Terminator Salvation: Cold War (38 page)

All the more reason to finish things quickly.

He closed on the Hunter-Killer, firing his remaining missile.

Eat this, you bloodthirsty machine.

The Sidewinder zoomed toward the HK, but was intercepted by a suicidal Aerostat instead. Ivanov seethed in frustration. The explosion went off only a few meters away from him, sending the Warthog into a spin. The out-of-control jet dove toward the bottom of the canyon. The rugged landscape whirled vertiginously before his eyes. A field of corpses waited for him to join them.

“No!” he blurted. Straining against killer g-forces, he pulled out of the spin only seconds before he would have crashed into the wreckage below. He gasped, but his relief was short-lived. Catching him by surprise, the demolished train opened fire on him as well. Gunports opened up along the top of the piled railcars. Ground fire slammed into the underside of the Warthog, perforating its thick armor plating. Ivanov was suddenly very grateful for the titanium “bathtub” protecting the cockpit area. The plane shuddered around him.

He fired back at the train with his own cannon. The barrage tore into the exposed gunports.

Meanwhile, the HK circled menacingly above the canyon. Ivanov wondered briefly what it was waiting for, then realized it didn’t want to risk blowing apart the train full of uranium. It intended to resume their duel when and if the Warthog climbed back up to meet it. It could afford to be patient.

It
wasn’t running low on ammo.

A warning light on his instrument panel flashed, informing him that he was losing fuel.

“Hell!”

He glared angrily at the gauge. The Warthog’s fuel lines and tanks were supposed to reseal themselves if hit, but apparently the back-up systems had malfunctioned. That was the trouble with twenty-year-old warplanes and equipment. Nothing worked quite the way it used to.

Shoddy American craftsmanship!

Ivanov conducted a quick inventory. He had no more missiles, only a few more rounds of ammunition, and he was leaking fuel by the bucketload. The HK was still waiting for him. Retreat was the only sensible option. If he was lucky—and managed to evade his pursuer—he might make it back to Canada alive.

I’ve done my part,
he reasoned. The Alaskans would have to fend for themselves.
If any of them are still alive.

Before departing, he swooped over the battlefield one last time, just so he could give Losenko an accurate report. His eyes widened at the sight of two small humans darting out from one of the wrecked railcars. He couldn’t be sure, but it looked like a pair of women, one slightly smaller than the other.

Just like his long-lost wife and daughter.

Yelena. Nadia.
An ancient scab tore off his heart, leaving it bleeding afresh. The women below were nothing to him. Americans, no less. But they were still mortal, still flesh-and-blood.

Like his own family.

He could not leave them to the HK’s tender mercies.

Climbing upward, he spied the Hunter-Killer circling above him, ready to pick up where they had left off. His eyes narrowed. A long-simmering anger boiled over. A muscle twitched beneath his cheek. Let this greedy vulture kill those women?

Not on his life.

He aimed the Warthog’s snout directly at the HK’s impellers. He unleashed the last of his ammo to keep its own guns at bay. Opening up the throttle, he zoomed toward the unsuspecting HK at top speed, turning the forty-ton aircraft into one enormous missile. White knuckles held the control stick steady. Yelena and Nadia had been waiting for him for fifteen years. It was past time he joined them.

For the Motherland!

Without hesitation, the kamikaze fighter collided with the Hunter-Killer at 400 kilometers an hour. Alexei Ivanov’s world ended for the second time, in a storm of fire and thunder.

He had no regrets.

Gunfire sounded above their heads. Explosions lit up the sky. Staring up in shock through the sundered ceiling of the storage car, Molly caught a glimpse of a Resistance warplane taking on the surprised Hunter-Killer. The noisy aerial combat was the answer to her prayers.

She knew at once who to thank for this unexpected stroke of luck

Losenko, you old sea dog!
She punched the air with her fist.
I should have known I could count on you!

She wasn’t about to let this gift horse go to waste.

“Out!” she hollered at Sitka. “Now!”

