done.'
He had her attention. She looked at him in a slightly different light, though it was clear that she didn't understand what he was trying to say. But she was beginning to believe his sincerity.
'But there's a catch. Something terrible has to happen. You couldn't live with yourself if you didn't try to stop it. But if you do... The rest of your life is pointless.'
'What's that supposed to mean?' Kate asked.
'I mean someone normal. Someone sane?' He wanted her to understand. 'It's just that... The life you know, all the stuff you take for granted, it's not going to last.'
She still wasn't getting it. Connor could see the skepticism and confusion in her pretty eyes. And there was something else. Something in the way she held herself. Something in the way that she was looking at him at that moment that seemed familiar. It was something she'd said to him earlier.
'Wait. Back at the clinic. Why did you say, 'Mike Kripke's basement'?'
Kate didn't answer.
Connor was suddenly remembering. 'Kripke's house. That's where the kids used to make out.' He was trying to bring it all back. 'So you and me. Did we??'
Kate looked away, more uncomfortable now than confused.
'Holy shit?we did!' Connor said. 'We made out in Kripke's basement. I can't believe you remembered.'
Still Kate held her silence, but a slight color had come to her neck.
'I guess I must've made quite an impression,' Connor said.
Kate turned on him. 'Gimme a break. I only remembered because the next day you were in the news.'
Suddenly the impossibility of the coincidence dropped into place for Connor. He glanced through the mesh at Terminator, then back at Kate.
'You and I hooked up the day before I first met him? And then again now, twelve~years later?'
'Right,' Kate said sarcastically. 'We were supposed to meet. Fate, right?' She shook her head. 'Coincidence.'
But it wasn't coincidence and Connor knew it 'Yeah,' he said to appease her, nothing more. He glanced at the back of Terminator's head. 'What was going on?'
The Valley
The bedroom was still dark because the shades were drawn. Kate's nightshirt lay on the floor where she'd tossed it a few hours ago, and her fiance', Scott Peterson, was still asleep in the double bed.
T-X stood in the doorway, cataloguing the homey scene. Kate had not returned yet, but she would have to come back here sooner or later.
Either that or someone would come looking for her. She was the key to finding John Connor again. Her fiance was expendable.
T-X moved silently across the room and sat down on
Kate's side of the bed. She picked a framed photo off the nightstand and studied it. It was Katherine Brewster at her graduation. Robert Brewster stood beside her. Smiling. The proud father.
Scott stirred on the bed. T-X put the photo back as Scott sat up. 'Hon? You just get in?'
T-X swiveled her torso 180 degrees to face Scott, who stared at her with incomprehension. She reached over with one hand, almost gently caressing the man's face, before she lowered her hand, thrust it deep into his chest, and destroyed his heart before he could utter a sound.
He fell back in a bloody heap.
T-X went to the bathroom where she fastidiously washed the blood from her hand as the front doorbell rang.
She cocked her head, her sensors picking up electronic emissions from a plain sedan parked on the street. Police frequency emissions.
She glanced at Scott's body, then headed to the living room, her body thickening, her clothing melting away and changing so that by the time she opened the front door she had assumed the infiltration mode of Scott Peterson, including the boxer shorts and T-shirt he wore for bed.
Two men stood in the corridor; one a bald white man, the other a black man with short dark hair. They were dressed in cheap suits and ties.
They held out their gold shields. 'Detective Martinez, LAPD,' the one introduced himself. 'We're looking for Katherine Brewster. Is she here?'
T-X, as Scott Peterson, shook his head.
The detective consulted his notebook. 'You're her fi-anceScott Peterson?'
T-X nodded.
'A few hours ago there was an incident at the veterinary hospital where she works. We're concerned something might have happened to her.'
'Where is she?' T-X asked without inflection, as if the Scott character were in shock.
'Well, we got a report from a gas station attendant out toward Victorville about a possible kidnapping. Might be related.'
T-X nodded his head. 'I can help you find her.'
The two detectives glanced at each other and nodded. 'Sure. Any idea where she might have gone?'
17
Valley of Peace Cemetery
In the back of the pet van John Connor watched through the dividing window over Terminator's shoulder.
He and Kate had finally eaten something and had drunk some water, but she refused to say anything else to him. He almost hated to turn his back on her. She looked as if she were on the verge of going berserk again. There was no telling what she was capable of doing.
Connor hadn't been able to figure out where they were going, although he knew that the desert was off to the east and LA. back the other way. But now they were in an area of grass and tree-covered rolling hills, the occasional long driveway up to a house in the distance, or a small horse ranch nestled against a steeper hill. Pleasant countryside. He figured that a lot of people escaping from the daily grind in Los Angeles came out here.
Terminator drove at a steady sixty miles per hour, on the straight stretches or on the curves, it didn't seem to matter to him.
They were off the main highway, on a blacktopped secondary road that suddenly came around a hill to a
broad vista of trees, grassy slopes, and narrow roads that wound their way in and among headstones, classical statues, small family plots enclosed by low iron picket fences, and mausoleums of all sizes, styles, and ornateness.
No one seemed to be here this morning, except for a hearse and a Cadillac limousine parked at the base of a hill in the distance. At the top was a Gothic stone building that was an entrance to a crypt. But there didn't seem to be any people nearby. Nor were there any signs that caretakers were at work this early.
Without slowing down, Terminator made the sharp turn onto the entrance road, flashed past a sign that read valley of peace cemetery, and crashed straight through a tall iron gate, knocking it half off its hinges.
He drove directly across the cemetery, following the narrow roads, finally slowing down and coming to a halt near where the hearse and the limousine were parked.
The morning was cool and beautiful out here, the sun very bright in a crystal clear sky. i
Terminator opened the rear door. Connor jumped out first, blinking in the brightness. He turned and offered his hand to Kate, but she batted it away and jumped down on her own.
'Come with me,' Terminator said. He turned and strode up the hill to the crypt entrance that was flanked by tall stained-glass windows showing angels ascending to heaven. Connor almost expected to hear organ music playing softly.
The heavy bronze doors were locked, but Terminator
simply pulled them open as if they had been held in place by straw.
Inside, he led them down a flight of stairs into the crypt Coffins were set behind marble slabs in tombs that were stacked five high. The morning light was diffused and colored by the windows, lending the place the solemn air it was supposed to have.
