Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles (8/10)
Title: Here I Was Born, and There I Died
Genre: Television
Series: Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles
Characters: Cameron Philips, Derek Reese
Spoilers: 2x21-“Adam Raised a Cain”
Rating: PG
Summary: She'd seen many dead bodies before, but somehow seeing Derek's was different.
Author's Note: This was written for 10_quotes.
Word Count: 500
Cross-posted: scc_fic
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Quote: Vertigo- “Here I was born, and there I died. It was only a moment for you; you took no notice.”
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There's a space between her eyes that has gone numb and its nothing Cameron has ever felt before. Her sensors don't register an error in her hardware (if you forgive the bullet holes), and her software is kept in optimum shape by John Connor himself. There is no explanation for the void of sensation she feels except that there is an exterior variable she is not factoring in.
Derek is dead.
She hesitates at his body, her auditory sensors picking up the firefight outside and her programming tells her to move past the fallen Resistance fighter, but she hesitates. She pauses just at his feet, the blood from his head slowly forming a crimson halo on the floor, and the space between her eyes goes numb. Her sensors evaluate her body and her “mind” in less than a second and her momentary confusion (she hesitated) falls by the wayside as her primary objective reasserts itself aggressively. She must protect John Connor.
It takes less than a minute for her to seek out the other Terminator on the balcony and to remove him from the situation long enough for the trio of humans to make their escape.
Sarah removes all the important documents from Derek's body and takes his gun and Cameron sees that Sarah doesn't falter for even a second. Death is natural for humans, and Sarah and John have seen more of it than most. Cameron has seen easily triple the amount of death that they have and caused exactly 93.8% of the dead she's seen. She lacks the emotion that the loss of life inspires in others, but Cameron finds it interesting that Sarah seems to hold the same apathy for this situation that Cameron does.
John is close to crying, Cameron has seen the phenomena enough times that she recognizes the warning signs. His chest pauses in its machinations of breathing and the girl in his arms shifts slightly at the break in rhythm. The small movement distracts him from the grief that is rising in him and Cameron watches his eyes cloud over with determination. Sarah moves to leave, ordering him to do the same, and Cameron finds her visual sensors drawn to Derek once again, one last time.
It's a waste, she deduces, and perhaps proof that humans will never be good protectors. They make mistakes, let their adrenaline get the better of them. Derek should have known to shield himself, he'd been in battle enough times that the scenario wasn't unfamiliar to him. He should have kept hidden until he'd had a clear shot and he would be alive now, glaring at her and making a snippy comment about bullets bouncing off metal. Cameron wondered briefly where his head had been, what he'd been thinking, that he'd allowed himself to become cannon fodder.
John walks through her line of vision and Cameron's eyes track his movement. She follows him almost immediately.
She hesitates, but it was only a moment; they took no notice.
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Review, please.
Genre: Television
Series: Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles
Characters: Cameron Philips, Derek Reese
Spoilers: 2x21-“Adam Raised a Cain”
Rating: PG
Summary: She'd seen many dead bodies before, but somehow seeing Derek's was different.
Author's Note: This was written for 10_quotes.
Word Count: 500
Cross-posted: scc_fic
_____
Quote: Vertigo- “Here I was born, and there I died. It was only a moment for you; you took no notice.”
_____
There's a space between her eyes that has gone numb and its nothing Cameron has ever felt before. Her sensors don't register an error in her hardware (if you forgive the bullet holes), and her software is kept in optimum shape by John Connor himself. There is no explanation for the void of sensation she feels except that there is an exterior variable she is not factoring in.
Derek is dead.
She hesitates at his body, her auditory sensors picking up the firefight outside and her programming tells her to move past the fallen Resistance fighter, but she hesitates. She pauses just at his feet, the blood from his head slowly forming a crimson halo on the floor, and the space between her eyes goes numb. Her sensors evaluate her body and her “mind” in less than a second and her momentary confusion (she hesitated) falls by the wayside as her primary objective reasserts itself aggressively. She must protect John Connor.
It takes less than a minute for her to seek out the other Terminator on the balcony and to remove him from the situation long enough for the trio of humans to make their escape.
Sarah removes all the important documents from Derek's body and takes his gun and Cameron sees that Sarah doesn't falter for even a second. Death is natural for humans, and Sarah and John have seen more of it than most. Cameron has seen easily triple the amount of death that they have and caused exactly 93.8% of the dead she's seen. She lacks the emotion that the loss of life inspires in others, but Cameron finds it interesting that Sarah seems to hold the same apathy for this situation that Cameron does.
John is close to crying, Cameron has seen the phenomena enough times that she recognizes the warning signs. His chest pauses in its machinations of breathing and the girl in his arms shifts slightly at the break in rhythm. The small movement distracts him from the grief that is rising in him and Cameron watches his eyes cloud over with determination. Sarah moves to leave, ordering him to do the same, and Cameron finds her visual sensors drawn to Derek once again, one last time.
It's a waste, she deduces, and perhaps proof that humans will never be good protectors. They make mistakes, let their adrenaline get the better of them. Derek should have known to shield himself, he'd been in battle enough times that the scenario wasn't unfamiliar to him. He should have kept hidden until he'd had a clear shot and he would be alive now, glaring at her and making a snippy comment about bullets bouncing off metal. Cameron wondered briefly where his head had been, what he'd been thinking, that he'd allowed himself to become cannon fodder.
John walks through her line of vision and Cameron's eyes track his movement. She follows him almost immediately.
She hesitates, but it was only a moment; they took no notice.
_____
Review, please.