Brawley, California - June 24, 2019
Kyle had never noticed the smell before. The air was acrid, leaving a taste on his tongue that he could only describe as 'like electricity'. It was worse here than it had been back at the bunker, or what was left of it. They were in what used to be the city of Brawley in southern California. It was one of the few areas that still had buildings standing that wasn't overrun by machines. That wasn't to say they weren't around, but it sure beat heading north for supplies. Even with the attack on Skynet Central, the whole northern sector was crawling with metal.
This was the mission Kyle had planned. Barnes was in command, as per the submitted personnel list. It might have been a peace offering or only because Barnes was the best guy for the job. Kyle wasn't saying which, making it a whole lot easier for Barnes to ignore the problem. Derek wasn't with them, which made Kyle uneasy. If he trusted anyone to watch his back, it was his brother, but Connor had insisted that Derek was needed elsewhere. There were things going on that Kyle didn't understand, but as a show of trust, he didn't ask for more.
The sun was high in the sky and here in Brawley it got hot. Not warm, not happy summer days heat. Kyle didn't have a thermometer but it had to at least be a hundred. The team was sweating like crazy and trying not to finish off their water supply before they even got to the food they were here to retrieve. The grip on Kyle's gun was getting hot to touch and he still had his coat on, the red band of the Resistance around his arm. They would be inside soon, he reasoned to himself, and it was better than sunburn.
In and out was all this mission needed to be. There was no sign of Terminator activity out here as they made their way from building to building. They got into a rhythm - clear the building, secure the building, take whatever food they could and put it on to one of the trucks. Any extra supplies were a bonus, but the focus was the canned and preserved food.
Brawley was one of the ghost towns now. Nowhere was heavily populated any more, but ghost towns stood out. They were the towns where everyone had left before the Terminators came. They were out of the range of the first bombs and the bulk of the inhabitants had fled the radiation clouds that were expected to sweep the area. The few that remained were wiped out by patrols in the weeks and months following Judgment Day and the rise of the machines. The radiation was a long time gone, and so were the people, but the supplies they left behind were still on the shelves and in the barns and cellars of the people who had lived here.
If any of the food was contaminated, it would be dealt with by the supplies people back at base. Their objective here was to get as much as possible as fast as possible.
Barnes
"Reese, Fuller," Barnes called. "You're with me." Kyle watched as Barnes nodded at Blair and headed off in a different direction to the rest of the group. He followed as ordered, matching Fuller's pace beside him.
Fuller
"You planned this mission?" Fuller asked, keeping his voice low.
weetinyreese
Kyle didn't look at him. He was busy watching the horizon for any sign of activity. "Yeah. How do you like it so far?"
Fuller
Fuller smothered a laugh. "Don't get me killed and I'll say nice things about you on the feedback form. Seriously Reese, you disappear for all that time and come back not three months and the General gives you a mission? You bucking for Corporal?"
weetinyreese
"What if I am?" Kyle replied. He wasn't.
Fuller
"Hey, I don't have no problem with it," Fuller shrugged. "But some guys will. You know what it's like if the guy in charge didn't earn his way there."
weetinyreese
Kyle would have been lying if he'd said he hadn't thought about why Connor had given him this opportunity. He hadn't earned a promotion. "I'm not trying to get a promotion," he assured Fuller, who gave him a disbelieving look. "I'm not," Kyle insisted. If he was ever going to get a promotion, it was going to be because he earned it in the eyes of his fellow soldiers, not because it was handed to him. "All I want to do is try to make up for screwing up."
Fuller
Fuller was quiet for a few moments. "Don't we all?"
Barnes
Barnes held up a hand ahead of them and they both stopped in their tracks, stepping closer to the nearest thing that might provide cover. When nothing came of the silence, Barnes waved them forward and pointed at a building that wasn't on the list for supply raiding.
weetinyreese
"What's going on?" Kyle whispered when it was okay to talk again.
Barnes
"Your mission isn't the only reason we're here." Barnes crouched to check on his ammo.
weetinyreese
"Connor didn't tell me-"
Barnes
"Connor doesn't tell us a lot of things," Barnes interrupted. "He told you what you needed to know, me what I needed to know. No one else knows why we're here and it's gonna stay that way."
weetinyreese
Was Barnes telling the truth? Kyle didn't know. Kyle didn't know a lot anymore, and didn't know who he could trust. But this was the Resistance. If he couldn't trust the people he fought with, he had no business fighting with them. Despite what he thought of what Barnes had done to the Gray, he was in command. If he said Connor gave him a separate mission, then Kyle had to believe him. "What are we looking for?"
Barnes
He fished a piece of paper out of his vest pocket. "Cases like this." They were nothing special, typical metal boxes that weapons were transported in. "We find them, we call in one of the trucks and get them back to the rendezvous point. Connor's orders."
weetinyreese
Kyle nodded. "What's in them?"
Barnes
"Need to know."
weetinyreese
Of course it was. "Then let's find some so we can take a look."
The building was dark, of course. The windows were covered with fifteen years worth of dirt. It was a warehouse of some kind, crates stacked off to the sides covered with dust and debris. They spread out, not taking the silence for granted. Flashlights were strapped to their rifles, guiding their way as they navigated the rows of storage. The warehouse appeared to be untouched, left the way it had been since before Judgment Day.
weetinyreese
There was just one problem. The dust on the floor had footprints in it. Kyle didn't know if he was the first to notice it, but neither Barnes nor Fuller reacted if they'd noticed it too. He couldn't risk alerting whoever else was here by saying anything, so he swallowed hard, forcing the lump in his throat down.
