Terminator Ficlets
Written for fandom_stocking.
Includes both the movies and Sarah Connor Chronicles, since I can't ever separate them in my mind.
All are PG-13 or lower unless noted.
For maharet83:
Bite.
Derek/Jesse, R. 215 words.
Spoilers through all aired episodes.
Their hair matched, Jesse finally noticed. Dark and thick and she wished his was longer so she could twine them together in ways that couldn't be undone.
John Connor's uncle -- what a mindfuck that was. Metal everywhere in the tunnels, wounded pouring in with blood everywhere, and their side was losing because Connor couldn't see past his pet Terminators. As if you could trust programming to hold when they were made to kill humans.
She'd watched him, the boy with floppy hair and an uncertain smile. She'd heard what Riley had to report about his likes and dislikes and vulnerabilities. Jesse still couldn't figure out why this boy was so special, why he was the one that the survivors would follow into hell.
Derek's palm stroked over her ribcage, and Jesse let herself shiver in response. She leaned down to kiss his lush, full mouth, traced her tongue over the ink embedded in his skin.
When her hand crept downward, he was hard. His breath panted against her neck. John Connor could wait.
Jesse wanted her pleasure. There were so few to be found in her past, after all. She wrapped her knee around Derek and pulled him into her, fast and steady.
The stubble on his cheek scratched her breast. She didn't care.
For dragonsinger:
Vanquish.
John Connor/Kate Brewster. 360 words.
His body was muscled perfection. Kate wished she could look at him and do anything but shudder. Her reaction to metal, no matter how aesthetically pleasing the form, was always to escape.
Or to kill, but this one would be a protector instead of a threat. Once they were done.
She looked over to the tech, busy typing at the programming terminal.
"Will he understand?" Her memories couldn't be trusted, not with all the instances where John had meddled with time. It was vital that this one did nothing but protect John Connor.
The pattern his blood had made against the tunnel wall had reminded her of a Pollack painting, one she'd seen during a school field trip to San Francisco. Before the bombs fell. Before her life turned into a surrealist narrative that Kafka would have killed to write.
The tech nodded, fingers flying over the keyboard. "His only purpose will be to defend John Connor against any and all threats."
Kate traced a fingertip down a bicep. The Terminator's skin was cool. "Make him listen to me," she said suddenly.
The tech looked up, startled. "Ma'am?"
She wished the machine's eyes were open, that she could judge his trustworthiness. "Do it," she told the tech.
She was John Connor's designated successor. She didn't need to explain her whims.
And if she was right, her husband would be beside her, where he belonged, instead of buried beneath an unmarked grave.
She wanted him back, wanted the comfort of his heartbeat against her ear, the softness of his skin under her lips. This cyborg might have taken John from her now, but he could save him then, and warn him about trusting familiar faces.
"Is the time displacement equipment ready?" she asked her aide, standing silent behind her until now.
Jesse nodded, "Yes, ma'am." Her Australian vowels were still exotic no matter how long she'd been attached to Kate's command.
"Let's do this, then," Kate said, determined that her mad start would ripple through time and return the love of her life to his rightful place by her side.
They'd vanquish Skynet together, the way it was meant to be.
For draickinphoenix:
Uncanny.
Crossover with Highlander. Gen. 202 words.
That Adam guy was strange. General Perry knew the world had gone topsy-turvy on Judgment Day, but a dark-haired man he'd never met before (he'd never met any of them before) who could scout irradiated territory and survive, over and over again, was especially bewildering.
The way Adam's head jerked up sometimes, and his eyes scanned a tunnel until he locked on another soldier, another man who looked wary and like a fighter, and both of them nodded at each other then separated, struck Perry as odd too.
Connor wouldn't hear a word against Adam, though. Blond hair against black, bladed nose next to snub, hovering over a tactical map of Skynet positions and debating the best avenues of attack. Adam had an uncanny ability to discern the winning approaches, the ways the hard-scrabble human survivors could fling themselves against hardened bases and not only survive but triumph.
