The Eternal Heart: Fragile Package

Ever since John Connor had announced the fact that he had decided to stay with Katherine and not be with me, things had become harder for me. When I had a moment to think I would think of all that could’ve been and how it couldn’t be now.

But whenever I focused on Resistance business I forgot about my feelings for John, if only for a little bit. I’d focus on not getting myself or my fellow Resistance fighters killed. I practiced and exercised more than I needed to. However, I never pushed myself past my limits. I didn’t want to be in a battle and be too worn down to continue.

John still gave me private lessons and those had become less awkward as time went on. But our glances at each other never went away. I doubted my feelings for him could ever go away. However, I didn’t interfere with his marriage and he would try to set me up with someone from time to time. I would never go out with someone other than John, though, so his attempts were useless.

I had mixed feelings about going on the simple mission with Katherine, Barnes, and Star.

Katherine was John’s wife and was still uneasy about John’s feelings towards me, but I still felt I had to protect her. If she died then John would never forgive me.

Barnes and I had become closer. By closer I mean that he kept his hate of me to a bare minimum when I was around him.

Star was the only one I didn’t have any bad feelings towards. Kyle Reese and I had been on a mission or two together so I had learned to trust his judgment. When I had first met him he had said he loved Star. I trusted his opinion and was going to make sure Star came out of her first mission safe.

I finished getting ready and headed to the chopper. I waved at some of my comrades and they nodded back. I was glad that they had opened up to me more. At least I didn’t get the feeling that they would try and kill me the first chance they got.

Upon arriving to the chopper I saw my team members. Barnes was standing close to Katherine and having a conversation with her. This didn’t surprise me at all since he was one of John’s most loyal soldiers. Plus he had another reason.

I controlled the grimace that tried to come to my face as I looked at Katherine’s round belly. It was a painful reminder of how intimate John was with her. Barnes nodded at me and Katherine continued to ignore me.

It was then I looked at Star who was nervous. It had always been hard to read her, almost like she was a machine herself, but I could tell she was uneasy.

“Hey.” I said to her as I walked towards her.

“Hi.” She replied and looked me directly in the eyes for a second before she got too afraid and looked away.

“You fought against the machines since you were young.” I told her. “You and Kyle managed to stay alive until you ran into John.”

“I know I’ll survive.”

“Then why take so long to go on a mission of your own?”

“I’ve been on guard duty. I’ve been to every training session. Hell, I’ve helped train new recruits from time to time.”

“But you’ve never been on a mission of your own.”

Star looked at something that was on the opposite side of the hanger from me. Like Barnes she had dark skin, but unlike Barnes her hairstyle was different. It was poofy. Since I didn’t have memories from before Judgment Day, I didn’t know what to call the hairstyle. But it was nice.

“What’s the reason?” I asked. “I know it’s not because you’re scared of dying.”

“I don’t want to be in charge.” Star whispered and looked around to see if anyone else was listening. “If I do good I’ll be told to handle people’s lives.”

“It’s not a good feeling.” I said, even though I had only been in charge of a mission only once before this. And that was only because my commander had died on the mission. “But if you don’t want responsibility, it means you’re less likely to do something stupid.”

“So I guess that means giving you power is bad.” Barnes said as he walked up behind me.

“Hey, at least I’m not you. Means I can’t do too bad.”

Star hid a smile and I looked at my group.

“Get in the chopper, we need to head out quickly.” I told them.

“It’s only a scouting mission, we don’t need to hurry.” Barnes replied.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean there can’t be danger.”

With that Barnes and Star went in the chopper and Katherine joined me in the cockpit.

I checked that the chopper was going to work throughout the scouting mission and avoided Katherine’s gaze when I could. It was like she was trying to kill me with a look.

“You know I had to convince John to allow you on this mission.” I told her, trying to bring her to my side.

“John didn’t mention that to me.” Katherine countered.

“Because I managed to convince him before he said something to you. I told him it was only a scouting mission and that the twins won’t be in danger.”

“How did you know I was going to have twins?”

“John told me. He was really excited about the news.”

