they emerge, and she smiles, taking them in, knowing what they've been up to. She pulls at the curl growing over Kyle's forehead.

"Need another hair cut?" she asks.

"Nah," he says. His hair is a mess; she smoothes it down for him.

The party is in the rec room, which of course makes Marcus think of the two guys Kyle saw in here, and he grins when Kyle surreptitiously points them out, leaning together against the far wall, one drinking from the other's cup. They look like the prison couples Marcus knew in his past life: indistinguishably beefy and unshaven, one of them holding the cup, the other drinking from it. Marcus gets a cup of his own -- vodka mixed with something tangy -- and passes it to Kyle, who coughs at the alcohol taste and then drinks more, frowning a little.

"What do you think?" Marcus asks.

"I don't know," Kyle says. "It kind of burns."

"I guess you're officially a man now. First drink, etcetera. Next I'll have to teach you how to drive."

Kyle smirks and presses his fist to Marcus' shoulder.

"I can drive," he says. "Remember?"

"You call that driving? That was, like, going over a cliff. With style."

There's music at the party, provided by a laptop computer, the guy who's picking songs doing so very seriously, though Marcus images his selection is pretty limited. Blair dances with everybody, but mostly with Kyle, who won't get any ideas. She leads on the first couple of songs, twirling him, then tries to teach him how to lead. Kyle is laughing, red-cheeked. Star is leaning against the wall next to Marcus like she doesn't really get this dancing thing, either.

"Come on, you two," Blair says, walking over to them. She pulls Marcus from the wall and he groans, planting his feet. Kyle picks Star up and twirls her around, making her laugh. Marcus wonders if she'll grow up and fall in love with him because of the way he took care of her when she was little. He gives Blair a look and lets himself be pulled into the center of the room.

"See those two guys over there?" he says as Blair puts her hands on his hips, making him sway awkwardly. She turns and looks at the couple by the wall.

"Yeah?"

"They're together. Kyle saw them."

"Oh, Jesus. No shit." She laughs her brilliant laugh, lighting up the party like a string of lights. "Tommy and James. They'd been living together in a cave when we found them. Bringing them here didn't change anything, and that was back when there were more women."

"What happened to the women?"

"Some died, but mostly they ran off with guys who thought they could take better care of them than Connor could." She lifts Marcus' arm and he takes the hint, gives her a twirl. "Never to be heard from again, and so forth."

"Hmm. You ever think about leaving?"

"Nobody's asked me to."

"But you would go? If somebody asked?"

"It depends on who did the asking." She frowns. "You're not thinking about going off on your own, are you?"

"No, I don't know. Kyle wouldn't leave. He thinks Connor's going to save us all."

"He saved you, didn't he?"

"Only so I could turn around and save his dumb ass."

Blair laughs. "What is with you and him? Okay, I take it back -- I can understand how there would be hard feelings, considering. But he let me go, Marcus, and you."

"Yeah, after he almost killed us both. And he only let me go because he wanted to get to Kyle. I don't like the way he looks at him."

"Oh, Jesus, you're crazy. John Connor isn't going to steal your jailbait boyfriend."

"Don't call him that. And that's not what I meant. It's -- something else, with Connor."

Blair rolls her eyes and spins away from him, across the dance floor. She takes Star from Kyle and sets her on the ground, trying to teach her some kind of step. Kyle falls against Marcus' side, laughing.

"I'm dizzy," he says.

"Your first glass of vodka will do that. Need to sit down?"

"No. Here, look what Blair was teaching me." He puts one hand on Marcus' shoulder, the other on his waist.

"You're going to lead, huh?" Marcus says, grinning.

"Yeah. Watch my feet."

He humors Kyle for a few seconds, not recognizing the song. A lot of people are dancing, drunk; the party seems to have been going on for some time, maybe since last night, when Marcus went to bed with Kyle. If that was night, if this is day. There's no way to tell, deep inside the base.

"Marcus!"

It's Kate, shouting across the room. She looks pissed. Marcus steps away from Kyle like he's on fire. The music seems to get quieter.

"Yeah?"

"John needs to see you. Come now."

And then she just leaves, as if giving Marcus an order that's been handed down from Connor is as easy as that. Marcus only follows her because everyone is staring at him, and because he's embarrassed. He's getting too carried away with Kyle, making it too easy to give everyone a reason to separate them. He casts an apologetic look back at Kyle as he goes, shrugging.

"I'll be right back," he says.