With that kind of track record, no wonder Connor listened to Adam. Even if sometimes Perry couldn't understand the words he said, the accent lilting his voice, the expression in his eyes that said he'd seen worse destruction before, and would live through the turmoil, no matter what.
Better a survivor than a loser.
For larah33:
The Morning After.
Sarah Connor/Kyle Reese. 244 words.
Sarah woke up warm and contented, wrapped around her lover. Without opening her eyes, she ran her fingers down his chest, relishing smooth skin and defined muscles.
His voice rumbled a purr, and Sarah's lips turned up in a smile. Her body ached in the best ways. It'd been too long since she'd brought a guy home. She stretched, and his arm shifted. There was a scar, a large one.
Something wasn't right.
It came back to her in a rush: the deaths of other Sarah Connors, the man trying to kill her, Reese. Kyle. Protecting her. Sarah breathed in sharply, fear returning as she remembered.
"Hey," Kyle said.
Sarah looked at him, so young and so skilled in defending, fumbling yet earnest when she gave into her attraction. She'd never felt connected like that before, like sex went beyond the physical into realms she'd not explored.
"Good morning," Sarah said, and shivered when Kyle traced down her shoulder blade.
He pressed a kiss to her temple. "Sensitive," he said, before doing it again.
"Should we leave?" Sarah asked, but her nails were already sinking into his hip.
Kyle's thigh nudged between her legs. "We've got a little time."
Sarah met his mouth against her nipple with a whimper. She wished they had nothing but time, so they could spend it all together.
Since that wasn't possible, she'd steal a few more minutes, and map the terrain of Kyle's soul so she'd never forget.
For medie:
Introductions.
John Connor/Kate Brewster. 788 words.
Spoilers through all aired episodes.
A flash of copper stops John's sweep of the tunnels, his body stuttering to a halt before his mind catches up. The woman looks tired, dark circles under her eyes, slumped shoulders belying her bright hair, but she straightens when he approaches.
"John Connor," he says, extending a hand.
She blinks at him for a moment, and John almost wants for his reputation, his legend not to exist. The mystique of John Connor is necessary for marshalling the survivors, for organizing them to fight against the machines. He wishes it didn't make it impossible to banish the constant loneliness that lurks inside.
When her palm meets his, he doesn't want to let go. "Kate Brewster," she says.
"Are you doing okay?" There's little enough he can do if she isn't. Sometimes, the question is enough, yet other times John aches at the suffering he sees.
"We could use more antibiotics," is what she says in reply. John's forehead wrinkles; he didn't expect a comment about medicine.
"I work with Kamal Singh in the infirmary," she offers.
"Are you a doctor?" John asks, because if she is, he should have met her before now.
"A veterinarian," she says, a rueful smile emerging. "I made my way from Palmdale a few weeks ago."
He nods. Any medical training is as valuable as weapons. And if she got across the Agua Dulce hills, she's competent at more than healing. "I'll see about sending a patrol out to search the hospitals again. Or warehouses." Maps flicker across his mind's eye, distances and Skynet positions and radiation zones. Martin should be able to help, he's more current on supply caches.
John doesn't like to think about what will happen when they've scavenged everything useful from nearby.
"If you need anything else, find me," he says, and his voice is a little bit more earnest than he usually allows it to be.
He wants to see her again, but a rush of cyborg assaults distracts him. They lose Kim and Morgan and Chi repelling the invasion, and John orders a retreat to a previously-prepared tunnel complex miles away. The dogs aren't spread so thin in their new encampment, and Perry has ideas about multiple checkpoints and lines of fire before letting people roam free. John mourns Cameron once again, even though he knows she'd be more anachronistic now than in 2007. Rubber skin has given way to flesh, but still-crude metal has many, many improvements to make before it can go unnoticed. .
Wounded rest in the new infirmary, which is barely-tamed chaos when John visits. It's important that his fighters know he cares, and John loves and hates the duty in equal measure. If he had his way, none of them would be hurt, ever. They have to be, though, have to throw themselves on the barbed pyre of resistance or humanity will find itself extinct.
