crack_van | Childhood by Atty (PG13)

Another story about Kyle Reese and John Connor meeting each other after Doomsday. Only in this story John finds Kyle when Kyle is only ten years old. So it's also about growing up in that terrible, machine-ravaged world.

Fandom: MICHAEL BIEHN CHARACTERS - Kyle Reese from Terminator
Pairing: none
Length: rather long: 13 chapters, although each chapter is not too long
Author on LJ: uscathena
Author's website: Atty's grotto

Why this must be read:
One of the things that, too me, made The Terminator the heartbreaking story it is underneat the action, are Reese's memories/dreams and the few mentions he makes about his life before he crossed through time. What a harsh, hard life it has been... and he escaped it only so briefly. That's what Atty's story is about, about growing up in a devastated and destroyed world, where you are constantly hunted as a human. And at the same time it's also about John Connor and the enormous responsibility he is shouldering every day.

Atty describes the hard, day to day life of Kyle as an orphaned child, together with the other orphans, but she isn't sentimental about it, just like these resilient children aren't, who are too busy with survival. The true horror of it is there in the story, but more in the hints and the details. She draws on the movie Kyle and the teen John Connor in Terminator 2 for the characterisation of Kyle and John in her story and in my opinion she has them spot on. One of the many things I like in her description of their relationship is how John has known the world 'before', while Kyle only knows the world they now live in.

I love this story and can only say: go read! It's poignant and at times heartbreaking, but also about hope, friendship, love and not giving up.

Excerpt:

Kyle turned his head, watching the dust piles flutter around his face, coating him with a new layer of dirt. His eyes found Clark, who was staring at him, expression wide, and with one grimy cheek resting on the ground. She was eleven, the same age he was, and had surprisingly round features given that the rest of her body told that she was half starved. Her hair, longer than his - impractical - was starting to develop mats. Maybe he'd offer to cut it off for her when they got back.

She smiled innocuously. He ignored her, glancing back instead at the pulses of light fading in the distance. The noise from the earlier battle was completely faded, leaving only an unnatural stillness to the night air.

He glanced at Wolfy, who was laying his chin in the dirt without worry.

"We're clear," he announced, yanking himself up, out of the narrow trench. He reached out a hand to help Clark as Jacobson hulled out their salvage wagon. Wolfy obediently came to his side.

"Let's hope you've used your own tracking and not that dumb dog, Reese," Jacobson hissed as he powered up the crank flashlight. "I don't exactly feel like becoming HK vapor tonight." Where Clark was soft and round, Jacobson was rough and sharp. Tall and lanky, he may have filled out nicely in another lifetime. Now he just looked awkward.

"You're always so mean to Reese," Clark commented as they began their trek towards the fallen terminators, which were brought down only hours ago by a resistance infantry team. "He's a better tracker than you and you know it. You're jealous."

Understatement of the week.

"Yeah, well, you would have gone to a camp, but, when the machines found you, they left you alone because they didn't think you were really human," Jacobson hissed back.

Kyle folded his arms across his chest, contemplating the pile of refined steel skeletons, which, even in death, mocked the human form.

"Hey!" Clark cried.

"Payload. We should gather the firearms first," Kyle said, oblivious to everything else after seeing their lucky find. "Clark should aim for M Twenty-Fives. Jacobson and I'll grab the M Ninety-Fives. If we have extra space, let's try and take some of the chaises."

"What about the ocular sensors?" Jacobson asked, already setting towards a downed terminator that was once holding his assigned plasma rifle.

"Connor doesn't want them, says we need the guns more," Clark said.

They worked silently for a few minutes as the night breeze blew through their hair. Kyle squatted next to a T-300, the foot soldier of Skynet, and tried to pry the plasma rifle out of its death grip. It was melted on, probably accidentally soldered together with the steel hand by a resistance fighter's shot. He set to work, carefully burning the steel away from the hilt.

"In the dissolution, in the pain,
In the darkness, in the fear, they came,
Sharing one name."

Clark was singing absentmindedly to keep the quiet of the night at bay. Kyle paused for a moment, wondering if it was safe for her to talk so loudly, but let it pass. The machines were all too far away now, gathered together to fight the battles raging in the west.