“What else does he tell you?”

“Stuff I pretend to be interested in.”

“But I’m not going to give birth for a week or two, John shouldn’t be worried.”

“Tell John that.” I said as I took off.

*                *                 *

I felt the tension in the cockpit ease. I knew Katherine didn’t like me, but she had to know that John trusted me. He trusted me but wasn’t going to leave her for me.
The silence in the chopper was deafening. I didn’t much care for Katherine, but I had no idea beforehand of the hate she harbored for me. I could understand, although very vaguely, of why she wouldn’t like me. I was the person that John was attracted to and had talked of leaving her for.

To distract myself from the silence I looked at the radar and the scenery. Though the scenery really just consisted of decaying buildings and some movements on the ground. But I couldn’t tell if the movements were from Resistance fighters, nomads, or Skynet. It wasn’t my place to determine that and Katherine didn’t speak.

Her silence might be her way of discrediting me later. While that wasn’t comforting on its own, it was comforting to know that it must not be that bad for her to hide it from me. Katherine might loathe me, but she would never put her hatred of me above the protection of the Resistance. In that way John had chosen a good wife.

I had let the silence go on for so long since I had failed to get a conversation started with her earlier. If she wasn’t going to make the effort to reply, I wasn’t going to make the effort to talk.

“So how do you keep your hair like that?” I heard Barnes ask by way of the headsets.

“I don’t think Kyle would like you asking questions about his girlfriend’s hair.” I joked as I needed to say something. The silence was getting really bad.

“Is that really how you think pick-up lines work?”

“Hey, it’s not my fault if I’m a little uneducated in certain areas.”

“Just certain areas?” Barnes replied and I could see a smile briefly on Katherine’s face.

“What, you acting like you’re better than me?”

“I’m human.”

“Well, you’re not a very good example.” Star said dryly.

I grinned as she had just ended a silence that could’ve gone on a long time.

“Barnes is an excellent example. John trusts him.” Katherine said, defending the man.

“So you’ve decided to talk?” I asked Katherine.

She became silent. Smooth, Jash, very smooth.

“Well, you got one defender.” I said after the silence went on for a few minutes.

“That’s more than you have.” Barnes tried to counter.

“I’ve got the leader of the Resistance on my side. Other people have seemed to act kinder to me as of late.”

“But you’re never going to fu-“

“You keeping track of those movements?” Katherine asked and I could tell that her reason for interrupting wasn’t to check on anything.

Not even Barnes could bring up my obsession with John while she was around.

“My job is to look at the radar and your job is to look at the ground.” I replied dryly. “Tracking movements on the ground isn’t important in this point in time. We’re still a little bit away from the area we’re supposed to scout. But tracking movements on the ground for now could give us some hints for future missions.”

“You like commanding me, don’t you.” Katherine said.

“No, I’m just doing my job. Besides, dealing with you means dealing with John later. It isn’t always the best thing when you have something negative to say about me.”

Katherine formed a small smile on her lips and I sighed. She liked causing me pain and I’d like to cause her some pain at this moment. But she could get away with any jabs at me while I couldn’t. Sort of sucked to be me at the moment.

“What are the movements on the ground like?” Star asked.

“Nothing threatening.” Katherine replied. “No movements that would signal that they’ll be involved with our scouting mission later on.”

“That’s good.” I said and then noticed something strange on the radar.

Skynet wasn’t human and could move ahead of what us humans were capable of. Luckily that had proved not to be such a big advantage in the war so humans could still have victories. One thing Skynet had done was tamper with how radar saw their different Terminators. Depending how important a Terminator was, such as one going to infiltrate a Resistance base would have higher priority over one fighting in the battlefield, they could get it so that radar would pick them up as something else.

Luckily the Resistance had a decent percentage of spotting when this trick was being used. From the radar reading it seemed like Skynet was trying this trick again.

“Katherine, John mention to you any other Resistance choppers being in the area?” I asked.

“No,” Katherine said. “Wouldn’t he have mentioned something to you?”