He follows Kate through the base, which feels empty, most people at the party, enjoying the rare chance to celebrate something. She takes him to the quarters she shares with Connor and their daughter. Sarah is in a crib in the main room, asleep. Connor is sitting beside her, in his wheelchair, hunched over, his skin greenish. It seems to take him a great deal of effort to turn and look at Marcus when he enters, but his eyes are somehow just as sharp and deadly as ever.

"Take Sarah," he says to Kate. She wordlessly obeys, lifting the baby into her arms. Sarah fusses a little, roused from sleep, and Kate disappears into another room, closing the door behind her. Connor rolls himself over to the table in the center of the room, which is suspiciously clear of maps and blueprints. There are three chairs around it, and Connor gestures to the one across from him.

"Sit," he says.

"I'd rather stand."

"Fucking have it your way. You always do." Connor puts his elbows on the table and sighs deeply, drawing his hands over his face.

"You don't look well," Marcus says, feeling guilty. He goes to the chair and sits.

"No shit." Connor takes his hands from his face and straightens his shoulders. "I'm dying."

"Fuck. Shit. Your heart?"

"No. Not my heart."

Connor stares at Marcus for awhile as if he expects him to fill in the blanks, then scoffs and looks away.

"My mother always warned me not to underestimate the machines."

"Your mother?" Marcus can't imagine the woman who raised Connor. He seems as if he crawled from the earth fully formed. Kind of like Marcus did when he was reborn.

"This kind of creativity." Connor lifts a hand and curls his fingers into a half-fist, gesturing as if he's struggling for the right words. "I didn't think it was possible for the machines to think like this."

"Like what? What are you talking about?"

"I should -- should have put two and two together. They were counting on you to care enough to go after my father. To try and save him. How could they be sure that you would? I took it for granted myself."

"Your father?" Marcus looks at the door that Kate disappeared behind. He wonders if she's listening, wonders if she realizes that her husband is losing his mind. "Look, I don't --"

"They made you --" Connor breaks off there, laughing darkly. "They created you based around this one thing. Destroying me. That's all you are, a tool designed to kill me. And how the fuck would they understand that making you -- want my father -- the way you do -- that this would be what finally accomplished it? How does a machine know that?"

"Who the fuck is your father and what does he have to do with me?" Marcus wishes Kate would come back in, maybe try to translate.

"Kyle is my father." Connor's voice is suddenly very strong, his eyes angry enough to kill, something Marcus has seen before.

"Kyle -- Reese? Jesus Christ, man, you need help."

"You know we're researching time travel. I'm sure he's fucking told you everything. Years from now, I'm going to send him back in time to protect my mother when they go after her. That's when I'm conceived. When Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese spend the night together in 1984."

Marcus laughs and shakes his head. "I don't have to listen to this --"

"The longer you're with him the closer I get to the grave," Connor says, speaking through gritted teeth. "It's worse every day. I would fight for my life even if I didn't have my daughter, but Sarah -- Sarah -- it will hit her, too. She'll disappear little by little, just like this."

"Connor, you're out of your fucking mind --"

"I'm out of my mind?" It's as if Connor can will his strength back with fury, the volume of his voice making Marcus' ears ring. "You're fucking a goddamn child and that qualifies you to tell me that I'm out of my mind?"

"He's not a child, for fuck's sake, he's seventeen and he's more of a man than I am after everything he's --"

"You know, I would be disgusted by you for being attracted to a seventeen-year-old boy, but--" Connor laughs, wolfish and somehow even more deadly with his decrepit posture. "I can't blame you, can I? You were programmed to want him."

"Bullshit! They can't -- there's no --"

"They can't? They can't? Of course, like they can't make your skin regenerate overnight, can't hibernate you for fifteen years until my father is so out of his mind with loneliness that he'd be infatuated with whoever came along --"

"This is so fucking nuts, are you listening to yourself?"

"Are you?" Connor leans forward, narrowing his eyes. "Can you deny that you wanted nothing but to stay close to him from the minute you fucking met him? That you were ready to die for him, to walk into Skynet headquarters with no weapons? Can you explain that? Why a grown man would feel that way about a teenager he'd just met?"

Marcus scoffs. His heart is pounding.

"Have you met Kyle?" he says. "He's -- it's just -- the way he is --"

"He's just perfect for you, right? Because of this or that reason that they've planted in your head? Excuses, justifications -- they put them there, Marcus! It was their fall back plan. If they couldn't blow me away, they could make me disappear. All they had to do was prevent Kyle Reese from falling in love with my mother. It was easy enough, wasn't it? A good-looking guy, someone strong who would protect him? He's fucking seventeen, he's impressionable. And you. They made you into what he thinks he needs. Soft with him, rough with everyone else. God. It fucking disgusts me. A robot's approximation of a real human relationship."

