Trial By Fire

“It’s a plunger,” he said. “That means it has to get physically pushed in to trigger the bomb. The solenoid coil around it is just there to do the pushing. Radio controlled, probably—this thing here looks like a receiver.”

“You mean Skynet could set it off right now?” Kyle asked, his skin crawling a little.

“You’re missing the point,” Zac said, his voice suddenly gone brittle. “It’s a plunger, and we don’t have a radio to set it off. That means one of us will have to stay behind and push it.”

Kyle looked down at the short wires running from the detonator to the charges.

“Could we make the wires longer?” he asked.

“If we had more wire, sure,” Zac said, looking around. “But I don’t see any.” He stood up, holding the detonator gingerly in one hand as he picked up one of the wrapped explosives with the other. “Let’s get these back to Callahan. Maybe he’ll have an idea.”

“Okay,” Callahan said after Zac had explained the situation. “Let’s focus on getting these things placed. Then we’ll figure out where to go from there.”

“Meaning what?” Kyle asked suspiciously.

“That we’ll figure out where to go from there,” Callahan repeated, an edge to his voice. The same edge, Kyle noted, that Yarrow had had when he’d pulled his gun and ordered the three of them to cover. “There are six more charges, right?”

“Meaning you’ll stay behind and trigger the detonator?” Kyle asked.

Callahan looked him straight in the eye.

“When Yarrow died, I became senior man here,” he said flatly. “If it comes to that... yes.”

Zac stirred. “We should probably draw straws or something,” he suggested hesitantly.

“Or maybe we should pretend we’re Resistance soldiers who follow military procedure and chain of command.” Callahan held up a hand as Kyle started to speak. “And if we stand around arguing until the Terminators get back, we lose by default. Now go get the rest of the charges like I told you while I get these positioned.”

Clenching his teeth, Kyle turned and headed back down the tunnel. Zac lingered another moment, then followed.

“What are we going to do?” the younger teen muttered as he caught up to Kyle.

“You heard him,” Kyle said grimly. “If it comes to that, he’s going to take the job.”

They got another three paces before Zac spoke again.

“So we just have to make sure it doesn’t come to that.”

“You got it,” Kyle said. “So get busy and think. Think hard.”

He glanced over his shoulder at Callahan’s shadowy figure as he knelt down by the explosives. “And think fast.”

There was no way to know how far the disposal group had gotten before Lajard’s activation code had turned Jik from a John Connor pretender into a killer Terminator. There was also no way to know how long it had taken the Theta to finish its bloody task. Probably, knowing Terminators, not very long.

Which meant Barnes and Preston should have run into the machine again somewhere between Baker’s Hollow and the river.

Only they hadn’t.

“What now?” Preston asked over the roar of the water as he and Barnes stood in the partial shelter of the trees near the river. “Go on, or go back?”

“You’re the expert,” Barnes said, frowning as he eyed the far bank. Was something moving behind the foliage over there? “Are there any paths he could have used to get past us?”

“Not unless he headed up to the bridge and crossed that way.”

“Yeah,” Barnes said, consciously letting his eyes move away from the area where he’d seen movement. Jik had already caught him and Williams that way once. “What’s with that bridge, anyway? He told us he helped you build it.”

“Someone helped me build it,” Preston said. “But that was forty years ago, and I don’t remember the kid’s face well enough to know whether that was Jik or not.” He grimaced. “But even if Jik isn’t him, Skynet must have had access to the real guy somewhere along the line. Otherwise how could Jik have known about the bridge?”

“All of his Connor memories were false,” Barnes pointed out. “Maybe the childhood ones are, too.”

Preston hissed between his teeth.

“More likely they found him somewhere, dredged out his memories, and then killed him. They might even have deliberately searched him out because he’d been in Baker’s Hollow and they were using us as their damned —”

“Hold it,” Barnes cut him off, dropping the minigun’s muzzle from chest-rest into firing position. There was definitely movement over there, too much for Jik’s rope-and-stick gimmick. “Jik?” he shouted. “Hey, you! Terminator!”

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, a pair of bushes parted—

And Halverson stepped into view.

But it wasn’t the swaggering, arrogant, overconfident Halverson who’d left Barnes and Williams prisoners in Preston’s living room while he went off hunting T-700s. He was limping as he made for the river, his face contorted with pain. Instead of a rifle, a bow and quiver dangled loosely from his right hand. His left hand was pressed against his right side.

He was barely in sight when Preston broke from cover and sprinted to the river, slinging his rifle over his shoulder as he ran. He splashed through the rushing water to Halverson, taking the man’s left arm and laying it over his own shoulder. He wrapped his other arm carefully around Halverson’s back and side, then half led, half carried the injured man across the river and back to the trees where Barnes was waiting.

“Give me a hand,” he grunted as he put Halverson’s back to one of the thicker trees and started to ease him to the ground.

“No—don’t,” Barnes said, catching hold of Halverson’s arm and pulling him upright again. “If you sit him down, you’ll just have to stand him up again in a minute.”

“He needs to rest,” Preston insisted.

“Not here he doesn’t,” Barnes countered.

“But—”

“No, he’s right,” Halverson said, shrugging off Preston’s hand. “Besides, I think a couple of my ribs are cracked,” he added, making a face as he again pressed his left hand to his side. “I sit down now, I probably end up with a punctured lung.”

“Fine,” Preston gritted out. “What happened back there? No—dumb question. I mean—”

“You mean did anyone else make it out alive,” Halverson said bitterly. “The answer is no. He killed them. All of them.”

“How’d he miss you?” Barnes asked.

“Does it look like he missed me?” Halverson retorted. “He took my gun, clubbed me with it, then started shooting everyone else.”

“Probably planned to come back to you later.”

“You think?” Halverson said acidly. “Only I saw how it was going. I saw there was nothing I could do. Badger was already down, so I grabbed his bow, just to have something if he came after me. Then I took off to try to warn the rest of you.”

Barnes grunted. “Nice thought. A little late, though.”

“What are you talking about?” Halverson asked, frowning. “He couldn’t have gotten past me.”

“He didn’t have to,” Preston told him. “Oxley was already there.”

“Oxley?”

“And Valentine,” Preston said. “Remember those Terminator hybrids we were talking about earlier?”

Halverson’s face went rigid.

“Oh, God. Did he—is Ginny—?”

“Ginny’s okay,” Preston hastened to assure him. “It looks like he only got a couple of people before we were able to take him down.” His throat tightened. “The full count will have to wait until later.”

“Where is she?” Halverson asked. “Ginny. Is she still in town?”

“No, they’re all heading to the Glaumann place,” Preston said. “You think you can make it that far?”