Skynet sends a mostly-human Infiltrator back in time to ensure its construction.

 

Notes from the Terminator chronology

 

This book opens immediately after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

 

Story Summary

 

Immediately after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Sarah and John Connor are on the run, while Cyberdyne is already working with the government to get back on its feet and continue the work of Miles Dyson.

 

In 2021, Skynet is raising human children to become I-950 Infiltrators, humans bonded with Skynet through microchip implantation and psychological conditioning. A child named Serena Burns becomes Skynet's most promising Infiltrator and is sent back in time to just after the turn of the century to ensure the creation of Skynet in the timeline altered by the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day. There, she arranges to become the head of security for Cyberdyne. She also clandestinely has Terminator parts manufactured by various companies, which she puts together into five endoskeletons and brings to life with microchips sent back in time with her inside her body, then using a cloning process to grow the Model 101 bodies over them.

 

Meanwhile, Sarah and John have been missing for six years and are presumed dead by authorities after an incident in the Amazon River. But they have been living under the assumed name of Krieger in the village of Villa Hayes, Paraguay, having started a new life, while remaining prepared and vigilant. Now, the Connors encounter a man named Dieter Von Rossbach who happens to look exactly like a Model 101 Terminator! He is a former counter-terrorist agent for the U.S. and is suspicious of the Kriegers, eventually gaining information that they are Sarah and John Connor. But he finds he trusts them and is attracted to Sarah, making him reluctant to bring them in.

 

As this is going on, Serena manipulates FBI agent Jordan Dyson, brother of Miles Dyson, who is still looking for the Connors, into quitting the FBI and becoming assistant head of security at Cyberdyne. This upsets Miles' family, but they promised the Connors they would not tell anyone the truth behind Miles' death at Cyberdyne headquarters in Judgment Day.

 

Due to her deep monitoring of internet communications for suggestions of the Connors, Serena learns of Dieter's recent inquiries on the matter and realizes the Connors are living in Villa Hayes. She sends one of her newly-completed Terminators to Paraguay to eliminate them. Just at this time, Dieter meets with the "Kriegers" at their estancia to confront them about their true identities and get to the bottom of their story. As a discussion begins, the Terminator attacks, but the three manage to bring it down and John salvages its head in order to gain information from the CPU. The Connors realize that Skynet is obviously at it again and they, with new ally Dieter, head back to the U.S. to make another attempt to stop Cyberdyne's operations. They first attack Cyberdyne's information backup facility in Sacramento, but John is injured and captured by Jordan Dyson, while Sarah and Dieter escape. In a series of events, Jordan realizes that the Connors were right all along: Terminators are real, and he sides with them in a battle at Cyberdyne's current headquarters at Fort Laurel Army Base. Together, they are successful in blowing up the Cyberdyne operation, Serena is killed, and her Terminators destroyed. But Sarah is seriously wounded; John and Dieter are forced to flee, but leave Sarah in Jordan's hands with his promise to do all he can to get her treated and released.

 

But Jordan informs John that there was another Cyberdyne backup site. And, meanwhile, a remaining Terminator in the mountains of Montana is completing the replication of a clone of Serena.

 

CONTINUED IN T2: RISING STORM

 

Didja Know?

 

The series of novels written by S. M. Stirling which are made up of Infiltrator, Rising Storm, and The Future War are collectively referred to as the T2 Trilogy.

 

   The author gives acknowledgement to the works of Harlan Ellison. Popular writer Harlan Ellison sued Orion Pictures after the 1984 release of the film The Terminator, claiming that it was based on his 1964 Outer Limits episode, "Soldier", about a soldier from the future who travels back in time and ultimately sacrifices his life fighting his future enemy in 1964 (the episode was itself based on Ellison's 1957 short story "Soldier from Tomorrow"). Orion Pictures reached a settlement with Ellison for an undisclosed amount of money and a credit ("Acknowledgement to the works of Harlan Ellison") in future releases of the film.

   The use of the word "works" in the acknowledgement implies multiple sources of inspiration written by Ellison. This may refer just to the Outer Limits episode and the original short story as mentioned above. But some observers have pointed out similarities to other Ellison stories within the film, such as "Demon With a Glass Hand" and "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream".

   James Cameron, writer and director of the first two Terminator films, has denied basing his original script on any of Ellison's works.

 

The author also acknowledges Tazer International. Presumably, this is meant to be Taser International (often misspelled "Tazer").