The women rushed out of the railcar, leaving Doc Rathbone’s lifeless body behind, along with several kilos of primed plastic explosive. They scrambled down the piled wooden trestles, which were now riddled with bullet holes. Averting their eyes from the grisly remains of their comrades, they sprinted alongside the river toward the woods. Snowmobile tracks crisscrossed the bloody snow. The icy spray of water pelted their faces. Molly gripped her pistol in one hand, the detonator remote in the other. She looked about anxiously for the snowmachines, but there were none in sight. She counted her blessings.

Maybe our luck is changing....

Sitka kept pace beside her. She nodded at the detonator.

“Forget something?”

“Not for a moment.” Molly glanced back at the plundered train. It was maybe sixty yards behind her.
Far enough,
she decided. She spotted a fractured concrete pier thrown clear by the train crash and explosions. It was lying sideways at the edge of the river, only a few yards to their right. They weren’t going to find any better shelter.

“Cover your ears!”

Sitka recklessly turned to take in the fireworks, but Molly grabbed her and tossed her behind the uprooted pier instead. “Duck your head, you loon. Unless you want those freckles blown off your skull.”

She clicked the detonator button.

The C-4 charges went off in unison. A tremendous explosion shook the valley, ripping out the train’s guts. More of the cliff gave way. Rockslides crashed down on the Skynet Express, hammering it to a pulp. A cloud of smoke and dust, liberally mixed with yellowcake, billowed up into the sky. Uranium scattered like snowflakes in a blizzard. They’d be digging radioactive powder out of the soil for years to come, but, after Judgment Day, what was a little more fall-out?

The important thing was: Skynet would have to do without.

We did it,
Molly thought.
Despite everything, we did it.

“Bye, Doc,” Sitka whispered. The blast had surely vaporized the old man’s body. “Never forget you.”

They lifted their heads cautiously. Ears ringing, Molly surveyed the aftermath of the blast. Mangled machinery and charred body parts were strewn all over the terrain. It was like Judgment Day all over again. She spied one of the train’s bullet-shaped heads lying smoking on the other side of the river. Its demonic red eyes flickered briefly, then went out for good. The Skynet Express was well and truly dead at last.

About time.

A second explosion, coming from further up the canyon, startled her. The ground quaked as something heavy crashed to earth a few miles away, beyond the demolished train and bridge. A churning pillar of smoke rose on the horizon. Molly searched the sky, realizing that she had lost track of the aerial dogfight that had saved their butts before. She wondered who had gone down in flames. The fighter? The HK?

Both?

Sitka stared at the smoke, too.

“Think the pilot made it?”

“Who knows?” Molly said. “We need to get out of here if we’re ever going to find out.”

They weren’t out of the woods yet. Or
into
the woods, to be more exact. Taking Sitka by the hand, she turned away from the dismembered train and started thinking about the fastest way back to camp. They had a long, scary hike ahead of them.

Wish I knew where those fucking Snowminators were.

The ear-pounding roar of a two-stroke engine provided an answer faster than she would have liked. A snow-machine barreled out of the woods in front of them, spraying a roostertail of white powder behind it. Fresh blood glistened on its front skis. A second machine appeared on the other side of the river. Another engine growled in the hills around them. The damn machines were closing in on them. Evil red optical sensors fixed the women in their sights. The muzzles of their mini-guns flashed.

“Down!”

Molly and Sitka dived behind the other side of the concrete pier. A furious barrage of bullets chipped away at the sideways foundation. Molly heard the snowmachine roaring toward them. She remembered what had happened to Tom Jensen. The crumbling concrete block wasn’t going to shield them for long.

She looked around frantically, trying to find some way out. The spray from the rushing river sprinkled her face again. Molly’s gaze seized on the frothing white water and rapids.

It’s our only chance.

Thrusting her pistol into her belt, she yanked the heavy pack off Sitka’s shoulders. It was only going to weigh her down.

“Hey!” the girl protested. “What’s that for?”

There was no time to explain. The Snowminators would be on them in a second.

“Shut up and follow me!”

