Rising Storm

'Hit the dirt!' Dieter yelled, throwing himself down.

He rolled toward the car and hugged the side, looking into the darkness. Around him men in black leapt aside, disappearing as if by magic. Waylon, Luke, and Luis huddled at the back of the car as Bridges dug out his keys and unlocked the trunk.

'Let me out of these!' Dieter demanded.

Luke looked at Waylon, who hesitated, then nodded. Luke slipped forward, digging in his pocket for his key ring. He unlocked the cuffs and Dieter chaffed

his wrists, giving the other man a hostile glance.

'Friends of yours?' he asked, gesturing toward the darkness.

Luke shook his head, then said 'no' softly. 'We didn't tell anybody about this.

Didn't want to give anybody else a cut.'

Von Rossbach grunted. 'You'd better give me a gun, then,' he said, and began to work his way to the back of the car.

The Infiltrator's permission to kill had been acted upon instantly, much to Alissa's dismay. Only one of the Terminators was in position; the others were still on the way. Her own fault, she realized, she should have phrased the order differently. More firepower would have made all the difference.

Only one human was down and Alissa, looking on remotely, was appalled.

Everything in her own experience and even in Serena's—up until the end, that is

—had led her to believe that humans were easy prey. It was only when the Connors were involved that things became difficult.

Therefore, the Connors, one or both, were present. In which case there was no need to capture von Rossbach. Which should make things easier.

Even so the humans had reacted much more quickly than expected. The fault, of course, was that never in their brief existence had these Terminators faced humans who had been trained to kill and to respond to threat. Nor had she for that matter, a fact that suddenly frightened her. *Terminate all humans present,*

she ordered. *Let none escape.*

John led the two commandos over the gentle rise just in time to see another black-clad man below them spin and fall. Instinctively he fell to the ground; his captors followed suit.

'Roger that,' one of them said softly. 'I can't see anyone.'

Neither could John, but he was betting that the shooter had been in front of the man shot and he watched that side of the landscape, frustrated by the almost total darkness. He glanced back at the gully; only the civilians, if you could count Dieter as such, were huddled around the car, looking around anxiously. John assumed that meant there'd been no more shooting.

Heck, John thought, this is the great Southwest. It might have been some fool out shooting bottles and cans a mile away.

He turned toward his escorts and instinctively signed Quiet! Someone's coming!

—indicating the direction by pointing with two fingers. The men lowered their nightscopes and looked. One man! one of them signaled.

John could barely make him out; then off in the distance he saw another hint of movement. Hardly even movement; shadows among shadows, a clatter of a small rocks, shapes trotting forward. Somewhere a coyote howled, distant and as cold as the stars winking into sight in the darkening sky.

They're not exactly sneaking around out there, he thought. Then the hair stood up on the back of his neck. My God. It's them. Terminators. There was no mistaking that straight-forward walk that disregarded terrain and bullets equally.

How many of them are there? Three at least, he answered himself, counting the shooter. He alerted the commandos, pointing off toward the one he'd spotted. He

could no longer see it; the desert was becoming as black as pitch.

Clearly these Terminators weren't in position yet and John wondered why the attack had gone forward without them.

Time seemed to crawl by as the four Terminators closed in on the gully. Alissa had read of this phenomenon, but this was the first time she'd experienced it. She pouted unhappily even as she felt her emotions becoming more and more muted due to the rebalancing of her brain chemistry that her computer was arranging.

Knowing there were armed humans lurking in the dark, she'd ordered the Terminators to approach stealthily. To them that seemed to mean slow down.

For this she was not to blame. Their programming was designed to deal with a different war. Clearly this was something that she and her sister would have to look into.

She frowned impatiently, switching her viewpoint back to the first Terminator on the scene. The humans in the gully had taken refuge behind the car. The man who'd been shot was no longer in evidence. When queried, the Terminator confirmed that he'd been dragged behind the car by von Rossbach and one of the others.

Alissa regretted that the Terminator didn't have a rocket launcher; one shell and problem solved. One of those approaching did have one. But they'd slowed yet again in the interests of silence, so she'd have to wait for the satisfaction of seeing her enemy blown to pieces. She wanted to tell them to get it over with, but held back. She'd already been too impulsive tonight; there was no sense in giving herself more cause for dissatisfaction.

And on the other hand, despite her suspicions, there had been no sign of the Connors. Perhaps she should amend her orders. Well, she'd consider it.

The Sector commandos had counted four men approaching and reported their positions to their fellows. All remained silent in the gully and John surmised that someone had jumped the gun and now was holding back, waiting for reinforcements. That wasn't like a Terminator. Their method was to go for their target. Undirected, the shooter would have been down in that gully exchanging fire ten minutes ago.

Which means, he thought, that we've got another… Serena Burns on our hands, for want of a better name. Another of Skynet's little surprises. Maybe she's less experienced. Then he thought irreverently, There are always two, a master and an apprentice…

He watched the gully for movement, trusting the commandos to watch the approaching Terminators. He wanted badly to warn them what to expect, but knew better; he'd been here before. They'd find out soon enough; let them keep their innocence awhile longer. Perhaps, though…

'These guys are going to be very hard to stop,' John said. 'Real hard. Sort of like armored-car hard. You won't believe me now, but keep it in mind.'

The black-clad gunmen gave skeptical grunts; John shrugged and looked back to the gully. He wondered why the five men huddled behind the dubious protection of the car didn't retreat to the rocks? At least rocks didn't explode when a rocket hit them.

Dieter van Rossbach had seen a lot of wounds. Sully didn't have a sucking chest

puncture, but it was bad, bleeding freely, and might be worse inside. He packed it with bandages from the pouches on the Sector agent's harness, tightened the straps to hold pressure on it, and stabbed a hypo of painkiller from the field medical kit through the cloth of his uniform and into his arm.

All that I can do, he thought, and looked at the two arms dealers. 'You're going to contribute some equipment to this, ratfuck,' he said, keeping the explanation on a level he estimated their shock- numbed brains could handle. 'Do you have any night-sight gear?'

Waylon swallowed as Dieter slipped the trunk open. 'Yeah,' he said. 'In the red plastic box by the spare.'

Dieter grunted satisfaction as he slipped the goggles over his head and switched them on. The world sprang back into clear vision, in shades of green and silver; not as good as full light, but fighting Terminators when they could see and you couldn't wasn't his idea of fun. The two arms dealers watched with awe as he loaded up from the rest of their samples; four LAWs across his back—those were collapsible one-shot rockets—a heavy Barrett .50 rifle in his arms, and a slung grenade launcher with a bandolier of 40mm shells. He picked out a few extras—thermite