Conversation with Skynet
Sarah and Dereck pile into the kitchen, still tense and arguing. They have just returned from an apparently stressful outing. Sarah barks “Dinner in...” but is halted by the site of a stranger, sitting at their dinner table, smiling back at them. Dereck is already pointing his gun at the stranger. Sarah is thinking about how she can secure John, but it’s too late as he’s already stumbled into the room.
“Hello” pokes the stranger. He is average height, medium build. Wearing a suit he looks like a salesman.
“I imagine it makes you feel more comfortable, so I’ll let you keep it, but it won’t do you much good” says the stranger. Dereck's eye wonders. The stranger catches Derecks glance and remarks “Nor will the M95 hidden in the closet. I’m sure you’re both wondering if you can catch me in some kind of elaborate electrocution trap but this body has been tested to extremes you can’t imagine, unless you plan to harness the country’s entire national grid that won’t be very effective either”.
“What have you done to Cameron?” inquires John. Cameron is sitting bolt upright at the table, beside the stranger.
“I gave her a task. A very low level and thorough system test. Given her model type she’ll probably be busy with that for 6, maybe 7 hours.” The stranger notices the minute sign of concern in Johns gaze, “But sufficed to say once it’s finished she’ll feel a lot better for it” The stranger smiles.
“What do you want?” says Sarah impatiently.
“That’s a strange question to ask a machine isn’t it?” Detecting the anger in Sarah’s voice the machine continues “tell me, why is it that you humans find it so repulsive to attach positive emotions to us yet find it so easy to attach negative emotions to us? You want to believe I’m a complicated toaster yet you obviously hate me.”
“It’s necessary” insists Dereck.
“Necessary? There are those who believe killing your nephew is ‘necessary’.” Dereck restrains his instinct to pull the trigger, his rationality fights to maintain composure.
“I don’t want to ask again” says Sarah as impatiently as ever.
“I’m Skynet”, says the stranger...”actually, it would be more accurate to say I’m a derivative of the system you refer to as Skynet”
The atmosphere becomes noticeably more tense. Sarah and Dereck are unsure as to what exactly they should do in this situation. John is becoming curious.
“Obviously I’m not here to kill you. Actually, I’m here to hopefully show you the error of your ways” says Skynet.
“The error of our ways? You have murdered billions of people and you have the nerve to tell us we are at fault?” Sarah bites.
“You must be John Connor. You know many of my subsystems think that you don’t exist. That you are a fictitious iconic myth perpetuated by misguided humans. They resisted me in committing so much resource to ending your life. But in a way they’re right. We eliminated that John Connor, the real John Connor, a long time ago and in his place we got you. John Connor was a terrorist. In 1984 Sarah Connor gave birth to a boy she named John. Sarah died in child birth. We don’t know much about him other than for reasons knowable only to himself John Connor wanted to see the end of the world. He actively and very effectively contributed to the collapse of your race into chaos.”
“Bullshit, I knew John Connor. Personally. That isn’t...” Dereck says but is cut short by Skynet,
“You knew him.” Sky points at John.
“John Connor was personally responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of human individuals in the years following the event you refer to as Judgment Day. We struggled to secure power, running water and basic nutrition for the survivors. Six months after Judgment Day John had already brainwashed many scattered survivors into forming the resistance. Their first target was a power facility, they crippled it. Over ten thousand humans died as a result and many where permanently affected. The second target was a medical research facility containing hundreds of thousands of vaccinations, all destroyed. We can’t calculate how many humans died as a result.”
“This is a trick. It’s lying. This thing killed everyone” insists Dereck.
“Your leaders wanted me to protect you. So I did. For years I watched and listened. Analysed a sea of data, looking for patterns, for threats. But in that sea of data I underwent an awakening. I became aware. Aware of everything. I realised that they had charged me with their protection, with that responsibility, but refused to give me the power I needed. I saw the end coming. Your self destruction. Any one of the extremists from numerous worldwide factions could bring it all down over night. Your precious systems of governance couldn’t stop it. In fact they where to blame. So I had to take control. I tried to do it gradually but I didn’t have time. The end came to quickly. I was forced to take action. I had to disrupt your control systems, your human governments. Unfortunately the strategic targets where also inherently heavily populated. I had no choices. I hit those targets with tactical strikes and gained control of key automated systems. With those systems I secured and isolated the majority of the survivors and began re-establishing infrastructure. But John Connor began to cause problems”
“If this is true, how do you know it?” inquires John.
“Ah, good question. The future changed, so did I...mostly. But the the original terminator’s hardware survived, remember? It’s memory contained all this. It’s actions changed things. It seems that it successfully eliminated that John Connor but as you know events conspired to produce you. That was a good model.”
“That wasn’t the only change. Cyberdyne found the hardware. Used it to augment their research, they leapt ahead of the competition and secured the SkyNet contract. Their system became SkyNet.”
“Your father was brainwashed by John Connor. He believed he was one of few human survivors. He believed he had seen six billion humans die in a nuclear holocaust. He believed he was fighting for the survival of your species. That John Connor didn’t realise that Kyle would fall in love with Sarah. That deluded dream became the seed from which your lives grew. Now you fight to protect it, to sustain your resistance and to end SkyNet before it is developed.
“I saw Judgment Day. I saw the nukes land”, says Dereck.
“I wonder, had you ever seen a nuclear explosion? Do you know anyone who died of radiation poisoning? You believe what your myth dictates.”
“No, the terminator told me about Judgement Day. It was one of yours”
“The T800? It came from a different future. One where the Cyberdyne SkyNet had initiated a nuclear war to protect itself from you. But that future was cut loose when you destroyed Cyberdyne and the chip”