Terminator Salvation - From the Ashes

“How soon?” Orozco asked.

Kate paused mid-turn. “We think you’ve got until tomorrow night,” she said.

Less than two days. “Any suggestions?” Orozco asked, forcing his voice to stay calm.

“Explosives are always a good place to start,” Tunney said. “T-600s have electromagnetic cores built into strategic joints so that they can reassemble themselves if you blow off their arms or legs.

Blow them far enough off, though, and that trick won’t work anymore.”

“Do you have access to explosives?” Kate asked. “We might be able to spare you some.”

“I have some,” Orozco assured her. “And the makings for quite a few more.”

“Good,” Tunney said, glancing around the lobby. “You could also consider rigging a few booby-traps. There’s a lot of heavy stonework in here, especially this archway and the stone facing above it. Collapse a wall on a Terminator, and even if you don’t destroy it you’ll put it out of action for awhile.”

“Of course, blowing up walls could also bring the whole building down on top of us,” Orozco pointed out.

“There is that,” Tunney conceded. “I notice you also have a fair number of guns, which is good.

How many of them are large caliber—9mm, .45, or bigger?”

“A fair number,” Orozco said. “Unfortunately, a lot of our armament is smaller than that.”

“Those won’t do much against Terminators,” Kate said grimly.

“But if you can get in enough head shots with the larger rounds, the T-600s will usually go down,” Tunney said. “You can also go for the joints—if you can cripple them, they aren’t as much trouble.” He pursed his lips. “Of course, if Skynet throws in more than a couple of HKs, life will get trickier.”

“Your other choice is to run,” Kate said. “Collect everyone you can, collect everything you can, and get out.”

“And go where?” Orozco countered. “Is there any place that’s safe from Skynet?”

Kate’s lip twitched.

“No,” she admitted.

“Then there’s not much point in running, is there?” Orozco said.

Barnes snorted contemptuously.

“Or you could just roll over and die,” he growled. “Guess that’s up to you.”

“I wish it was up to me,” Orozco said ruefully. “Unfortunately, it isn’t.”

From behind him came the sound of an opening door, and he turned to see Grimaldi’s men filing out of the chief’s office. Apparently the skull session—or chewing out—was over. A couple of the men glowered at Orozco and Kate as they all headed together across the lobby and into the hallway that ran along the north side of the building.

“Excuse me a moment,” Orozco said, and he headed after them.

Halfway across the lobby, as he circled the old fountain, he glanced back over his shoulder to discover that Kate and her people had quietly disappeared.

He caught up with the nearest of the men, Wadleigh, halfway down the hallway.

“What are you doing?” Orozco asked him.

“What do you think?” Wadleigh retorted. “We’re going to find Connor’s back door and plug it.”

“Go ahead and find it,” Orozco said. “But don’t plug it. Not yet.”

Wadleigh snorted. “Sorry, Orozco, but the chief gave orders.” He turned away.

Orozco caught his arm and turned him back around.

“Find the door,” he repeated, enunciating each word carefully and distinctly, “but don’t plug it.

Put a bar across it if you want, or pile a few bricks on it that can be quickly removed. But don’t plug it.”

Wadleigh started to speak, took another look at Orozco’s face, and nodded silently. Orozco held his arm another moment, then released it. Wadleigh turned and continued down the hallway, hurrying but trying not to look like it.

Orozco watched for another moment, then returned to the lobby.

Four people. Only four people had been willing to leave the Ashes’ false sense of security in order to take on the more immediate risks of standing up against humanity’s common enemy. Only four people. And one of them had been just a teenager—

Orozco felt his breath catch in his throat.

Damn.

Damn.

CHAPTER

TEN

His measured tread switched to a reckless sprint as he tore across the lobby toward the entrance. He reached the archway, automatically getting a grip on his holstered Beretta as he dashed outside.

But Connor and his people were already gone.

Orozco took a couple of deep breaths, swearing viciously and uselessly to himself as he looked up and down the street. His plan had been to wait until Tunney’s recruitment talk was over, then quietly call them in from the sniper’s nest so they could meet the Resistance team.

But in all the excitement and tension it had completely slipped his mind. Now, it was too late.

Swearing one last time under his breath, he gave the hand signal to call Kyle and Star back in.

A minute later the two kids emerged through the battered doorway, Kyle with the Remington cradled ready in his arms, a taut look on his face.

“Where did all those other people come from?” he called as they started across the street. “They went south—I couldn’t see how far. Zac and Callahan and the Iliakis were with them. They weren’t being—I mean —?”

“No, they weren’t being kidnapped,” Orozco assured the teen as he took back the Remington.

“They left entirely of their own free will.”

“Should I have tried to stop them?” Kyle persisted, clearly still concerned that he’d failed in his assigned duty. Maybe he was assuming Orozco’s frustration was directed at him. “Maybe pinned them down until you could get there? I didn’t hear any shots, but there were all those others with them—”

“Kyle, you did fine,” Orozco said firmly, resting a reassuring hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Just relax, okay? I’m just sorry you didn’t get a chance to meet them.”

“Okay,” Kyle said, still sounding a little uncertain, as Orozco led the way back under the archway into their building. “Who were they, anyway?”

“Resistance recruiters,” Orozco told him. “They—”

“They were Resistance?” Kyle interrupted sharply, an unreadable expression on his face.

“That’s what they said,” Orozco answered, taken aback by the unexpected intensity of the boy’s reaction. “Why? Did you recognize any of them?”

Kyle looked away.

“No,” he said, his voice back under control again. “I just…wondered.”

“Ah,” Orozco said, letting the subject drop and looking around the lobby. Barney and Copeland, who had ostensibly been guarding the entrance, and who had really been put there to draw down on Barnes’ men, had of course disappeared with the rest of Grimaldi’s crowd.

“I guess you and I are on guard duty,” he commented to Kyle. “Unless you need to get some sleep.”

“I’m okay,” Kyle said, looking at Star. “So’s Star.” He peered closely at Orozco. “You’re the one who needs sleep.”

“I’ll be fine until Johnson and Baker show up for their shift.” Orozco handed the Remington back to Kyle. “Go put this away, if you would, and get me the M16.”

Kyle nodded and headed for the arms locker, Star trailing as always behind him.