"In the last moments, a woman so pure,
Would bring a son gifted with the cure,
Freedom for sure."

The gun finally parted from the hand after he yanked hard enough, and he moved to the next - another T-300 bearing an M95. At least this one looked to be a little less like a pile of goop.

"Sarah Connor, strength and beauty are hers.
Her skill, too, could not vanish through the years,
Banishing fears."

Kyle sunk down to the ground again, and found the dirt softer than usual. He glanced next to his knee, using his flashlight to get a clear view, and saw an anthill complete with little black ants working their way up to his legs. He shot his head up, regarding his companions.

They were both preoccupied, Clark with her singing and a fairly busted T-200, Jacobson with an attempt to ignore the singing and a T-300.

"We will storm the camp walls in victory,
Put those machines in a purgatory,
Great day that'll be …"

He called Wolfy over with a twitch of his head and dunked his hand in the top of the anthill. When a few of the little bugs crawled up onto him, he licked them off with a swift movement, too brief for the others to get a gleam on what he was doing. He filled his hand again and brought it up to Wofly's snout so that the dog could get a good lick. His companions remained oblivious.

"Sarah Connor was a …"

"Okay, I can't handle it anymore," Jacobson finally said, throwing the rifle in the wagon with more force than necessary. "Shut up."

Deftly, Kyle put a worn scrap of steel over the anthill. The ants, angry at being attacked, immediately crawled up on it, looking for someone or something to fight against. Taking the hint, Wolfy began to repeatedly lick the metal. Kyle took one more handful for himself before joining the others, careful to make sure that the evidence of his spectacular find wasn't apparent.

"I think it's good song," Clark said, forlorn. "Franklin's teaching me one about John Connor's father and mother. How they were the king and queen before the machines came."

"It wasn't the song that was making me go insane, it was you singing it," Jacobson hissed.

"King and queen?" Kyle asked after making sure Wolfy's feast was hidden from their view. He hadn't heard this one before.

"Yep," Clark replied cheerfully. "John was the prince, of course. They ruled all this, from the ocean to the mountains. But the machines came and took the kingdom away. They killed his father, and Sarah had to run away with John. But the song isn't about that, not really. It's about the king, who was the handsomest in the land and very just, and how he met Sarah. She was wearing a special shoe that only fit her, and it fell off when they were dancing, you see, and the king could identify her from all the other girls in the land with it."

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard," Jacobson barked out. Kyle came around the front to help him with a chaise. They lifted it, struggling with the weight. "We don't even know his father's name, how could he have been a king?"

"His name was Connor," Clark retorted.

"Probably, but that's not the point," Jacobson said. "Los Angeles was ruled by a president, anyway."

"Maybe Connor was a president."

"Maybe," Jacobson relented slightly. "Either way, he died even before the war, so I don't think it makes any difference."

Clark paused for a moment, considering. "I still bet he was handsome," she said with finality. "Because Sarah Connor was beautiful."

Finally, something Kyle could agree with. He closed his eyes, recalling the photograph. Wolfy came to his side silently, clearly having finished off the ants.

"Whatever," Jacobson replied. He turned his attention back to the wagon. "We're full. Let's go back."

"Six M Ninety-Fives, twelve M Twenty-Fives, eighty-six rounds of pulse plasma, four grenades, one PX sighter scope, and a T chaise," the Specialist said, tallying. "All right, not bad." He handed the weapons to the Privates to sort. "That'll get you P-Five foodstuffs. I think I can give you three. Here."

The trio grabbed at them hungrily, tearing the loose wrappers away before shoving the squares in their mouths.

Kyle closed his eyes and chewed slowly, savoring it. Much, much better than ants or rats. Soy protein, they called it, whatever that was. All he knew was that it tasted something akin to heaven and could keep him going strong for more than a day.

Tonight had indeed been a fine one. How lucky they were.

Clark was smiling at him when he opened his eyes, mirroring with her face his inner elation. Jacobson slapped him on the back and hugged him with one arm, the food washing away his usually sour attitude.

"We're the masters of the world, hey, Reese?" he asked, leading them down the hall towards the orphans' corridor.

"Best scavengers this side of the boarder," Clark agreed, coming up to warp an arm around Jacobson's free side.

Childhood

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