He feels eyes watching him, as always. He keeps his posture straight, his bearing one of confidence and security. Low-voiced conversations with his soldiers end with a touch of his hand to a shoulder or forehead, an exhortation to get better.
When he stands, John spots her again: Kate Brewster, red hair remarkably sleek given the scarce bathing facilities.
He nods to her, and she walks to greet him. "How are the antibiotics?" Derek Reese had led the raid, his face appallingly young compared to the seasoned fighter John grew up with after a bank vault transformed into a freeway and eight years disappeared.
"Just what we needed," she says.
John likes her smile. And the way she smells, and this is one of the points where he curses his mother for isolating him as a teenager, because he never knows how to act. His first girlfriend slit her wrists and John withdrew from his peers even more.
Kate looks older than him, maybe in her early 30s instead of his mid-20s. John never answers when people ask him his age, because he doesn't know what to say. Time travel fucks with more than causality.
"Have you eaten?" he blurts out, then hides his wince. Smooth, Connor. Oh so smooth.
She shakes her head, expression puzzled.
"It's not much, but I've got some MREs. 1800 hours? Off indigo corridor?" He can't keep his voice steady, hears the rise toward the end of what shouldn't have been a question. She could refuse now.
She could have refused before, if he were honest with himself. Miraculously, she doesn't. Her smile returns, broader than ever. "I'd love to," Kate says.
John smiles back.
He leaves the infirmary cataloguing his stash of delicacies. He'll break out the chocolate for later, and discover how many different types of smiles Kate can bestow.
For noveltea:
Abundance.
Derek/Sarah. 204 words.
"Can you get groceries today?" Sarah asked just after John left for school.
Derek had been planning to do some recon of the neighborhood, check out the places to avoid and the places they could lose pursuers, but he knew Sarah was hot to investigate something the machine had told her.
"Sure," he said.
"Don't forget the list." She slid a piece of paper, full of scribbles, across the breakfast table.
Later, walking the aisles of Ralph's, Derek had to stop himself from hoarding staples. It was still bizarre, seeing the abundant produce and bread and meat for sale. He remembered scavenging for cans, disregarding expiration dates and wolfing down pears in syrup because they were sweet, and he hadn't eaten anything sweet in forever. Kyle was gone by then, lost to Skynet, and Derek didn't share his treasure with anyone. Didn't have anyone to share it with, no matter how rare.
Once the sun was blocked by fallout, nothing had a chance to grow on the surface.
The cashier looked at Derek's collection of cereal and milk and apples. "Got a family, huh?"
Derek stopped counting twenties and blinked.
He'd never thought of it that way before.
"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I do."
For missyvortexdv:
Prudence.
Cameron/John. 118 words.
The T-888 advanced with a complicated apparatus held in its hands. Cameron could not determine the purpose of the tangle of wires and tubes; prudence dictated that she treat it as a lethal threat.
She turned to John and told him, "Run."
He gave her a brief look, and his face was set in the expression she'd learned to label "anger."
Cameron braced herself for objections, but John didn't argue. He ran toward the lemon grove and their vehicle.
A decision tree of contingency plans flickered through Cameron's processor. Time elapsed and distance would determine where they could rendezvous.
For now, she would repel this attack. Perhaps she could investigate the T-888's invention later. John would like that.
For nelliewu:
Serenade.
Derek gen. 175 words.
Birds twittered outside the bedroom window as dawn broke over the house. Derek woke suddenly, startled into alertness.
He couldn't get used to the sounds of nature, not after so many years in the tunnels. The surface he knew was a place of ash and ruins, with laser zings barely announcing an assault before the H-K's hovered overhead and death descended.
For all that Sarah recognized what was coming, she hadn't lived it. She could imagine, but she couldn't know, not the way Derek did. Maybe that was why she let the metal stay.
Derek wanted to stuff a grenade up the machine's ass, or at least to grab its chip from under that fake brown hair and break it into shards, but Sarah said no. Derek obeyed her orders, mostly, even when he disagreed. Sarah had strategic sense. If anyone could stop Judgment Day, it was her.
Footsteps passed his door, John yelled something about a world history exam, and all Derek could think about was how precious it was to hear birdsong again.