“We have a friendship, not a relationship. Besides, sometimes a leader has to hide facts to get a victory.” I paused a moment. “Star and Barnes, get prepared for some action. Shit is about to hit the fan.”

I watched where the ‘Resistance’ choppers were and turned just as the first shot was fired.

“Get ready to shoot back!” I shouted and tried to get in a good position for Katherine.

But she was pregnant and getting a good shot was hard. I wasn’t going to be the one to have John lose his children. However, I still had to make sure we all didn’t die.

I spent a few minutes just dodging and cursing the fact that this was just supposed to be a simple mission. Katherine wasn’t supposed to be in danger and if something happened John would kill me.

Thoughts of John killing me were cut short as Katherine was finally able to get a shot out, but that victory was cut short when Skynet’s HKs finally landed some hits on the chopper. Due to me having to dodge, Katherine wasn’t able to land another hit.

Then I dodged some more, Skynet shot the chopper down, and darkness.

I opened my eyes slowly and the sight of burning wreckage greeted me.

“Katherine!” I shouted as I looked at her.

I quickly pulled her away from the wreckage and tried not to look at the metal that was now showing through my burnt skin.

“Star! Barnes!” I yelled, but there was no reply.

The burning smell was about as bad as seeing the metal parts of me. I knew I was metal and that my humanity had been tainted, but seeing proof of that was a thing unto itself. Because when I had proof like this that I wasn’t human, but a hybrid, then I wondered who I had been before. Was I someone that had sided with Skynet or had I been against it?

I put thoughts of the metal showing underneath my burnt skin to the back of my mind. Right now I had to look at the burning chopper wreckage to see if Star and Barnes were there.

“Star! Barnes!” I shouted and looked for any movements or the slightest sounds of a cry for help.

But I heard and saw nothing.

“John...” Katherine said and I quickly turned to her.

She wasn’t in good shape and didn’t have the benefit of being a hybrid to help her. I knelt by her and felt her stomach. If she survived but her twins died, then John would be distracted from the war. He wouldn’t be in good shape if just Katherine died so I didn’t want to imagine his reaction to his unborn children dying.

“Katherine?” I asked and tried to lift her up.

I stopped after she groaned. Shit. How was I supposed to get her somewhere safe? Skynet would probably be coming by soon. Maybe I was trying to carry her the wrong way.

“You need to walk. Can you do that?” I asked.

“John?” Katherine asked and looked at me. “I feel like I fell or-“

“You crashed, Katherine.” I told her. “Skynet will be coming soon and I need to get you to safety.”

“Weren’t there others?”

“Barnes and Star scouted an area ahead and found somewhere safe. They  are waiting for us there.” I lied and figured the truth could come later. Right now I needed her to move as quickly as she could.

As I managed to slowly help her up she said, “John, if I die-“

“You aren’t goin-“ I started to say.

“You never wanted to accept that I could die. I think that’s why you didn’t want to send me on missions. But if I do die I just want you to stay away from Jash. You’re a human, John, and you deserve the love only a human can bring. Promise me.”

“I promise.” I replied since there was no other option. If Katherine was going to confuse me for John, I didn’t have the time to correct her.

“And if you’re going to die, want to do it at another location?” I asked after she didn’t move for a minute.

Katherine’s reply was to smile weakly and I helped her walk. I didn’t know where to go since I hadn’t gotten a good layout of the land while I was crashing. I didn’t know if I was even going in the right direction, but I had no choice. I had to continue going forward.

It was hard work getting anywhere with Katherine in her current condition. Besides it being a pain in the ass to move her, she kept confusing me for John. While I didn’t mind the tidbits of gossip I was able to get from her, some of what she said was a little more personal. Sexual stuff was included in what she was saying. Sometimes she thought that they were just starting their relationship and so didn’t know John’s turn-ons and turn-offs.

While this could’ve been amusing, the fact was that for three hours I had to go with imagining John and Katherine together in detail.

As the fourth hour approached, I saw a broken down building. It seemed to be crumbling but was otherwise stable. Maybe other people had been here recently and so there would be supplies. Water and food to last us a few days was all that we needed. I could always give Katherine my clothes if need be.