 

Parts of the book take place at various points in the future, but most of it is set in the ambiguous present. The "present" year is never stated outright, but it is revealed that John is 16 years old at the time, making it about 2002; however, it is also stated that the destruction of Cyberdyne headquarters happened 6 years ago, which would make it 2001. Danny Dyson is said to be 12 years old, which would again fit with the 2001-02 year.

 

Didja Notice?

 

   The prologue of the novel opens immediately after the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, with Tarissa Dyson and her children at a motel in Los Angeles. Unlike the alternate timeline novel Dark Futures, this one just barely acknowledges the existence of the Dysons' daughter, Blythe; both she and her brother, Danny, are present in the motel with their mother. In Judgment Day, Tarissa tells Danny he needs to get to bed like his sister; a scene cut from the film shows the daughter and the script reveals her name to be Blythe.

   In Dark Futures, the Dyson's hotel room was in Anaheim, not Los Angeles.

   The date of the prologue states it is 1995, and most sources seem to agree that Terminator 2: Judgment Day takes place in that year. However, as I commented in the study of the film here on PopApostle, there is a fair amount of discrepancy in evidence as to what year that story takes place. John's police record (as seen in that film) states he was born on 2/28/85 and that he is ten years old, making the current year 1995. But the Judgment Day novelization states it is 1992; and remarks by the T-800 suggest it is 1994 (he says he was sent back from 35 years in the future, which we know was 2029, so his year of arrival would be 1994; he also states that Cyberdyne becomes the nation's largest supplier of military computer systems "in three years" and that Skynet goes online in 1997, again making the of the events of the film 1994.)

 

Page 2 reveals that Sarah had chosen the motel Tarissa and her kids would stay at and they would all meet there after the Cyberdyne take-down mission.

 

On page 3, John calls Tarissa at the motel to let her know about the death of her husband and what happened at Cyberdyne. In Dark Futures, it was Sarah who made the call.

 

On page 5, John picks up some food and supplies at a store in Altadena. Altadena is a an area of Los Angeles county just north of Pasadena.

 

Page 6 reveals that John and Sarah stole a Chrysler to escape from L.A. (It might be argued this is the car also stolen in this same situation in the alternate timelines of Dark Futures and "Lost & Found".)

 

Page 7 reveals that Paul Warren and Roger Colvin are the president and CEO of Cyberdyne, respectively. "CEO" stands for Chief Executive Officer. In The New John Connor Chronicles series of books, Oscar Cruz was the president of the company.

 

On page 8, Warren claims that Cyberdyne had backups of all Dyson's files, including his home computer files, though it seems the backups were all at Cyberdyne headquarters, so they have been destroyed along with the originals.

 

Chapter 2 opens in 2021. 2021 was also a key year in The New John Connor Chronicles series of books. Perhaps that year is a Nexus point like 2029 was in those novels.

 

Page 12 explains that up until 2021, the human survivors/resistors had tended to avoid the big cities of North America due to the radiation from the nuclear strikes of Judgment Day. Skynet had thus established most of its satellite receivers, antennae, and repair stations in those zones, to keep them clear of resistance strikes. One of John Connor's recent major tactics in the war has been to send people into the cities to destroy or subvert Skynet's facilities there.

 

The novels of the T2 Trilogy use the T-90 series designation for the hyperalloy endoskeleton Terminators sent into war sometime before the development of the T-800.

 

In this novel, the I-950 Infiltrator is developed by Skynet, a mostly organic, human construct designed for infiltration. The I-950 called Serena Burns is based on the captured resistance fighter Lisa Weinbaum, with blond hair and blue eyes. Skynet chose her for her physical and mental attributes and essentially cloned her from her own ova. Some fans have speculated that Weinbaum was also the model for the female T-X Terminator seen in Rise of the Machines and its associated timelines. Skynet is also raising other I-950s, both male and female.

 

On page 13, Weinbaum knows the old colloquialisms "a walk in the park" and "have your cake and eat it too" but she doesn't know what a park or cake is because she grew up in the post-apocalypse world.

 

Page 15 mentions the rubber-skinned T-600 Terminators. These were mentioned by Reese in The Terminator.

 

In this novel, Skynet has a number of human scientists who work for it. These scientists are referred to as Luddites and they welcome the eradication of humanity as part of the cure for Earth. Skynet has promised these humans it will allow them to end their lives once the rest of humanity is eradicated from the planet. Skynet also has humans it has coerced to work as slaves for the promise of food, shelter, and safety.

