#threads | cameron

❝ we shouldn’t meet here again. it’s a security risk. ❞  at the very least, she thinks, they ought to choose a different cafe for their next rendezvous. lydia rodarte-quayle may believe herself to be a cautious woman, but anxious might be a more apt descriptor. cameron is not fond of public meeting places, let alone repeat haunts — she worries that eventually, lydia’s proclivity for the perceived safety of the familiar and the routine will come back to bite them both. in her experience, such established patterns make it too easy to track down her marks, and she has no doubt the businesswoman has enemies.

with others, she would elaborate further upon these concerns in grisly detail, though she retains her usual stoicism for her employer’s sake. she suspects that she would not appreciate it. regardless, they are already here, and cameron is not one to waste her words, nor anyone's time.

❝ — let’s talk about the job. ❞  she changes the subject with a reassuring smile, maintaining eye contact while she stirs a single packet of sugar into her coffee.  ❝ what are your parameters? ❞

❝ — it wasn't really in my plans. ❞ shooting all those people, she means. hopefully her companion will be chill about it. she doesn't want to waste any more bullets.

❝ i’m looking for my brother. he’s missing. ❞   the machine’s countenance is as inscrutable as ever, but the urgency in her tone is unsimulated, as real as she is capable of expressing. for all their efforts to stop the development of skynet, who would have anticipated another apocalyptic event would lay waste to it all? she and the connors had once enjoyed a gift of foresight, burdened with knowledge of the future events that had yet to pass — events they could still fight to change. but this virus is a different entity entirely. cameron was not built for this kind of emergency. her metal body is impervious to biowarfare, and she can easily hold her own against the infected. but should the virus infect john, there is nothing she can do. it is imperative that she finds him immediately, and they find someplace safe to wait out the chaos. beyond that, they’ll cross that bridge when they get there, as humans like to say.

her eyes survey the other before her, scanning her body from head to toe. various lines of data flash within her visual field as she isolates and analyzes each component of the woman’s outfit for something useful: shirt, belt, pants, and then — success — the weapon holstered at her hip. her gaze snaps back to meet the woman’s eyes with an uncanny speed and a deadly intensity, before she speaks again with the same urgency, still wearing her blank expression:

her classmate’s sudden anger hardly phases cameron. this kind of interaction is unfortunately familiar; the machine has noticed that even outside of her own home dynamics, she has a peculiar way of irritating people. it's a clear deficiency in her infiltration abilities that despite her continuous efforts, she can't seem to correct. human behavior abounds with minutiae that she falls short of fully understanding. but practice makes perfect, as the saying goes, and her kind are nothing if not persistent.

❝ you look stressed. upset. ❞  she keeps her answer succinct. there are plenty of other physical observations she could note — sleep deprived, visibly anxious, elevated heart rate — though judging by her prior reaction, cameron thinks it’s best not to voice these conclusions. in her experience, humans tend not to appreciate when she speaks the obvious. instead, she attempts a new tactic, affecting a sympathetic smile.

❝ yes. all of them. ❞ she has come to this conclusion from her own experience. whether programmed to kill or reprogrammed to protect, the most accepting of their kind still regard her with suspicion at best, and far more frequently with utter contempt.

❝ i know it seems wrong to accept. ❞ she can't fault his reaction — most people she meets don't take very well to news of an impending machine apocalypse.