He took the rest of the corner in a dive, pulling Star with him as the stream of lead raked down the wall of the shanty from somewhere behind them, raining bits of wood and brick across his back and legs.
Kyle winced, squinting against the dust as the rounds began tracking back and forth, methodically perforating the walls of the makeshift structure. He risked a quick look, and through the disintegrating walls spotted two T-600s marching stolidly toward them, miniguns blazing.
Their only chance now was an all-or-nothing run for the archway. Getting a fresh grip on Star’s hand, Kyle prepared himself.
And then, to his stunned surprise, a head and torso rose into view through one of the upper windows of the overturned bus half a block away.
It was another Terminator. Only this one was between them and the Ashes.
Kyle froze, the roar of the miniguns in his ears drowning out the painful thudding of his heart.
So that was it. He and Star were caught in the open between two groups of killing machines.
They were dead.
Unbidden, tears welled up in his eyes. Not tears of fear or anger, but of frustration and shame.
He’d failed. He’d failed himself, and he’d failed Orozco.
Worst of all, he’d failed Star.
He frowned, blinking away the tears as something strange caught his attention. The Terminator in the bus wasn’t looking at him and Star. In fact, it was looking in almost exactly the opposite direction.
He studied the machine, his flash of shame fading as he tried to figure out what was happening.
Orozco had told him all the Terminators were linked together through Skynet, so that what one Terminator saw or heard could be passed on to any of the others.
The Terminators shooting up the shanty beside him knew that he and Star were here. So how could the machine in the bus
And then the Terminator in the bus opened fire, its minigun raking the side of the old corner store half a block further north.
And abruptly, Kyle understood. The Terminator knew he and Star were there, all right. It just didn’t care. All it cared about right now was trying to kill the people he could see cowering inside the store.
And when it had accomplished that,
Kyle hissed out a breath, a surge of anger driving out the last remnants of his momentary panic.
He didn’t know who the people in the store were, whether they were a fire team Orozco had sent or just a group of civilian refugees running from Skynet’s slaughter.
But who they were didn’t matter.
What mattered was that Kyle still had two bombs left, and a good throwing arm.
“You think we were annoying before?” he muttered as he reached into his shoulder bag. “Let me show you what annoying
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
Connor had moved to the north-facing window and was assisting Bishop and Tony in their efforts to keep the group of T-600s there at bay when he heard the explosion from behind him.
“You get it?” he shouted over his shoulder to Joey.
“It’s got,” Joey called back, sounding bewildered. “But not by me.”
“What?” Connor demanded, turning around and looking through the other window.
The bus was a shambles, all right. Its edges had been splayed outward by a seriously healthy blast, its empty windows and other openings flickering with light from the small fires the explosion had ignited inside it.
And Joey was, indeed, still clutching the squad’s last grenade.
Connor had no idea what had happened, but this wasn’t the time to try to figure it out. From the look of the bus, the explosion had been strong enough to rattle the Terminators’ electronics and temporarily stun them. But unless it had been powerful enough to dismember them, they would soon be up and running again.
Someone had to get to them before that happened, and put them out of action permanently.
“Joey, Tony: take them out,” Connor ordered, jerking his head back at the other four T-600s who had suddenly stepped up the tempo of their attack. “Bishop: you’re with me.” Without waiting for acknowledgment, he zigzagged through the debris of the store, dived through the east-facing window, and sprinted toward the bus.
He was nearly there when he suddenly realized he and his team weren’t alone. Half a block away, at the next street to the south, he could see two figures: a child and young adult or teen, cowering against a building that was being steadily demolished around them. More Terminators on their way into the battle zone, with the two kids caught in the middle of it.
He had reached the bus and was leaning in for a closer look when Bishop caught up to him.
“How many?” she asked, panting.
“Two,” Connor told her. The word was barely out of his mouth when the crunching blast of a C4
grenade came from behind them. “You take close,” he added, “I’ll take far.” Ducking his head, he stepped inside the vehicle.
The two Terminators were lying on the ground, unmoving, their miniguns momentarily silenced.
Great sections of their rubbery skin had been torn away by the blast, and a couple of joints on each one were no longer looking quite right.
Mentally, Connor threw a salute to whoever it was who’d put together this particular explosive.
Even considering the concentrating effect the confined space would have had on the blast, it had still been one hell of a bomb.
Stepping over the first Terminator, he placed the muzzle of his MP5 against the dented skull of the second and squeezed the trigger.
It took two three-round bursts to batter through the tough metal. But when the echoes had died away, the last hint of red glow had faded from the machine’s eyes.
Terminated.
Connor looked back at Bishop, gave her a thumb’s-up and got one in return, then grabbed hold of one of the skeletal seat frames and climbed up to the top side of the bus. Hoping it wasn’t too late to save the two kids he’d seen out there, he eased his head cautiously through one of the windows.
He had had long experience with the kind of firepower Skynet had put into the hands of its T-600s, and he’d seen what that firepower could do. But even Connor found himself in awe at how the scene outside had changed during the handful of seconds he and Bishop had been inside the bus.
The structure the kids had been huddling beside was gone. All of it. There were still a few sections of wall standing, but nothing taller than half a meter and most considerably shorter. The roof, what was left of it, had collapsed into the house, and was lying in broken pieces across broken furniture and other unidentifiable bits of material.
And with the building no longer in the way, Connor could now see the two T-600s approaching from fifty meters away.
“There,” Bishop said from the next window, jabbing a finger over Connor’s shoulder.
Connor looked where she was pointing. Sure enough, the two kids were still there, hugging the ground in front of one of the few remaining pieces of wall.
“Can we take them?” Bishop asked.
Connor grimaced. Bishop was experienced enough to know that the answer to that was no. Not just the two of them, not with the weapons they had available.
But if they didn’t do something, those two kids were dead.
“Let’s find out,” Connor said. Hauling his MP5 up through the window, he pointed the muzzle at the approaching T-600s and opened fire.