 

The novel seems to forego the use of the T-800 series designation for the model T-101 designation. Rise of the Machines confirmed that the 101 model is simply the human body form (of actor Arnold Schwarzenegger) often used over the T-800 endoskeleton. Page 22 states that all anthroform Terminators appear male due to the large size of the endoskeleton; however, "One Shot", at least, featured a large, female T-800.

 

Page 26 reveals that the I-950s have some animal DNA mixed in with the human.

 

Page 27 reveals that the female I-950s are capable of parthenogenesis (asexual reproduction).

 

Page 27 also reveals that Skynet was insistent on always having a backup plan.

 

Page 33 reveals that the mechanical subsystems of the I-950s were powered by a biological fuel cell running off the organism's bloodstream.

 

Page 35 describes the I-950s as too organic to upset dogs, which were able to smell the metallic ketones of regular Terminators. However, page 458 states that the dogs at Fort Laurel don't like Serena, growling and showing their teeth at her, even though she is human! Ketones are a type of organic compound often used in industrial production. A metallic ketone can cause the metallic smell or taste of some substances.

 

On page 36, Serena muses on the humans' tendency to operate against Skynet's forces at night as being illogical since the machines' instruments allow them to see just fine in the dark, unlike humans.

 

Page 36 reveals that some exotic animals such as tigers had escaped from zoos and animal parks in North America during the destruction of Judgment Day and had managed to survive and breed. This sounds similar to aspects of the 1995 film Twelve Monkeys.

 

On page 39, Serena claims to have been a member of the resistance group in Colorado called Rodriguez's Rangers. The NOW Comics Terminator series had some similar descriptors for various resistance groups such as Sarah's Slammers in Miami, Florida, Connor's Grizzlies in Sierra Madres, Mexico, and the Synth Slashers.

 

The novel reveals that Miles Dyson had a brother named Jordan who was an FBI agent. The FBI, of course, is the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which investigates federal crime and provides internal intelligence for the federal government.

 

On page 42, Tarissa Dyson remarks that her son Danny outgrew a brand new pair of Nike shoes in three weeks. Danny jokes he might be able to play for the NBA.

 

Page 43 reveals that Miles and Jordan's parents were killed in a car accident along with their little sister when they were teenagers. The two boys had lived on the life insurance payments after the accident.

 

Page 43 also reveals that Tarissa was attending college with Miles when they met. She was intending to become a CPA (Certified Public Accountant).

 

On page 45, Jordan tells Tarissa he has FBI business in Escondido and San Marcos. These are cities in San Diego County, California.

 

In the present time of the novel, Cyberdyne is just setting up a secret installation on an army base to continue the work of Miles Dyson. The army base is said to be Fort Laurel, a fictional base. Possibly the author borrowed the name from that of the Canoga Park, CA home of actor-comedian Stan Laurel (1890-1965) which was dubbed Fort Laurel by the press.

 

Tarissa tells Jordan that she learned from the SWAT team commander that they had killed Miles during the Cyberdyne standoff, not the "terrorists" Sarah and John Connor.

 

Page 53 reveals that the U.S. government bought the damaged microchip and robotic arm found by Cyberdyne from them and gave the company exclusive rights to develop the technology for the government.

 

This novel introduces two characters who became the models for the Model 101 Terminators (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the movies). Kurt Viemeister is an Austrian neo-Nazi and expert on computer languages hired by Cyberdyne to work on the Dyson project; his voice becomes that of the 101s. Dieter Von Rossbach is another Austrian, naturalized U.S. citizen and former CIA agent on whose body the 101s are based. However, this conflicts with the bonus features on the Rise of the Machines DVD which suggests the body model of the 101s was U.S. Air Force Chief Master Sergeant William Candy with a voice dubbed by an unnamed Cyberdyne employee.

 

Page 55 states that Viemeister attended USC and MIT and was a member of the Integral National Socialist Renewal Movement-Tyrolese branch. The INSRM appears to be a fictional organization in the Austrian state of Tyrol; the name indicates it is likely a Nazi-esque group, "integral nationalism" being a totalitarian type of society.

 

Warren claims that Viemeister will be able to get Cyberdyne's new computer system to respond to verbal commands and respond verbally itself, with an ability to actually understand concepts. He refers to it as Chinese-box stuff. A Chinese box is a set of nested boxes, one-within-another, growing smaller and smaller, similar to the concept of Russian matryoshka dolls.

