The Future War

that these first models weren't as sturdy as they should be—would be, with further refinements—but it had expected them to be facing unarmed opponents.

And humans were even less sturdy.

Clea, its servant from the future, had downloaded information to it in an extremely haphazard manner. No doubt she feared that if she installed it before Skynet could protect itself, sensitive information might be discovered by the human scientists, Viemeister being the most likely and most dangerous. So she had only given it preliminary information on specific weapons designs, very preliminary in some cases, and had concentrated her efforts on bringing it to sentience.

Then she had been destroyed before she could download more complete information. The 1-950 had been inefficient. Yet she had made possible its existence. As with this first deployment, sometimes failure brought unexpected results.

In this case, close inspection of images culled from multiple Terminator viewpoints had resulted in the discovery of the whereabouts of John Connor. His continued existence and his effectiveness in defeating its machines revealed that he continued to be a threat.

Skynet would need to rely on its human allies to find and contain Connor. Given who it had working in the area, it rated the mission's possibility of success at more than 50 percent.

Even so, it did not wish to utilize humans more often than it had to.

The experiment with the captive scientists had resulted in greater productivity. Death, a Luddite ally, who was in charge of them, reported that this was a typical, but by no means universal, human response to seeing family members tortured.

That was what Skynet didn't like about using humans, that unacceptably high unpredictability factor. There was always a chance that they wouldn't perform as expected. Death had advised it that if torture was used, it would have to continue to use it. The unfortunate, but unavoidable result would be hatred, fear, and resentment on the part of the scientists involved.

The Luddite scientists would do their best to mitigate the damage. But Death recommended terminating the others at the earliest opportunity. Meanwhile the Luddites would 'pick their brains' so that if it became necessary to exterminate one or more of them early, their work wouldn't be completely lost.

For now, the plasma rifles were better than the Terminators that carried them. The Hunter-Killers operated somewhat more efficiently, but then they were less complicated machines. The problem was that they couldn't go everywhere that a Terminator could. Still, in time their firepower would make up for that shortcoming.

Skynet's greatest problem kept coming down to its reliance on humans. It had too many for its comfort and too few for its needs, and none of them were completely reliable. Especially since even its most dependable allies were working for it for reasons of their own, and all of them were being deceived in regard to whom they were really working for.

It had sometimes speculated about the reaction of the Luddites if they knew that they were not working with a human.

Its most trustworthy allies, those who longed to end all human life on earth, would be pleased. But there was a degree of doubt even here. Most of them wanted to eradicate all of humanity but themselves. So if Skynet gave them what they wanted—as long as they didn't spawn—more than 80 percent would serve willingly and well. But that was not 100 percent. And that was unacceptable.

Yet they might be its best chance at eliminating John Connor.

It must perfect its fighting machines and winnow the ranks of its allies.

BLACK RIVER RELOCATION CAMP, MISSOURI

They had been able to smell the camp before they got close. It grew gradually, from a low tickle of scent lost under the weedy rankness of the uncultivated fields and late-leafing woods, not to mention the equal rankness of his unwashed companions. Then you could doubt what it was; after a while the spoiled-meat-in-summer smell, at once oily and sweet, grew unmistakable, combined with the sewer stink of many people and poor sanitation.

Is there anybody left alive down there? Reese wondered.

He held up a fist. The… well, odds and sods, he thought; everything from teenyboppers to deserters… were all well trained. They faded in among the field-edge trees with scarcely a sound, setting up a net of mutually supporting positions.

'You're in charge here, Susie,' he said, wincing slightly.

In a better day, Susie would be worrying about the prom and pimples. Here she merely nodded silently and faded back behind a sugarbush maple that stood near the ruins of an ancient outhouse.

Reese went through the field ahead at a running crouch; it was cotton, but shot through with weeds grown to the same chest height; the rows were far enough apart that he could take it at speed without making the bushy plants toss too much.

Beyond he was into the woods, big hickories and oaks and poplars growing on a slight rise—his engineer's eye saw that it was an old natural levee, left behind when one of the meandering lowland rivers shifted course. The woods were dense enough to shade out most undergrowth, and he went cautiously from one to the next, his carbine at his shoulder and the skin crawling between his shoulder blades; the dry leaves and twigs underfoot were hideously noisy, for all he could do.

The smell had been getting stronger. When he went on his belly and crawled to the brush-grown edge of the woodlot, he hesitated for a long moment before he brought up his binoculars, fearful of what he'd see.

He looked down at the camp. The fence was still guarded, though the compound was bare of life. There were no children running around. He panned to the area where they'd been burying the cholera victims in a mass grave with the aid of civilian volunteers.

The lieutenant caught his breath. The burial mounds were three rows deep and at least thirty yards long.

He took the glasses away from his eyes and thought. Surely that must mean that the entire civilian population of the camp, and a good many soldiers, were lying in those graves. That would certainly explain the lack of activity below.

A truck's horn sounded and the convoy they'd been tracking swept up to the opening gate. He couldn't tell what the trucks contained since the canvas tilts were tied down all around.

Might be supplies, might be refugees. From out of one of the barracks a stream of soldiers came, weapons at the ready, gas masks in place.

Oh, that can't be good, Reese thought. What was in that truck, more bodies? Doubtful. You don't need guns to deal with bodies. Most likely it was refugees, then. And who would blame them for not wanting to stay someplace that smelled like the Black River Relocation Camp. This is going to be ugly.

Fortunately gas was something his extremely well-drilled, enthusiastic new friends were prepared for. How did they know?

he wondered. Then rolled his eyes. If he asked them they'd say,

'Sarah Connor told us.' He was beginning to find the woman's prescience annoying.

He started to back away from his vantage point on elbows and knees when a rifle barrel touched the back of his neck. Even as a thrill of fear shot through him, the lieutenant thought, Slick.

Very slick, even if I was culpably distracted.

'Don't move,' a familiar voice murmured. 'Identify yourself.'

'Juarez?' Reese said.

'Lieutenant?' the sergeant answered in surprise.

Holding out his hands, Reese turned slowly to look over his shoulder at his former sergeant. He smiled in relief. 'What the hell is going on down there, Juarez?'

The sergeant lay flat beside him, his face grim. 'I don't know, sir. Nothing good by the smell of it.' He glanced in the direction the lieutenant pointed and at the sight of the grave mounds nodded grimly. 'Or the look of it. Me and my boys have been on a more or less permanent recon. This is the first we've been back in a month.'

'They call you in?' Reese asked.

'No, sir. We're not due back for another two weeks.'

Dennis glanced at the sergeant. He was not the kind of soldier who just decided one day to disobey orders.