“Watch it!” Geir shoved Molly behind the saddle. Bullets ricocheted off the sturdy steel pylons. The ferocious gunfire chipped the paint. Dull red flakes blew in the wind. Trapped sled dogs howled and barked in alarm. One pack managed to tear loose the snow hook that was mooring it to the ground. The riderless sled bolted for the woods.
Molly didn’t blame the frightened dogs for turning tail. Terminators weren’t sentimental where animals were concerned.
“Forget the fuel!” she shouted to what was left of the work crew. She kicked herself for letting her mind wander, even for a minute. “Fall back! Retreat!”
“Here they come.” Geir said as he peeked around the side of the saddle, then yanked his head back before it could get blown off his shoulders. “Ugly as ever.”
Tell me about it, Molly thought fiercely. Through a two-inch gap in the supports, she saw multiple T-600s emerge from the woods. Their humanoid endoskeletons aped the size and proportions of an adult male human. Molly had never seen a female-looking Terminatrix, although John Connor had warned that they were in development. Their mass-produced rubber faces looked unconvincing in the daylight, like cheap Halloween masks; Skynet had a ways to go, thank God, before its infiltrator models could truly pass for human.
Binocular red optical sensors, posing as eyes, were a dead giveaway, as were the unnervingly blank expressions. Machineguns and assault rifles were strapped beneath their arms via detachable velcro straps. Hands squeezed the upside-down triggers of the guns. Reinforced wire snowshoes kept the Terminators from sinking into powdery white drifts. They didn’t even flinch as their weapons fired loudly. Their pace was unhurried, methodical. Skynet had been killing off humans for over fifteen years now. There was no rush.
By contrast, the surprise attack kicked the humans into top gear. The sentries returned fire, just as Molly had trained them, while the rest of the squad retreated as ordered. Those who weren’t cut down by the first fusillade scrambled madly to get away. They slipped and fell in the spreading slushy pools of blood and oil, only to be shot from behind as soon as they got back up again. A few dived for cover, burrowing deep into the snow, as others made a break for the forest. Loose bits of down stuffing blew about the battlefield.
RPGs and anti-materiel fire tore into the ranks of the Terminators, making it a battle, not a rout. An exploding RPG sent a T-600 flying backwards into the woods. M82 rifles, designed by the military to take out enemy trucks and parked aircraft, dismembered another Terminator. A robotic leg was cut off at the hip. Undaunted, the T-600 hopped forward, using its severed limb as a crutch. Its fellow machines targeted the sentries, forcing them to retreat. Their limited supply of grenades was quickly exhausted.
Molly cursed Command for not supplying them with more.
The casualties continued to mount:
Jake Nollner, a thirty-five year-old father of two, jumped onto his snowmobile and hit the throttle. He only got about fifteen yards before a Terminator’s bullets nailed the snowmobile’s gas tank. The ride exploded in a shower of blazing shrapnel, scattering pieces of Jake all over the landscape. The burning debris ignited pools of spilled oil, which erupted into flames. Choking black fumes added to the chaos.
Trapped huskies, held in place by their harnesses, jerked spasmodically as they were terminated as well. Wounded men, women, and dogs contributed to an agonizing chorus of pain and fear.
Monsters! Molly was tormented by the sight of her people dying all around her. She counted at least four Terminators left. Thank God Sitka isn’t here!
She and Geir fired back at the T-600s, providing more cover for the fleeing guerillas. Their combined assault shredded the rubber faces, exposing the fearsome steel death’s-head expressions underneath. The machines’ winter garments were ripped apart as well, until gleaming steel endoskeletons could be glimpsed through the torn fabric. Round after round of automatic weapons fire jolted the oncoming machines, driving them back for moments at a time, but failing to stop the Terminators from advancing, and from picking off human targets with computerized precision.
A targeting laser lit up the back of Kathy Seppala’s head a heartbeat before she toppled face-first into the snow, a crimson fountain spurting from her skull. She fell across the runners of her own sled, while another volley dropped her dogs.
Molly bit down on her lip to keep from crying out in rage. Amidst the carnage, she couldn’t help noticing that not one of the Terminators’ shots had hit the pipeline by mistake. The T-600s were obviously taking care not to damage the vital conduit. Skynet valued oil, if not human life.
They were waiting for us, damn it! She tried to figure out how Skynet could have known what they were planning. It was getting better and better at calculating probabilities and patterns where the Resistance was concerned. We must have gotten too predictable.
That was something she’d have to work on, if she lived to see another day.
“Head for the hills!” she ordered the survivors. “Regroup at the rendezvous point!” She kept firing to give the others a chance at escaping. “Don’t let them follow you back to the camp!”
She spotted a party of Resistance fighters, who had survived the initial salvos by diving into a shallow ditch. Their refuge had become a trap, however, as enemy gunfire cut them off from their snowmobiles less than two yards away. A Terminator stomped across the snow toward the ditch, ready to turn it into a mass grave. Molly had only seconds to save her people.
Switching the carbine to full automatic, she targeted the machine’s vulnerable shoulder joint. A barrage of 5.56-millimeter ammo crippled the T-600, causing its gun arm to go limp at its side. Its weapon fired uselessly into the ground. Misdirected bullets shredded its own snowshoe, throwing it off-balance.
“Palmer! Johns! The rest of you!” Molly shouted at the humans in the ditch, while the Terminator clumsily attempted to shift its chain gun to its other arm. “Now’s your chance. Hustle!”
She watched with relief as a handful of people scrambled to their feet and dashed for the snowmobiles and their attached cargo sleds. They threw themselves onto the vehicles and fired up their noisy, two-stroke engines. The machines accelerated across the snow, taking the humans with them. Exhaust fumes mingled in the air with the acrid smell of cordite. The roar of the snowmobiles was soon punctuated by gunfire from the Terminator, firing in vain at the retreating men and women, who were already out of range of its gun.
Thank God, Molly thought. At least this won’t be a total massacre.
The T-600s paused to close the valves on the violated pipes, granting Molly a momentary respite. She reloaded her rifle and estimated their odds of slipping away while the Terminators were distracted. Then a diesel engine roared to life in the woods which had hidden the enemy.
She shared a worried look with Geir.
“Now what?”
The answer barreled out of the forest in the form of a large automated snow plow. A wedge-shaped metal blade, raised ten inches above the snow, preceded an armored steel transport with snow tires and four-wheel drive. Chains around its tires granted the tank extra traction. A T-600 was seated in a turret on top of the plow, behind a mounted machinegun. Red eyes glinted in metal sockets.
Tons of rolling metal came on like a bulldozer. Bullets sparked harmlessly off the blade.
Geir gulped.
“I don’t know about you, Molly, but I’m feeling more than a little outmatched.”
“Me too,” Molly admitted grimly, though she continued to fire on the newcomer. She glanced around quickly. As nearly as she could tell, the rest of the fueling party was either dead or scattered. Time for a strategic retreat, not that the Terminators were going to make it easy.