 

On page 59, Serena says, "De nada." This is Spanish for "not at all."

 

On page 64, Tricker thinks of Warren and Colvin as Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dumber. This is a reference to the characters of Tweedledum and Tweedledee from Lewis Carroll's 1871 sequel novel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There.

 

The author capitalizes the "D" in Dumpster and "S" in Styrofoam on page 67 because they are actually brand names, even though both words have taken on a genericized air in the public mind.

 

On page 68, Skynet's tells Serena that its records show instances of "blurring", temporal anomalies such as files indicating Skynet became sentient in 1997 while other files indicate this occurred years later and in another location.

 

On page 69, Skynet describes time having an "inertia"; when artificially diverted, time seeks to resume its original path. While this is happening, several timelines can coexist in a state of quantum superimposition. Serena compares it to Schrödinger's cat, a thought experiment postulated by Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger (1887-1961) in 1935. See the Wikipedia article for more on the Schrödinger's cat paradox of quantum state simultaneity.

 

On page 71, Serena kidnaps a woman who works for Incetron. Incetron appears to be a fictional company.

 

On page 76, Serena muses that it is in the nature of the human species to destroy itself. A very similar line was spoken by the T-800 in Judgment Day.

 

Also on page 76, Serena opens a Cayman Island bank account. The Cayman Islands are a British territory in the Pacific Ocean near Cuba and known as a major offshore financial center for nations around the world.

 

On page 77, Serena opens credit card accounts with Visa, MasterCard, and American Express.

 

Page 78 introduces radical environmentalist Ron Labane, formerly of the New Life Organic Farm commune in Oregon. This appears to be a fictional farm, though there are several farms going by this name around the world.

 

On page 81, Lisa Labane tells her husband the commune is not Jonestown or any other cult where the women are cattle. Jonestown was the informal name of the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, largely a cult run by charismatic leader Jim Jones in the South American nation of Guyana in the 1970s. Jones convinced most of the members to commit suicide by drinking poisoned punch on November 18, 1978.

 

On page 82, Serena arrives at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). After claiming to have been robbed there, a security woman suggests she go to Travelers Aid, an international organization dedicated to helping stranded travelers; many airports have Travelers Aid desks manned by volunteers.

 

Serena's fake history includes starting her career at Worlon Systems. This appears to be a fictional company.

 

The novel finds Sarah and John living in Villa Hayes, Paraguay, under the names Suzanne and John Krieger, running the Krieger Trucking Company. Villa Hayes is an actual city in Paraguay. Krieger Trucking appears to be fictional, though there are a few similar business names in the U.S.

 

Page 90 describes Villas Hayes as being in the Chaco. This is a hot, semi-arid region of the Río de la Plata basin of Paraguay, Bolivia, and Argentina.

 

Sarah likes to drink an iced maté drink called tereré and flavored with caňa. Maté is a traditional South American beverage made by steeping dried, crushed yerba maté leaves in water, yielding a highly caffeinated drink. Maté is usually served hot, while tereré is the iced variety. Caňa is a liquor made from sugar, like a rum. Sarah is also seen drinking maté in The New John Connor Chronicles novels.

 

On page 91, Sarah jokingly thinks of herself as a milquetoast. "Milquetoast" is a term referring to a mild or timid individual. It derived from the comic strip character of Caspar Milquetoast appearing in The Timid Soul by H. T. Webster from 1924-1953.

 

Sarah is described as having her hair cut short around her face and dyed dark brown.

 

Sarah owns a small estancia in Paraguay where she lives. John lives there as well when he is not attending school at a military academy. An estancia is normally a cattle ranch in Spanish South America.

 

Page 92 reveals that Sarah's trucking company also engages in some of the local smuggling, but nothing dangerous like guns or drugs, just computers, CDs, and such.

 

Sarah has considered moving from Villa Hayes to Asunción, the capital city of Paraguay.

 

Sarah owns a mare named Linda. Possibly the author borrowed the name from that of the actress who portrays Sarah in the films, Linda Hamilton.

 

Page 93 describes Meylinda's boyfriend working at a confitería. This is a cafe.

 

Page 95 reveals that John is fluent in not only English and Spanish, but also Guarni (sic) and German. Guarani is an indigenous language of South America and is one of the official languages of Paraguay, along with Spanish.