“Katherine, we don’t have to go much further.” I told her and her only response was to nod.

I felt her stepping a little more quickly as she realized the walking would end shortly.

As we entered the building, I looked around to make sure that there weren’t any surprises waiting for us. Of course if there was a Terminator my small handgun wouldn’t do much to it. I would have to battle the metal hand to hand and hope that hybrids were well built to fight against other Terminators.

After two minutes nothing came out to get us so I set Katherine by some stairs. I let her down slowly and allowed her to choose how fast we went. After she was sitting relatively comfortably by the stairs, I started looking around in detail.

There was some food and water that would hold us over for the next few days. I then looked for things I could use to make a makeshift bed for Katherine, as this building hadn’t been one for sleeping in before Judgment Day.

As I made Katherine comfortable on the makeshift bed, I started to fully realize a problem. I had known about the problem before, but now things were calm and I could reflect on it.

I couldn’t tell if Katherine’s twins were now dead or if they were going to be born like they should. I stayed up all night with those thoughts going through my head.

The night had seemed longer than normal. Maybe because it was the first time I was basically on my own. Or maybe it was the fact that I was having to defend Katherine from any Terminators that stopped by. I had looked for better weapons in the building and hadn’t found anything useful.

All that was useful were a few items that I used to set up an elementary alarm system. Of course the Terminators could easily avoid it if they wanted to, but at least it was there. Maybe it was my human side that wanted a sense of false reassurance.

Did that make me weak?

When the sun rose I didn’t feel any safer. Hell, I felt even more like I was in a cage with Skynet able to walk in any time that they wanted to. I held my handgun and watched over Katherine’s sleeping form. The rise and fall of her chest which hopefully meant the twins would be born.

As Katherine awoke I took care of her needs even as she kept continuing to confuse me for John Connor.

“I’m not John Connor.” I finally told her. “I’m Jash. You know, the person you hate and never want John to be with.”

“Stop trying to avoid yourself, John.” Katherine said and reached for my hand. “I believe in you.”

I realized why John would admire this woman. Even while she was in so much pain she still found it in her to encourage me. Well…to encourage John. But right now we were really the same person. I took her hand in mine and squeezed it.

“Yeah, I just don’t believe in myself. The war is hard which is why you can’t die.” I told her and she tried to squeeze back.

I then let go of her and started to feel her stomach. I didn’t know what to look for. It wasn’t like Skynet was interested in raising or killing pregnant women. Unless you counted killing them like other people. I wanted to scream in frustration. I should be able to do this for John, but I couldn’t.

I couldn’t tell if Katherine was still pregnant. I should be able to. Why didn’t I try learning more about how humans worked as much as I learned about how machines worked?

Looking down I remembered. Oh, yeah, because then I would have to deal even more with Katherine. And dealing with Katherine was hard.

But, as I looked at her, I realized that dealing with her was worth all the pain and heartache. I had never really cared when someone died. However, if she died then I would have to deal with John and I didn’t want that. So did my caring for Katherine’s life have more to do with John than me actually giving a shit about his wife?

Probably.

“I’m going, aren’t I?” Katherine asked weakly.

“No, no.” I said and stepped away from her. “You’ll live to torment me but I’m not certain about the twins.”

“I feel like I’m going. I’ve thought of what death feels like. This is it.”

“You are not dying. Not today. Not here.”

“You’ll find someone to love you, John, you’ll find someone to put your trust in. You’ll find another me.”

“Unlikely, you’re…you.”

“You have a lot of strength and if you don’t find someone you can always carry on. I know it’ll be hard for you, but you’ll be able to do it.”

“You’re not dying. Just stop talking like you’re going to go any moment now.”

“Do you know why I decided to be with you?”

“No.” I said, generally curious.

“Because I couldn’t stand to see you alone.” Katherine explained. “I saw you on Judgment Day and didn’t think you could handle things on your own. I thought that you needed to have someone to lean on. Please prove me wrong. Prove me wrong.”

“I will.” I said and her breathing slowed down.