Marcus tries to speak, but his heart is pounding too hard. It's not like it hasn't occurred to him before, that the machines might have put things in his head, could have if they wanted to. But Kyle. No. Connor is insane. That's all.

"I need to separate the two of you," Connor says, cool again, sitting back. "For my daughter's health and for my own. You'll understand. Or you won't. Doesn't matter."

"I -- no." Marcus stands, shaking. "If you don't want us here, we'll go --"

"You're not going anywhere." Connor scoffs, and Marcus can hear the scrape of boots outside the door, and someone chambering a round. Of course. He's stronger than everyone here, but they'll have thought of that. They'll have one of those mines, or two, three.

"Not even without him," Connor says. "I can't risk having you running around the desert, getting reclaimed by them, turned into their next version of the perfect weapon. You're being decommissioned, Marcus. Something I should have done as soon as we got back to the base."

"You can't," Marcus says. "You can't -- John -- you're sick, it's your heart, it's nothing to do with --"

"I feel sorry for you, really," Connor says. "You were their pawn. But you're not a man anymore. It was my mistake to think that you could be, after they'd done what they liked with you --"

"Goddammit! So, what? You're going to destroy me, kill me, take me apart, throw me into the scrap heap? You think Kyle will thank you? You think he'll volunteer to save your fucking mother after you killed the person he -- he --"

"Loved? Jesus. He's a boy. It's a crush. He'll get over it. We'll tell him you tried to kill me. He shouldn't have a hard time believing that. It's basically true. Kate!"

Kate walks into the room, shutting the door behind her. She's pale, shaking, trying to feign composure. Marcus tries to draw her gaze, but she avoids his eyes.

"Get the guys," Connor says, gesturing to the front door. "Then go back to the party and tell everyone what happened. That he tried to attack me. We realized he was a sleeper and put him down. Tell Kyle -- tell him we're sorry."

"John -- no -- Kate!" Marcus screams when she puts her hand on the front door's handle. The men have gone quiet outside, ready to strike. "Look at me -- look at me, Kate! You're a doctor, you know they can't just -- just -- make someone feel something --"

"It doesn't matter," she says. She lifts her face, her eyes wet, not quite meeting Marcus' gaze. "Even if whatever you feel for him is real. John will die. And then, my daughter --"

"What about me? What about Kyle? This will kill him, you don't understand --"

"Jesus, listen to you," Connor says, sneering. "Kate. Go."

She opens the door and the men pour in like ants from a hill that's been attacked, swarming Marcus. He's so disoriented that they don't need to use the mines. All it takes is the butt of a gun to his forehead and he's out.

*

Marcus wakes up slowly, as if his systems have been compromised, cranking irritably with the effort of booting up. He's sore, restrained, tied down to something in a room he doesn't recognize. His back is screaming with pain and he can hear a dripping sound from somewhere nearby, maybe the ceiling. He can't even move his head; it's held down by a heavy bar, feels like metal. He's not sure why he's alive, but whatever the reason, it can't mean anything good for him.

There's someone in a lab coat puttering around on the other side of the room, a man with graying hair. Marcus watches him for awhile, wondering how long he's been out, where he even is. Have the machines reclaimed him somehow? No, the man in the lab coat is familiar. Marcus has seen him in the halls at the base. When the man notices that Marcus is awake, he smiles, pressing his hands together as if he's pleased.

"Ah, there you are!" he says. "I was afraid those brutes had damaged you permanently."

"Where the fuck am I?" Marcus asks. It hurts to speak; his throat is so dry.

"In my auxiliary lab. My name is Dr. Yune. I'm sure Kyle told you about me. He's certainly told me plenty about you!"

"Why the fuck aren't I dead? I thought Connor --"

"Oh, Connor, well. He doesn't know everything that goes on around here, believe it or not. He'd have the most fascinating piece of machinery this war has turned out scrapped because he feels threatened. He's a bit of an egotist, in case you hadn't noticed."

"You think so? Then maybe you'll help me the fuck out. Let me go. Let me tell everyone that Connor's lost his mind --"

"Lost his mind? I wouldn't go that far." Yune begins fussing with some of the monitors that line the walls of the small, windowless room. "He's got a point, actually. I'm trying to map your brain here, and from what I've seen so far it's beautiful, beautiful work. Inspired. Makes you wonder about the machines, about their tenacity for survival and what it means --"

"Listen -- mister --"

"Doctor."