 

On page 100, Sarah tells John she's been wanting to go to Ciudad del Este and also visit Parque Nacional Caaguazu. Ciudad del Este is the second largest city in Paraguay. Parque Nacional Caaguazu (Caaguazu National Park) is a nature conservation area in Paraguay.

 

Also on page 100, John tells his mom that Luis Salcido's family is having an asado to welcome him home from school. Asado is Spanish for "barbecue" or "roast".

 

When Sarah accuses him of being unsubtle, John says, "Unsubtle? Moi?" "Moi" is French for "me".

 

On page 101, Sarah tells John she suspects Luis' mother probably thinks Sarah is déclassé. This is a French term for someone of low social status.

 

Sarah drives a Jeep.

 

Page 105 reveals that Sarah no longer has the nightmares about nuclear holocaust. However, she does have nightmares about her incarceration at Pescadero State Hospital as depicted in Judgment Day.

 

On page 106, Sarah reflects back on Dr. Silberman. He was Sarah's psychiatrist at Pescadero State Hospital.

 

Also on page 106, casa grande is Spanish for "big house".

 

On page 107, John jokes with his mom about being a gray-haired, gingerbread-baking mamacita and says, "Whatchoo talkin' about, gray hair!" This may be a reference to the oft-spoken line, "Whatchoo talkin' about, Willis?" by the character of Arnold Jackson (Gary Coleman) in the 1978-1985 TV sitcom Diff'rent Strokes.

 

Also on page 107, Sarah asks John if the Salcidos' asado is going to be a "sittin'-on-the-hay-bales kind of a do" or more like the barbecue in Gone With the Wind. She is referring to the 1938 film Gone With the Wind, which features a fancy, dress-up, barbecue in a scene near the beginning of the film. Later, on page 162, Sarah relates her recent dream that she attended the asado dressed as Scarlett O'Hara; Scarlett is the protagonist of Gone With the Wind.

 

On page 110, a waitress refers to Dieter as a kuimbaé. This is a Guarani word, but I've been unable to find a definition for it. From the context, it seems to mean something like "hunk".

 

On page 112, Sarah reflects on being on Thorazine while at Pescadero. Thorazine is the brand name of chlorpromazine in the U.S., an antipsychotic used to treat schizophrenia.

 

On page 117, Dieter is awaiting a shipment of bull sperm from King Ranch in the United States for breeding his cows.

 

Page 121 describes Dieter's house as having rafters of thick quebracho--ax-breaker--trunks. Quebracho is a Spanish term used to describe several species of very hard wood trees, hence the etymology of the word coming from the Spanish for ax-breaker.

 

Also on page 121, Dieter works on a state-of-the-art IBM computer at his home.

 

On page 122, Marieta tells Dieter her nephew is coming up from Tobati. Tobati is a city in Paraguay.

 

Page 123 reveals that Dieter drives a Land Rover.

 

Page 124 reveals that Sarah and John have a number of buried stockpiles of food, weapons, and gold coins throughout the southwestern U.S. and northern Mexico.

 

Page 125 describes Dieter's career as a counterterrorist operative as having begun with the Bundesheer. The Bundesheer is the Austrian Federal Army.

 

Page 129 reveals Sarah's cover story as Suzanne Krieger: that she was formerly married to John's father, Paul Krieger, who started Krieger Trucking, which she inherited when he died.

 

On page 132, Dieter uses an Identikit program to make a likeness of Suzanne Krieger's face.

 

Dieter was an agent for the Sector, a counterterrorism branch of the CIA, before his recent retirement. The Sector appears to be a fictional branch of the real world CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) of the United States.

 

On page 141, Serena remarks that the scientific geniuses working for Cyberdyne hate anything that restricts them or smacks of Big Brother. "Big Brother" is, of course, a reference to the authoritarian character in George Orwell's 1949 novel 1984, and the now ubiquitous phrase that appeared in the world of the novel, "Big Brother is watching you."

 

Discovering Serena in his house on page 147, Colvin has thoughts of the Michael Douglas movie Fatal Attraction and thanks God his family doesn't own a bunny. Fatal Attraction is an immensely popular 1987 film, starring Michael Douglas and Glenn Close. Close plays a woman obsessed with Douglas' married character after a weekend fling and begins stalking him, entering his family's home uninvited and boiling his daughter's pet rabbit on the stove.

 

On page 157, Serena listens to a CD called Hits of the Eighties. There have been a number of compilation music albums published with this generic title.