Includes both the movies and Sarah Connor Chronicles, since I can't ever separate them in my mind.
All are PG-13 or lower unless noted.
For maharet83:
Bite.
Derek/Jesse, R. 215 words.
Spoilers through all aired episodes.
Their hair matched, Jesse finally noticed. Dark and thick and she wished his was longer so she could twine them together in ways that couldn't be undone.
John Connor's uncle -- what a mindfuck that was. Metal everywhere in the tunnels, wounded pouring in with blood everywhere, and their side was losing because Connor couldn't see past his pet Terminators. As if you could trust programming to hold when they were made to kill humans.
She'd watched him, the boy with floppy hair and an uncertain smile. She'd heard what Riley had to report about his likes and dislikes and vulnerabilities. Jesse still couldn't figure out why this boy was so special, why he was the one that the survivors would follow into hell.
Derek's palm stroked over her ribcage, and Jesse let herself shiver in response. She leaned down to kiss his lush, full mouth, traced her tongue over the ink embedded in his skin.
When her hand crept downward, he was hard. His breath panted against her neck. John Connor could wait.
Jesse wanted her pleasure. There were so few to be found in her past, after all. She wrapped her knee around Derek and pulled him into her, fast and steady.
The stubble on his cheek scratched her breast. She didn't care.
For dragonsinger:
Vanquish.
John Connor/Kate Brewster. 360 words.
His body was muscled perfection. Kate wished she could look at him and do anything but shudder. Her reaction to metal, no matter how aesthetically pleasing the form, was always to escape.
Or to kill, but this one would be a protector instead of a threat. Once they were done.
She looked over to the tech, busy typing at the programming terminal.
"Will he understand?" Her memories couldn't be trusted, not with all the instances where John had meddled with time. It was vital that this one did nothing but protect John Connor.
The pattern his blood had made against the tunnel wall had reminded her of a Pollack painting, one she'd seen during a school field trip to San Francisco. Before the bombs fell. Before her life turned into a surrealist narrative that Kafka would have killed to write.
The tech nodded, fingers flying over the keyboard. "His only purpose will be to defend John Connor against any and all threats."
Kate traced a fingertip down a bicep. The Terminator's skin was cool. "Make him listen to me," she said suddenly.
The tech looked up, startled. "Ma'am?"
She wished the machine's eyes were open, that she could judge his trustworthiness. "Do it," she told the tech.
She was John Connor's designated successor. She didn't need to explain her whims.
And if she was right, her husband would be beside her, where he belonged, instead of buried beneath an unmarked grave.
She wanted him back, wanted the comfort of his heartbeat against her ear, the softness of his skin under her lips. This cyborg might have taken John from her now, but he could save him then, and warn him about trusting familiar faces.
"Is the time displacement equipment ready?" she asked her aide, standing silent behind her until now.
Jesse nodded, "Yes, ma'am." Her Australian vowels were still exotic no matter how long she'd been attached to Kate's command.
"Let's do this, then," Kate said, determined that her mad start would ripple through time and return the love of her life to his rightful place by her side.
They'd vanquish Skynet together, the way it was meant to be.
For draickinphoenix:
Uncanny.
Crossover with Highlander. Gen. 202 words.
That Adam guy was strange. General Perry knew the world had gone topsy-turvy on Judgment Day, but a dark-haired man he'd never met before (he'd never met any of them before) who could scout irradiated territory and survive, over and over again, was especially bewildering.
The way Adam's head jerked up sometimes, and his eyes scanned a tunnel until he locked on another soldier, another man who looked wary and like a fighter, and both of them nodded at each other then separated, struck Perry as odd too.
Connor wouldn't hear a word against Adam, though. Blond hair against black, bladed nose next to snub, hovering over a tactical map of Skynet positions and debating the best avenues of attack. Adam had an uncanny ability to discern the winning approaches, the ways the hard-scrabble human survivors could fling themselves against hardened bases and not only survive but triumph.