Katherine really did love John Connor. It was in no way because she felt she would have more power or anything of the like. I didn’t expect that. I expected her to be a mean bitch. But she wasn’t.

I was lost. Everything I had thought about her was wrong. How could I think such cruel things of her? She was a human being. She deserved kindness and respect. Not only because she was John’s wife, but because she was a person.

I sat down and felt weak. I had hated her for so long that I didn’t know why I was feeling like I was losing someone I cared about. I should be able to just carry on fine. I should be worried about John’s reaction, of course, but I shouldn’t be frightened of her dying body so close to me.

Slowly I stood up and made sure I was still capable of standing. Nothing would be right once John heard the news that his wife was dead. He would never fully recover. Would he heed Katherine’s dying words? Would he take the chance to be with me?

I admit that I felt a little bit happy with the thought that John Connor and myself would finally be able to be together. I could do nothing more for Katherine, so I wouldn’t be the one to blame once she died. John and I could finally live a life together.

Katherine started screaming loudly and I looked over. Whatever was happening, she was not dying at this moment. It didn’t sound like a death cry and she wouldn’t yell out now that she was so close to death. She continued screaming and I finally knelt down beside her.

She grabbed my shoulder and I realized what was happening: Katherine Brewster wasn’t dying, she was giving birth.

I was aware of how to take lives out of existence, but bringing new life into the world wasn’t something I was familiar with. I was used to dying people screaming, but I wasn’t used to helping them give birth. I’m not a medic, though I am passable. I usually depended on another comrade to help the injured and dying.

Hell, Katherine was the medic everyone liked to get when they could.

I, on the other hand, was just a killer.

“Katherine!” I shouted. “Breathe in and out!”

I should’ve replied calmer, but I was frightened. Katherine would be alive and John would continue to be with her. How could I tell him I had hoped that she had died?

No matter now, I had to focus on helping her deliver.

Katherine was struggling and I had to try and keep her still. She had injuries from the chopper crash and I didn’t want to imagine the pain she was going through now. I thought of tying her up to keep her still but I finally decided to ditch the idea. I didn’t want to stop circulation and I wouldn’t be able to do it quickly enough anyways.

The last thing I wanted was for John’s offsprings to plop onto the floor like discarded items.

“I...I...I can’t!” Katherine said, but part of her wouldn’t quit wanting to give birth.

“Give birth first and then die.” I hissed, but she wouldn’t stop yelling.

Dammit, this was not going to work. Katherine would die and the twins would die and then I would have to watch John try to not fall apart. This was not going to be a good day at all. Even if the twins were born without being injured themselves, the fact was that I would be in the middle of nowhere with a dying woman and two newborn children.

I didn’t know how I managed, but I helped Katherine birth the twins. My hands were ready for both when they came out. Neither of them were terrified of my metal poking out. I knew that they were way too young to feel fear from seeing it, but there was always a chance that a fear of metal was an instinct. I guess that wasn’t true.

“Can I see them?” Katherine asked me, her voice sounding weak.

“Sure.” I replied and handed each of them to her carefully.

“What do you want to name them, John?”

“Shouldn’t the mother decide?” I asked her and I saw that she had fallen asleep before I could finish the question.

I looked at the twins and shook my head. They looked like weird little aliens from Mars and yet it was my duty to take care of them for now.

I sighed and took them both in my arms as I looked for some place to wash them. There was a sink and some of the water I had left would allow me to bathe them for the first time. I was alert at all times as I washed them so as not to hurt them.

This was hard to do as they struggled and I was afraid I would inadvertently kill them which would piss John off. Thinking of John made me able to do a better job than I would have without him in my mind.

After I finished bathing them, I took random bits of clothing to cover them up. When we got back to base they could get real clothing and real help.

As I put the twins next to Katherine I realized I couldn’t wait. I needed to find a radio so that Katherine could be taken care of.

For over an hour I made sure that Katherine would be fine if left alone for a few hours at least. I had to go around the area to find a radio. I had no other choice if we wanted to survive.

As I looked at them for what could be the last time, I smiled at the twins and Katherine’s sleeping form before walking away.
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