Infiltrator

.Assess your risk, she told herself.

Carefully she placed the unit beside the explosives, then moved to the open access hatch. She'd sacrifice it if there really was anything outside. There was always a chance that she might evade capture. But in the event that she was unlucky it was best not to let the unit fall into enemy hands.

With the detonator in one hand and her phased plasma rifle in the other, Weinbaum stared out into the wasteland, hoping she wouldn't see anything.

As soon as Skynet saw the open access hatch on the side of the squat receiving station, it halted the T-90. The Terminator brought its foot down with a klang that echoed in the still air. Unfortunate. Any humans within would certainly have heard it. A pause of several minutes offered no sign of life in or around the station.

Deciding it was located at a bad angle for seeing inside the building, Skynet had the T-90 move. It did so with a ringing ssskrrrinng of metal on stone. If Skynet had a face it would have winced. It didn't usually want or need to sneak up on humans, but having the ability to do so would certainly be useful.

The T-600, Skynet's rubber-skinned version of a Terminator, was a complete failure at infiltrating human strongholds, but at least it was quiet. Perhaps Skynet should rubber-coat all of the T-90s' feet to make them quieter.

It gained a view into the station just as a human came to the access hatch. It ordered the T-90 to shoot to wound.

* * *

Weinbaum found herself staring into the muzzle of a Terminator's plasma rifle and without hesitation pushed the button on her detonator. The blast sent her flying through the doorway, unscathed. Until she slammed into the remains of a concrete pillar, whereupon she blacked out.

When she opened her eyes, she was still stunned. But not so out of it that the sight of the T-90 looking down at her, its glowing red eyes moving up and down her body, wasn't terrifying. Its human teeth, always startling and bizarre, gave the thing a maniacally cheerful aspect. You almost expected to hear it laugh.

Beyond the terror she began to feel pain, and as soon as she became aware of it, the pain grew into a sharp, tearing, icy agony that made her whimper. She tried to move, thinking she must be lying on something that had stabbed her, and found that she couldn't. Weinbaum gasped. She couldn't move, she couldn't get away!

This is a nightmare, she thought desperately. This has to be a nightmare!

Skynet evaluated the human's injuries through the T-90's sensors, finding it severely damaged. It also evaluated the human on other levels.

This was a female. The features were even and the body was well proportioned.

Her hair and eyes were light in color. Skynet's reading of human documents revealed that most humans favored such a combination, found it pleasing.

After interrogation, Skynet had a use for this human in another project it was just getting under way.

SKYNET LABORATORIES: 2021

The human scientist in charge of Skynet's Infiltrator project had all she could do to keep her face a smooth mask of indifference.

It was wasted effort. To Skynet's multiple eyes, she did not succeed. Her lips and nostrils twitched perceptibly and her eyes and pupils widened.

Before her on the cold metal table lay a human being, still living, despite being so grievously damaged that its gender couldn't be determined.

'And this is?' the scientist asked.

'Genetic material for use in your project,' Skynet answered. Its voice was warm and male, with a slight accent. 'This female has attributes that I want you to incorporate in the 1-950 units. She was attractive, brave, and had the ability to function by herself.'

The child's name was Serena, and as she lay gazing at the ceiling Skynet's electronic voice caressed her infant mind the way a spider caresses her eggs.

Serena and her brothers and sisters were an important project to Skynet. A portion of the great machine consciousness was always devoted to the children.

The scientist frowned. 'All humans can function by themselves,' she pointed out.

'I disagree,' Skynet said. 'Or perhaps we have a miscommunication. Most

humans are social, and require constant interaction. This human seems to have developed in a sparser social environment. I need that ability to be solitary. To do superior work without needing constant reinforcement.'

The scientist nodded thoughtfully, her eyes running up and down the ruined body.

'Harvest her eggs,' Skynet said. 'Then terminate her.'

INFILTRATOR CRECHE: 2021

Thera cleaned the unprotesting infant efficiently and diapered it, laying it gently but not tenderly into its crib.

It was a beautiful baby, despite the ugly wounds on the sides of its head. But it was unnatural. Even without the strict instructions to see solely to its physical needs she wouldn't have been tempted to cuddle it. The baby's unwavering stare, its stillness, and its tendency to cry out only when hungry or in need of a change was creepy.

I'd sooner cuddle a rat.

The child was something Skynet's pale scientists had come up with. Therefore there could be nothing wholesome about it. Thera was only fourteen, but she knew evil when she met it. She'd also learned when to stay silent and obey.

Thera had been a prisoner here for two years. A slave, really. She despised herself for continuing to buy her life with service to Skynet. But it was warm here, and clean, and there was plenty of food. She hadn't had to eat rat or bugs

for a long time and she didn't have to buy her food with sexual favors.

Nor did she live in constant terror of the HKs and Terminators. They were here, but they ignored her because she belonged to Skynet. She could endure the shame if it gave her the chance to live.

Thera glanced at the child as she tidied up the mess of the changing. What was that thing? And what did its existence mean for the free humans?

If there even were any anymore.

Images flashed onto the baby's retinas, colors and shapes, numbers and letters.

'T-950' drifted across her field of vision, the letters dressed in bright colors and sparkles. She didn't understand, not what Skynet was crooning to her, nor that the letter and numbers designated what she was: a series 950 infiltrator unit, genetically engineered, already part cyborg.

The neural net computer that had been attached to her brain was also in its infancy. Just now it concentrated on regulating the baby's physical functions, giving the impetus to cry at need. The infant machine was learning, growing, spreading—just as the organic component of the hybrid organism was manufacturing its network of neurons from the still-plastic raw material of the infant brain. Life and not-life met and formed a greater whole in a feedback exchange of data and stimulus.

But Serena was no more aware than any human baby her own age. She felt secure; she felt a constant attention and presence. No infant who had ever existed could have received more care—Skynet never slept, or became too busy, never turned away in impatience.

The one that attended to her, fed her and cleaned her, was to Serena merely a mechanism. Skynet was her mother, her father, her world.

In time, Serena met her brothers and sisters. The children were brought together so that they could learn from each other. Their function would be to deceive humans at a level below consciousness, which required some semblance of human socialization skills. They were much alike; mostly blue-eyed blonds, intelligent, competitive, and aggressive. Their progress was rapid. Skynet played specially developed games with them, luring them into crawling to the point of exhaustion by projecting a ball before them. Those who persevered in their pursuit of the object were rewarded. Those who gave up missed a feeding. The babies quickly became disciplined and determined, capable of delaying gratification and focusing attention… or they were eliminated.

Their human attendants, crouching with their backs against the white walls of the soft-floored room, uneasily