Keeping low, she dived into the freezing river. Bullets whizzed over her head, but she could barely hear them over the crash of the rapids. The current gripped her and sent her hurtling downstream at a breakneck pace, far from the deadly machines. Tossed about like flotsam and jetsam, she fought to keep her head above the water. Churning white froth invaded her mouth and nostrils. She kicked and sputtered, swallowing a mouthful of ice water, then spitting it out again. The sudden, frigid immersion shocked her to her marrow. Her heart skipped a beat.

She tumbled over the deep rapids.

There was another loud splash behind her.

“Molly!”

Twisting her head, she caught a glimpse of Sitka bobbing in the water not far away.

“Where are you?”

Molly reached out for the teen, but the relentless current tore them apart. The river carried them away.

Molly tried to remember if Sitka knew how to swim.

Gasping for breath, they dragged themselves to shore, many miles downstream from the battle at the bridge. Molly guessed that they’d been in the water for maybe ten minutes, tops, but it felt like hours had passed since they’d thrown themselves into the freezing current. Her entire body felt black and blue from bouncing over the rapids. She shivered from head to foot. Her legs were wobbly.

She leaned against Sitka, the two women clinging to each other for support as they staggered away from the water, splashing through the thin ice and slush at the edge of the riverbank. Slowing as it rounded a rocky shoal, the river had slackened just enough to give them a chance to break free from the current. It was shallower and narrower here, too.

Another lucky break.

Thank God they hadn’t gone over any waterfalls!

Exhausted, they collapsed onto the snow. Molly coughed up a gallon of water. She listened intently for the roar of the snowmachines, but heard only the river continuing on its way. If nothing else, they had escaped the vicious killers, who were presumably far behind them now, and in no position to follow them down the river.
Sure, they can ski,
she gloated, reveling for the moment in their unlikely escape.
But they damn well can’t swim!

Icy water dripped from her hair and clothes. Tremors shook her body. Forget the machines, she thought. Hypothermia was their enemy now. If anything, it felt colder on the shore than it had been in the water. The bitter wind chill could kill them just as surely as a Terminator’s bullets. At best, they had maybe a couple of hours before they froze to death. Probably less, given how drenched they were. She could feel her sodden clothing freezing already.

Fuck, it was cold!

“Up!” she ordered Sitka, resisting the temptation to sink forever into the soft white drifts. She hauled herself to her feet and turned her thoughts to survival. Years of wilderness training came to her rescue.
Shelter,
she realized. That was their top priority. She nudged Sitka with her toe. Water slushed inside the boot. “Up and at ‘em.” Her teeth chattered. “We’ve g-got work to do.”

It took a couple of prods, but the grumbling teen finally got up.

“Always so b-b-bossy.” Her soggy red mane was plastered to her head. Her lips were blue. She fumbled in her fanny pack for a cigarette lighter. Shaking fingers tried to get a spark going. “F-fire?”

Molly shook her head. The snow and frost had left any available tinder too damp to kindle; by the time they got a fire going, it would be too late. Besides, they couldn’t risk the Terminators seeing the smoke or flames.

“Sh-shelter.” She hugged herself to keep warm. It didn’t work. “F-follow me.”

There was nothing to work with by the river’s edge, so they had to trek deeper into the woods before they found enough timber and debris to construct a crude shelter. While Sitka gathered as many fallen branches, leaves, ferns, and pine needles as she could rustle up, Molly got to work on the basic construction. First, she dug a shallow depression in the snow, barely big enough to hold both her and Sitka. She spread the branches and ground cover over the frozen earth like a carpet, then built a simple wooden framework over the ditch. Two crossed sticks, thrust upright into the dirt and snow supported a longer, diagonal ridgeline

Working together, they leaned the extra branches and debris against the central pole, forming a crude lean-to whose narrow opening rose less than a foot above the surface. The rest of the structure tapered to the ground behind the opening. Packed snow, heaped up against the angled sides of the shelter, provided an additional level of insulation. Given time, it would freeze solid, hopefully keeping the two women from doing the same.

Panting, Molly paused long enough to inspect their work. It wasn’t much to look at, but it might keep them alive until the sun came up. She shivered in the wind, taking shelter behind a nearby pine. The heavy exertion had warmed her up some, but had also left her dangerously soaked in sweat. Sitka looked just as cold. They had to get out of the wind before it was too late.