With that kind of track record, no wonder Connor listened to Adam. Even if sometimes Perry couldn't understand the words he said, the accent lilting his voice, the expression in his eyes that said he'd seen worse destruction before, and would live through the turmoil, no matter what.
Better a survivor than a loser.
For larah33:
The Morning After.
Sarah Connor/Kyle Reese. 244 words.
Sarah woke up warm and contented, wrapped around her lover. Without opening her eyes, she ran her fingers down his chest, relishing smooth skin and defined muscles.
His voice rumbled a purr, and Sarah's lips turned up in a smile. Her body ached in the best ways. It'd been too long since she'd brought a guy home. She stretched, and his arm shifted. There was a scar, a large one.
Something wasn't right.
It came back to her in a rush: the deaths of other Sarah Connors, the man trying to kill her, Reese. Kyle. Protecting her. Sarah breathed in sharply, fear returning as she remembered.
"Hey," Kyle said.
Sarah looked at him, so young and so skilled in defending, fumbling yet earnest when she gave into her attraction. She'd never felt connected like that before, like sex went beyond the physical into realms she'd not explored.
"Good morning," Sarah said, and shivered when Kyle traced down her shoulder blade.
He pressed a kiss to her temple. "Sensitive," he said, before doing it again.
"Should we leave?" Sarah asked, but her nails were already sinking into his hip.
Kyle's thigh nudged between her legs. "We've got a little time."
Sarah met his mouth against her nipple with a whimper. She wished they had nothing but time, so they could spend it all together.
Since that wasn't possible, she'd steal a few more minutes, and map the terrain of Kyle's soul so she'd never forget.
For medie:
Introductions.
John Connor/Kate Brewster. 788 words.
Spoilers through all aired episodes.
A flash of copper stops John's sweep of the tunnels, his body stuttering to a halt before his mind catches up. The woman looks tired, dark circles under her eyes, slumped shoulders belying her bright hair, but she straightens when he approaches.
"John Connor," he says, extending a hand.
She blinks at him for a moment, and John almost wants for his reputation, his legend not to exist. The mystique of John Connor is necessary for marshalling the survivors, for organizing them to fight against the machines. He wishes it didn't make it impossible to banish the constant loneliness that lurks inside.
When her palm meets his, he doesn't want to let go. "Kate Brewster," she says.
"Are you doing okay?" There's little enough he can do if she isn't. Sometimes, the question is enough, yet other times John aches at the suffering he sees.
"We could use more antibiotics," is what she says in reply. John's forehead wrinkles; he didn't expect a comment about medicine.
"I work with Kamal Singh in the infirmary," she offers.
"Are you a doctor?" John asks, because if she is, he should have met her before now.
"A veterinarian," she says, a rueful smile emerging. "I made my way from Palmdale a few weeks ago."
He nods. Any medical training is as valuable as weapons. And if she got across the Agua Dulce hills, she's competent at more than healing. "I'll see about sending a patrol out to search the hospitals again. Or warehouses." Maps flicker across his mind's eye, distances and Skynet positions and radiation zones. Martin should be able to help, he's more current on supply caches.
John doesn't like to think about what will happen when they've scavenged everything useful from nearby.
"If you need anything else, find me," he says, and his voice is a little bit more earnest than he usually allows it to be.
He wants to see her again, but a rush of cyborg assaults distracts him. They lose Kim and Morgan and Chi repelling the invasion, and John orders a retreat to a previously-prepared tunnel complex miles away. The dogs aren't spread so thin in their new encampment, and Perry has ideas about multiple checkpoints and lines of fire before letting people roam free. John mourns Cameron once again, even though he knows she'd be more anachronistic now than in 2007. Rubber skin has given way to flesh, but still-crude metal has many, many improvements to make before it can go unnoticed. .
Wounded rest in the new infirmary, which is barely-tamed chaos when John visits. It's important that his fighters know he cares, and John loves and hates the duty in equal measure. If he had his way, none of them would be hurt, ever. They have to be, though, have to throw themselves on the barbed pyre of resistance or humanity will find itself extinct.
He feels eyes watching him, as always. He keeps his posture straight, his bearing one of confidence and security. Low-voiced conversations with his soldiers end with a touch of his hand to a shoulder or forehead, an exhortation to get better.