Barnes
Barnes came to a stop the next row over. Kyle quietly moved to join him, flashlight pointed at the footprints. "I know," Barnes whispered.
Fuller
"I got it," Fuller called from a few aisles over. He adjusted his rifle strap so it rested where the flashlight could point towards the container. He unfastened the clip on the front of the metal box and pushed the lid up, coughing at the dust. "Looks like guns," he called, "but nothing I've ever seen."
Fuller's flashlight suddenly turned on them, causing Kyle to squint. He didn't even see what caused Fuller to react. "Oh shit," Fuller yelled a split second before being grabbed and hurtled down his own aisle.
Barnes
"Go!" Barnes ordered.
weetinyreese
Kyle broke into a sprint, trying to get to a decent place to take cover and respond to whatever the threat was. His heart was racing as he skidded on the concrete floor and turned back, gun raised. Fuller was on the floor, movement at a minimum. Any movement meant he was alive though and that was a start. There was a bigger problem than footprints now and the problem with the problem was that he couldn't see it, or Barnes. He had to assume the threat was a Terminator, but what kind of Terminator stopped shooting before you were dead?
The Terminator
The answer was clear. The kind that looked far too human and was staring down at him. The Terminator - definitely not a T-800 - grabbed Reese's shoulder and stared at him. "Identify."
weetinyreese
There were fifteen hundred and eighty three things Kyle Reese would have rather been doing than being held in the Terminator's grasp, but he couldn't move. He tried to fire his gun, even if only to cause a distraction, but the machine yanked it from his hands and damaged the barrel, rendering it useless for anything other than a backfire. Kyle tried with every ounce of strength he had to pull away, but he could barely squirm in the machine's grasp. But it didn't know who he was. Kyle knew he was in Skynet's database. He'd been in one of their cells for long enough. Skynet had picked him out of a crowd before. So why was this model asking for his name? "Go to Hell." Self-preservation was a learned skill, not a Reese genetic trait.
The Terminator
"Identification not recognized. What year is this?"
weetinyreese
Now the machine sounded more human and to Kyle that was nothing short of terrifying. He didn't want to answer, but he had to keep the Terminator from spotting Barnes approaching from behind. For a big guy, Barnes moved with incredible stealth and if Kyle could keep the machine's attention, the back of the neck would be accessible. "2019. It's 2019."
The Terminator
The Terminator had skin that was more human-like than anyone here had ever seen. The hair looked natural and not waxy and full of gel like the T-800. If not for the mannerisms being all wrong, he could have passed for human. And if not for the way he looked at Kyle. "You will take me to John Connor."
Barnes
Barnes was so close. His knife was out and he charged, aiming for the back of the Terminator's neck. At the last moment, the machine released Kyle from his grasp and spun to hit Barnes away and into the shelving that reached almost to the ceiling.
weetinyreese
Kyle didn't wait to get grabbed again. His gun was useless, but he'd heard what Fuller had said. There were guns in the metal box and he still had his ammo. He sprinted down the aisle and pulled out one of the guns. It wasn't a model Kyle had ever seen before, but a gun was a gun, or so he thought until he realized something. "How the hell do I load this thing?" Kyle muttered with urgency. Barnes was losing the battle with the Terminator and needed back-up now. There was a switch. Kyle flicked it and there was a low whine as the rifle powered up. The screen flickered to life and though he had to squint to read it, Kyle knew a power bar when he saw one. He tried to fire, but nothing happened. "Come on, come on," he urged it on. "HEY!" he called to the machine. "You want John Connor? You're talking to the wrong guy." 85 percent. 90. "BARNES! MOVE!" Barnes took a dive to the right as the power bar hit 100 and Kyle felt the weapon kick into action.
The Terminator
Pulling the trigger let off a line of pink light that hit the Terminator directly in the chest. There was almost no kick like a regular weapon, meaning Kyle's movement wasn't restricted as he edged towards his target, firing a second, third and fourth time. Again, the pink light, tinged with purple and white, shot out from the barrel, hitting the target, who crumpled under the third shot - the one that caught it directly in the face.
Barnes
Barnes took action as soon as the Terminator was down. He lunged at it and, trying not to vomit at the smell of the charred flesh and the up close sight of the human skin peeling back on the metal skull. Kyle stood over them with the new rifle pointed at the Terminator while Barnes, for reasons Kyle didn't understand, used his knife to hack away at the hair and scalp, unscrew the protective cap and yank out the chip.
weetinyreese
Kyle lowered his weapon. The threat was neutralized. "Why'd you do that? I could've destroyed it."
Barnes
Barnes picked himself up off the ground and pocketed the chip. He patted it. "Connor's orders."
weetinyreese
Standing orders to bring back Terminator chips. There was more going on here than Kyle understood. He handed the rifle to Barnes and went to check on Fuller. "What are those things? They don't fire bullets."
Barnes
"Plasma pulse rifle." Barnes fired another shot at point blank range into the Terminator's head. "Need to know basis."
Fuller
Fuller groaned as he came around. "Please tell me we got what we came for."
Barnes
"We got it," Barnes called. "I'll call it in. Keep an eye out. There could be more than one."
weetinyreese
More than one new Terminator model that looked human. Things were getting complicated now all too fast. Kyle helped Fuller sit up. "You okay?"
Fuller
"Screw your feedback form."