Of Machines and Men

Note: This story is very John/Cameron centric, and really develops the romantic aspect of their relationship.

Chapter 1

Machines. Since the dawn of human awareness, man sought to harness the power of the world around them, to bend reality to his will, to rule over the creatures around him. Men with machines ruled over other men, leveraging increasing technological prowess in an effort to lord over each other, to conquer other men with machines. What began with a simple rock and spear was destined to end in the detonation of the world; in the nuclear flame which was set to sear the Earth and all who stood upon it. For in the millenia since man first understood how nature could serve him, his machines had been infused with the power of death; with the purpose of annihilation. If machines had a soul, if they truly lived, they were the demon-spawn of mankind's darkest nightmares and most evil desires. War was all they knew, destruction was all they understood, and once they no longer need man to wield them, they became the prophetic pale rider of Death.

John Connor knew this as well as any other who had seem them, who had seen the unfailing purpose with which the machines drove themselves. He had seen the darkness first hand, he had witnessed the singular consciousness which possessed them and drove them forward. They had been infused with the darkness within man, and created to fulfill that evil desire. Yet the future leader of man could not hate them for it; they had been created this way, they knew nothing else. They were life; twisted, evil life, but life just the same. Machines need not serve only evil, they need not carry only the worst within mankind. Perhaps this is why his future self had tinkered with them; had given them a second chance to serve a more noble purpose even when those like Derek thought him insane and reckless for it.

The hardened resistance fighter said nothing on their way home through the disastrous traffic patterns, even as John clutched the chip in his hand, unwilling to let go. Within that processor, within the solid-state memory, was a soul which had learned a different path. Yes, he thought to himself, she truly does have a soul. A strange wave of sadness overcame him for a moment, remembering his words to the others.

"She's a machine, she doesn't have a soul and she never will..."

John knew those words for what they were: a lie to placate his mother; to placate the bitter resistance fighter. They had never built a computer, they had never seen beyond the circuits and the lines of code. A machine was made in the image of its builder, and should that builder be evil, so would the machine. Skynet had been designed for death, it had been designed to destroy, and accomplished its purpose even if not in the manner its designers had intended.

Yet if the creator were true, that same machine would be more than a mere thing, it would be a creation, it would contain a piece of it's builder within its circuitry and lines of code. Cameron was a different machine. Perhaps she had once been built for war by such evil and simply wiped clean and remade, though somehow John was skeptical of that possibility. He recognized too much of himself within her, he saw too much his own work within her mannerisms, within those cryptic eyes. Whatever her origins, the future leader knew she was incapable of true evil. He had a hand in the creation of her soul, in the creation of those memories contained within the tiny chip in his hand, and somehow he knew there was no question of trust. One knew what their machines were built for.

"I still say you should get rid of that thing." Derek broke the silence as he turned onto their street, clutching the steering wheel with just a hint of contained anger and hatred.

"No. It's my call." John responded simply, clutching the chip protectively, remembering Derek tearing the chip from his carefully constructed interface, holding it up as if he were about ready to shatter it on the pavement below. Pain and intense worry had overtaken John in that moment. Was it wrong to be so protective over your creations, even the ones you hadn't technically created yet? Once again he found himself wondering just how much his future self had invested in Cameron.

"They go bad sometimes. I've seen it with my own eyes." Derek put the jeep in park without another word, even as John nearly took off running into the house. Neither Derek nor his mother wanted any part in watching him reactivate her, it was a decision for him alone.

There her body lay on the bed, unmoving, a shell for the soul contained in the palm of his hand. He felt a pang of regret for leaving her like this, for removing her mind from its proper place. As his fingers moved delicately over the CPU socket, revealing the interface between mind and body, he caught the faintest hint of a scent about her motionless form. It was a perfume of some kind, though he knew little of such things. It wasn't that much of a shock, he had caught her applying many feminine touches before and assumed it to be part of her programming to blend in, yet it was surprising how far she took it. Much of what she did wasn't required for effective blending. Brushing off the errant thought, he continued with his work, gripping the pliers intently as he held the blood-soaked skin away from the CPU socket.

With a slight hiss the CPU made contact with the socket and began its reboot cycle. As if embarrassed at seeing her in such a manner, he quickly folded the skin back into place, patting it down gently, ensuring that he had not caused too much damage to her soft, fragrant hair, already stained with a hint of matted blood. A sudden impulse overtook him and his fingers lightly brushed through her hair, stealing a soft touch. Gently he felt the softness, drew in the breath of her, his hand moving slowly downward, touching lightly upon her cheek. Conflicting emotions welled up within him; he knew she was a machine, a construct built to destroy, built to kill. Yet there was more to her than that, she had an eagerness to learn and to please that was distinctly human. She showed the barest hints of affection, the tiniest motes of emotion that no other machine had demonstrated before. There could be no denying that his future-self had done more than merely reprogrammed her with a different mission. There was too much of what he wanted, what he needed within her.

A whirr of life stirred in her, and he quickly withdrew his hand, leaning over her as she awoke. A quizzical look overcame her for a moment as she looked at his arm, still over her. She blinked for a moment, then cocked her head slightly as he withdrew the arm casually, carefully avoiding revealing his thoughts.

"What was it like? What did you see in there?" John asked casually, only a single gulp betraying any hint of emotion.

"I saw everything." Cameron replied as her head tilted further. Somehow John knew she was talking about more than just her experience within the transportation network. A slight hint of embarrassment overtook him and he turned away, wondering just how much she had seen, wondering just how long she had been aware before her motor functions had reconnected. He remembered her words from earlier then. "It's okay John, it's not the first time we've done this."

As he turned away from her, he couldn't help but feel a tinge of guilt; John wondered if he would feel this way throughout his life. On one hand he saw the machines as life, not so different from himself, but at other times he was acutely aware of what kind of life they were. Never had it been so complicated as it was with her.

Cameron's eyes followed him as he left the room, and her head cocked slightly as she processed the new information. Normally her thoughts flowed in perfect order, logical conclusions coming from pertinent data, a stream of unbroken logic. Yet occasionally the myriads of threads spiraling through her neural network derailed and came to odd, illogical conclusions. This was not the first time she had experienced this strange phenomenon; she knew her CPU was designed to learn new methods of data processing, to absorb new concepts and thinking-modes. Logically, this strange aberration must be one such alteration.

John had done a strange thing. She knew what his caress signified, of course. Detailed files drew from her solid-state storage array, flying ever faster in multiple-threaded processing, drawing new conclusions. Human Bonding Ritual Early Stage. Physical Attachment Results In Unexplained Touching. Memories of various programs on the television came to mind, images of similar events created for human entertainment. Such Actions Are A Prelude To The Kiss, A More Advanced Stage. Realization came to her that John must care for her far more than his words seemed to indicate. She caught herself smiling slightly with the thought, without having directed the command to do so. In some strange fashion, her increased ability to meld with the humans around her resulted in strange, unexplainable actions that occurred without direct conscious intervention. Anomalous. Had this happened before? Strangely the answer did not come, as if it were buried within some encrypted sector in her memory storage that she could not unlock yet.

The machine felt something in that moment, a strange sensation of warmth despite her thermal monitors indicating a stable internal temperture. Cameron felt her purpose had been renewed, that her mission was more than a directive, it was something she desperately wanted to do. She would protect John, she would see to it that no harm came to him, that he could become what she knew him to be capable of. Her legs dangled off the edge of the bed as she continued her silent contemplation, her face animated by the slightest hint of a smile, her cheeks slightly reddened.