Read Online Terminator Salvation: From the Ashes by Timothy Zahn - Free Book Online Page A

them had never faded. “Besides, sometimes they’ve got spare ammo and other stuff.” He looked back at John. “I get to choose my men?”
    “Knock yourself out,” John told him as he started folding up the map again. “Only you can’t have your brother,” he added. “I’ll be leaving him in command of the group here.”
    “Will you want Yoshi and me as part of the attack?” Blair asked.
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    “I definitely want you,” John said wryly. “Whether I get to have you or not will depend on how fast Wince can get your planes put back together.”
    “Oh, they’ll be ready,” Blair promised, her tone the exact same level of flat and dangerous that Barnes had just used.
    Kate suppressed a smile. Blair and Barnes didn’t always get along, not because they were opposites, but because they had far too many of the same hard-ass traits in common.
    “Then we’re adjourned,” John told them as he stood up. “Get some sleep, and I’ll see you back here in six hours. And don’t forget to make sure the sentries get rotated.”
    John was silent as he and Kate walked down the long corridor to their new quarters. Kate, for her part, was content to allow him his moment of quiet. Particularly since she knew that it wasn’t going to last.
    They reached their room, a slightly bigger space than they’d had at the previous bunker, but with oddly angled walls and a rather lumpy floor. There was no door, either, just a curtain that could be pulled across the opening for minimal privacy. Together, she and John took off their weapons belts and pouches and outer jackets, keeping on enough clothing to push back the cold night air. Kate finished first and climbed beneath the sleeping mat’s covers, trying to figure out how exactly she was going to broach the subject she and John needed to discuss.
    Wasted effort, as it turned out. John knew her as well as she knew him. He climbed onto the mat and pressed himself against her side, one arm draped lovingly and protectively over her, his breath warm against her cheek.
    “Let me guess,” he whispered. “You want to go with my infiltration team.”
    Here we go, Kate thought.
    “It’s not that I want to go,” she whispered back. “It’s that I have to go.”
    “Because we need a medic?” He shook his head. “We can’t risk you, Kate.”
    “It’s not just that,” Kate said. “It’s that…John, I’ve seen how they look at me. Seen how they treat me. They respect me, yes, but as a surgeon and medic.”
    “Nothing wrong with that.”
    “Yes, but I’m also supposed to be one of their leaders,” Kate said. “You and the others call me that, and I sit in on your meetings. But I never actually lead.”
    “Neither does Williams,” John pointed out. “No one’s thrown her out of a meeting yet.”
    “It’s not the same,” Kate said, hearing a hint of desperation creeping into her voice and ruthlessly forcing it back. She needed to convince him, not manipulate him. “I don’t ever share the same risks they do. They respect me, John, but they wouldn’t follow me. Not the way they follow you.”
    “And someday they’ll have to?” he asked.
    Kate felt her chest tighten. Don’t say things like that! she thought fiercely.
    But stifling the words wouldn’t change the reality that had already been foretold by that last Terminator they’d met before the horror of Judgment Day. Just as John would one day rise to lead all of Earth to victory over Skynet, one day he would also die at Skynet’s hand.
    “That’s still a long way down the road,” she said instead. “All I’m saying is that I need to do this. I need to do this.”
    John reached his hand up and stroked her cheek.
    “I hate this,” he said quietly. “You know that, don’t you?”
    Kate pulled her right arm from beneath the blankets and took his hand.
    “More than I hate watching you go off without me?”
    “Touche,” he admitted. “Does anybody say ‘touche’ anymore?”
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    “You can say it in