"Yeah -- sure -- okay -- you know Kyle, right? If you care about him at all, even a little bit --"

"Kyle's a fine young man, but I'm afraid I can't let you go anywhere, Mr. Wright, though I'm sure he'd appreciate it. You see, I'm disobeying direct orders by holding you here for study. I would be rather, well, fucked if anyone were to find out that you're still -- alive, I suppose, is nearly the right word."

"Please, you don't understand --"

"No, I do! I've got your whole brain mapped on my monitors here -- well, most of it, enough -- and I can see it here, your desperation to get back to him, this exquisitely effective programming! If there were a formula for love, this would be it -- cracked by machines, ha! The poetic metaphors for the texture of his skin, the weakness for his big eyes, the need to close him into corners as if your body is a shield and the rest of the world is a weapon -- it's all here, look, see!"

Yune points to the monitors, practically foaming at the mouth with excitement. The screens show bluish diagrams that look like geometric figures to Marcus, little ladders branching into infinite patterns, shifting and reshaping as Yune admires them.

"They constructed it all from the material that was already there," Yune says, still staring lovingly at the monitors. "Your experiences in prison, your admiration of your brother's irrationally passionate response to his friend's death, a song you heard as a child -- it's like a love poem written by the machines to the humans. In the midst of this war, it's -- it's a groundbreaking discovery."

"Please," Marcus says, because this is breaking him, hearing himself described this way, being told that he's nothing more than a computer program. "Please, I'm human. You -- can't you see the part where I'm human?"

"Yes! That's the most fascinating aspect of all! They have manipulated an actual human brain. The brain itself isn't their creation. The memories, the capability to learn, to feel -- it's all real. It's the brain's desires, its needs, its emotions that have been created to serve a particular purpose -- that is the genius of the machine."

"How do you know I don't just love him?" Marcus' eyes are burning, with anger as much as agony. Somewhere, Kyle is alone, vulnerable, thinking that Marcus died a monster, that he was just a reactivated machine as soon as he was alone with Connor.

"Well, you do love him." Yune frowns, walking over to Marcus. "Your feelings for him are as real as your heartbeat. Just because the machines put them there, that doesn't make them any less real. Which is precisely why I've kept you. I can learn a lot about the human mind from you, and the way the machines understand it. The research will be invaluable to our struggle with them. Can you imagine a peace between us? I never could, until I found you."

Marcus growls with frustration, struggling fruitlessly against his bonds. So this was how the Frankenstein monster felt, bolted to a table, listening to a madman's monologues. Marcus is going to burn it all down as soon as he gets free.

"Relax, Mr. Wright, please. You're so much more interesting when you're not in bare emotional flux."

"You fucking - someone's gonna come for me, someone's gonna find this place and fucking blow you away -"

"Who? Kyle?" Yune laughs uproariously, like a comic book villain. "Oh, maybe. But by then you won't care very much."

"Wha - what?"

"You know which experiment I must conduct to truly understand what the machines have made you feel, yes? And how they've done it?"

"What, Jesus, what? You're going to lobotomize me? Slice this fucked up brain into pieces?"

"Oh, God, no!" Yune leans over Marcus, smiling slowly, his teeth crooked and rabbit-like. "I'm going to make you fall out of love with the boy," he says. "After I figure out how they made you feel this way about him in the first place. It will prove that I've mastered the technology. After that, well. I can make Connor and the others think I'm a god if I want them to. Not that I'm quite so petty, just an example -"

Yune stops talking when Marcus' quiet laughter grows louder. The smile drains from Yune's face and Marcus laughs even harder, feeling victorious. Yune consults the monitors and then looks back to Marcus, frowning.

"I don't understand why you're laughing," he says.

Marcus can barely speak, so fucking thrilled that, even this powerless, this defeated, he's still got something they want that they can't take from him.

"Good fucking luck," he says. "Good fucking luck, man."

Yune's nasty smile curves back onto his lips.

"Well, of course you think it's impossible," he says. "You're still under its control, enslaved by their manipulations. I wonder if you'll actually thank me when I free you from them?"

Marcus just sniffs out another laugh, tears pouring down his cheeks, from laughter, from whatever. Even if he never makes it out here, the way he feels about Kyle isn't going to change. The machines might have put it there; he doesn't care if they did. It's still as real as the hammering heart that Yune will have to put a knife through if he wants him to stop loving Kyle.

Even then. Even if Marcus were dead, some part of it would go on.

"You're awfully smug all of a sudden," Yune says. He smiles and walks over to the monitors. "I think you underestimate the potential of emotional torture."

"Do whatever you want," Marcus says, staring at the ceiling. "Just know that I'm going to kill the living fuck out of you as soon as I get the chance."

Yune sighs. "You are going to wish you could, at every moment," he says. "I'll give you that."

*

Part III