When he stands, John spots her again: Kate Brewster, red hair remarkably sleek given the scarce bathing facilities.
He nods to her, and she walks to greet him. "How are the antibiotics?" Derek Reese had led the raid, his face appallingly young compared to the seasoned fighter John grew up with after a bank vault transformed into a freeway and eight years disappeared.
"Just what we needed," she says.
John likes her smile. And the way she smells, and this is one of the points where he curses his mother for isolating him as a teenager, because he never knows how to act. His first girlfriend slit her wrists and John withdrew from his peers even more.
Kate looks older than him, maybe in her early 30s instead of his mid-20s. John never answers when people ask him his age, because he doesn't know what to say. Time travel fucks with more than causality.
"Have you eaten?" he blurts out, then hides his wince. Smooth, Connor. Oh so smooth.
She shakes her head, expression puzzled.
"It's not much, but I've got some MREs. 1800 hours? Off indigo corridor?" He can't keep his voice steady, hears the rise toward the end of what shouldn't have been a question. She could refuse now.
She could have refused before, if he were honest with himself. Miraculously, she doesn't. Her smile returns, broader than ever. "I'd love to," Kate says.
John smiles back.
He leaves the infirmary cataloguing his stash of delicacies. He'll break out the chocolate for later, and discover how many different types of smiles Kate can bestow.
For noveltea:
Abundance.
Derek/Sarah. 204 words.
"Can you get groceries today?" Sarah asked just after John left for school.
Derek had been planning to do some recon of the neighborhood, check out the places to avoid and the places they could lose pursuers, but he knew Sarah was hot to investigate something the machine had told her.
"Sure," he said.
"Don't forget the list." She slid a piece of paper, full of scribbles, across the breakfast table.
Later, walking the aisles of Ralph's, Derek had to stop himself from hoarding staples. It was still bizarre, seeing the abundant produce and bread and meat for sale. He remembered scavenging for cans, disregarding expiration dates and wolfing down pears in syrup because they were sweet, and he hadn't eaten anything sweet in forever. Kyle was gone by then, lost to Skynet, and Derek didn't share his treasure with anyone. Didn't have anyone to share it with, no matter how rare.
Once the sun was blocked by fallout, nothing had a chance to grow on the surface.
The cashier looked at Derek's collection of cereal and milk and apples. "Got a family, huh?"
Derek stopped counting twenties and blinked.
He'd never thought of it that way before.
"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I do."
For missyvortexdv:
Prudence.
Cameron/John. 118 words.
The T-888 advanced with a complicated apparatus held in its hands. Cameron could not determine the purpose of the tangle of wires and tubes; prudence dictated that she treat it as a lethal threat.
She turned to John and told him, "Run."
He gave her a brief look, and his face was set in the expression she'd learned to label "anger."
Cameron braced herself for objections, but John didn't argue. He ran toward the lemon grove and their vehicle.
A decision tree of contingency plans flickered through Cameron's processor. Time elapsed and distance would determine where they could rendezvous.
For now, she would repel this attack. Perhaps she could investigate the T-888's invention later. John would like that.
For nelliewu:
Serenade.
Derek gen. 175 words.
Birds twittered outside the bedroom window as dawn broke over the house. Derek woke suddenly, startled into alertness.
He couldn't get used to the sounds of nature, not after so many years in the tunnels. The surface he knew was a place of ash and ruins, with laser zings barely announcing an assault before the H-K's hovered overhead and death descended.
For all that Sarah recognized what was coming, she hadn't lived it. She could imagine, but she couldn't know, not the way Derek did. Maybe that was why she let the metal stay.
Derek wanted to stuff a grenade up the machine's ass, or at least to grab its chip from under that fake brown hair and break it into shards, but Sarah said no. Derek obeyed her orders, mostly, even when he disagreed. Sarah had strategic sense. If anyone could stop Judgment Day, it was her.
Footsteps passed his door, John yelled something about a world history exam, and all Derek could think about was how precious it was to hear birdsong again.