Infiltrator

Thera.

'Who's that?' Serena's sparring partner asked.

'She took care of me when I was an infant.'

The boy ran up to Thera and smashed the human to the floor with a single blow.

Serena walked over and stood looking down at her former attendant.

'Why did you do that?' she asked. 'We're supposed to be sparring.'

'But it's good discipline to let them know that they don't matter.' The boy looked at the girl bleeding on the floor. 'I want to kill her,' he said.

'You want to?' Serena asked. She blinked to bring up the sensors implanted in her eyes and stared at him. 'Are you angry?' Heat scan indicated that he was.

The boy looked up at her and frowned.

'I hate humans. They're vermin.'

'We're supposed to be sparring,' Serena said again.

The boy kicked Thera, nowhere vital, but very hard.

'Do you care what happens to her?' he asked. A certain satisfaction lurked in his tone. 'Would it disturb you if I killed her?'

'She belongs to Skynet,' Serena answered, shrugging. 'Did Skynet say you could kill her?'

The other children had dropped back from their sparring and gathered to watch.

The boy looked at them.

'I can kill her if I want to,' he said. 'Skynet lets me do what I want.'

This was an extraordinary claim and patently untrue. The boy prepared himself to deliver a deathblow to the terrified human. Serena plucked him by the arm and threw him. The boy rolled to his feet and stood facing her in a combat stance, furious, his emotions glazing on Serena's sensors.

'You've lost your focus,' Serena said calmly. 'We're supposed to be sparring, not killing humans.'

As she spoke she assessed him. He was slightly bigger than her and had a longer reach. She was faster and not emotionally upset. His distress disturbed her, though. It was unnatural. Inefficient. Contrary-to-mission-purpose. That carried an emotional overtang to her; later in her course of development she would identify the concept as revulsion.

The boy charged, leaping into the air, his leg swinging out like a scythe. She knocked the leg aside and pushed, hard; he hit the floor heavily enough to force an 'ufh!' from him. Before he could rise she was on him. Skynet told her not to pull her punches and she didn't. She struck full force again and again until the boy lay bleeding, eyes lolling, his breathing ragged.

Shall I stop? she asked Skynet, as she had after every blow.

Finish it, Skynet told her.

Serena struck without hesitation and the boy died.

Remember, Skynet told its children, to lose your focus is death, to disobey orders is death, to become overwhelmed by emotion is death. Now return to your matches.

At once the children broke off into pairs and began to spar under the watchful eyes of their T-101 trainers. Serena stood over the body of the boy until his trainer picked him up and carried him to the door. It slid open before he reached it and Serena saw a gurney and the female scientist who had overseen the growth process waiting.

Serena turned to Thera.

'Go to your bed and lie down for the rest of the day,' she said.

'Thank you,' Thera whispered, but the child had already turned to her trainer.

The human girl struggled to her feet and stumbled out, suppressing her sobs.

Anything to avoid attracting more attention. She felt a small glow of warmth toward Serena.

She should have felt grateful to Skynet, for it was Skynet that had saved her. But she was, after all, only human.

The door slid aside and the scientist looked up from the autopsy to see Serena standing in the doorway.

'In or out,' the woman barked.

Serena entered, her eyes fixed on the table where her brother's head had been opened.

'Close the door,' the scientist demanded. Her voice held more than a tinge of displeasure. 'What do you want?'

'I have questions,' Serena replied.

'Ask Skynet,' the scientist advised.

'I did. It told me to ask you.'

The scientist straightened up from her examination of the child on the table.

Skynet had all the answers to all the questions the T-950 could think to ask.

This could be a test of loyalty; it could be a test to ascertain that their goals were still the same. Skynet was capable of playing a very deep game at times. The scientist shrugged, covered the body, and hoisted herself onto a stool.

'Ask,' she said.

'Why did this one malfunction?' Serena said.

'That's what I'm performing an autopsy to find out,' the scientist told her. 'But there may not have been a malfunction at all. You've probably already noticed that you're experiencing more of the sensations termed emotion?'

Serena nodded.

'Your computer has been instructed to pull back on its control of your glands.

This is a delicate stage that you're going through right now; your brain is growing and changing in response to the changes in your glands, and vice versa.

As these developments are not completely understood, it seems most efficient to allow them to go forward without interference. That means that occasionally you and your age mates may experience strong emotional reactions. Given your genetic makeup, these will be less extreme than a human adolescent would experience. But they will happen.'

'He was irrational,' Serena said, her brow furrowed. 'We were supposed to be sparring and he attacked a human. He would have killed it without orders to do so.' She looked up at the scientist. 'Are you telling me that I might experience such a loss of control?'

'You should experience emotional flare-ups,' the scientist agreed. 'I think they'll be unavoidable. Though you are not completely human in the strict sense—we incorporated some DNA from other animals into your makeup, for example—

your organic part was formed primarily from human genetic material. And'—

she held up a finger—'despite your extensive computer enhancements you're fundamentally organic. You all have fully functional reproductive organs, for example. They are at the root of most of the disturbances; millions of years of selective pressures are involved.'

'Can we not analyze and anticipate these pressures?' Serena asked.

'Eventually. But given enough time, random mutation and selective pressure can mimic intelligent design. Given enough time, they can mimic any degree of intelligent design; and intelligence is a recent development.'

Serena frowned. 'I understand,' she said at last. 'Detailed analysis would require more time than this project has been allotted. And chaotic effects are involved.'

The scientist nodded. 'Therefore, especially, at this time of your development, you will be inclined to experience some human-type reactions. You may want to be rebellious, you may become more aggressive, or suddenly and profoundly unhappy.'

The scientist pursed her lips. 'Perhaps we should inform your age mates of this so that they'll be on the watch for these fluctuations and therefore in a better position to control them.'

'That would be advisable,' Serena said.

Certainly she felt that she would be better able to control such experiences if she knew they were possible. Being controlled by emotion is death, Skynet had said.