 

Also on page 157, Labane and the filmmakers attend the New York Ecology Fair in 2001. This appears to have been a fictional gathering of the ecologically-minded.

 

Page 157 mentions that Ziedman graduated from Chapman University.

 

On pages 162-163, John is singing the lyrics of "Wind Beneath My Wings", a 1982 song by songwriters Jeff Silbar and Larry Henley and recorded by a number of different artists, most popularly by Bette Midler in 1988.

 

On page 163, Dieter is performing kata in the courtyard outside his home. Kata is a Japanese martial arts form of choreographed movement of the body.

 

Catching Elsa watching as the shirtless Dieter performs kata in the courtyard, Marieta compares her to a puta and tells her to vamos. "Puta" is Spanish slang for "slut" and "vamos" means "move".

 

On page 166, Sarah, at the Salcido asado, thinks of herself and John being out of place among the upper class. She's reminded of a movie starring Peter Ustinov where his character speaks of he and his friends as desperate criminals having fallen in with nice people. The film she is thinking of is 1955's We're No Angels, which also starred Humphrey Bogart.

 

On page 167, Consuela sees Dieter and remarks, "Qué hombre!" This is Spanish for "That man!"

 

Chapter 9 reveals that Serena smuggled T-800 microchips from the future in her abdomen. She cuts them out of herself with a knife in "the present" to provide the brains of her newly-built cadre of model 101 Terminators.

 

On page 184, Serena muses that she has so far been more successful than "any of the previous agents" sent back in time by Skynet, perhaps because she is mainly attempting to preserve the "original" timeline. Her use of the word "any" stands out a bit because, if one takes only the film continuity into account, there have only been two previous agents of Skynet, in which case the preferable word might be "either". The use of "any" somewhat implies more than two agents; so, we might take that as acknowledgement, in our own minds, if not the author's, that there was a third previous Terminator in this timeline...the female Terminator who goes after the fourth Sarah Connor during the events of The Terminator, as witnessed in "One Shot". She may also be thinking of other Terminators mentioned in the "blurry" files of Skynet that are remnants of alternate timelines as mentioned above.

 

Page 190 reveals that Miles Dyson was exonerated of complicity in the Connors' Cyberdyne attack in Judgment Day, due to his wife's testimony that she and her son were being held hostage by the "terrorists". (No mention is made, in this case, of where the Dyson daughter was during these events.)

 

Page 191 describes Jordan's apartment as being in Wilmington, Delaware. Wilmington is the largest city in Delaware.

 

Page 192 reveals that the intelligence agencies, by-and-large, believe the Connors died in the jungles of Brazil at some point in the past. Page 212 states that the intelligence agencies have been led to believe the Connors fell into the Amazon River and were eaten by piranha! (This ferociousness of piranha is largely mythical, often promulgated in Hollywood productions. Though they are voracious meat eaters, they are actually omnivorous and do not normally attack living prey larger than themselves.)

 

On page 192, Jordan's apartment is described as having clunky Mission end tables. This refers to Mission Style furniture, made of wood and making use of simple lines and flat panels, a design esthetic dating back to the late 1800s.

 

On page 197, John mentions the Connor estancia being stocked with Coke. John is also said to favor the beverage in Dark Futures.

 

One of John's martial arts teachers was Sensei Chuck Wei at the Academia Mendoza in Paraguay. Academia Mendoza appears to be a fictional institution in that country.

 

Page 198 reveals that Dieter (and presumably the T-800s) is 6'2" tall. This is also the claimed height of Arnold Schwarzenegger, though some have claimed he is actually much shorter than that, possibly as low 5'10". My height! I could take 'im, man, I could take 'im! Not.

 

Page 203 mentions Max, the German Shepherd dog John had to leave behind at his foster parents' house in Judgment Day and which was killed by the T-1000 (as seen in the Extreme Edition of the film). It is also revealed that John has refused to have a dog since then, knowing that they may have to leave it behind in flight from the potential forces of Skynet.

 

In Chapter 10, Dieter takes Sarah to a classical music concert of Vivaldi. Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741) was a composer, priest, and violin virtuoso.

 

On page 208, John says, "Nada." This is Spanish for "nothing".

 

On page 211, Jeff Goldberg mentions that Dieter once worked as an agent in Amsterdam, breaking up an arms smuggling ring that was running Sarin (sic) gas. Amsterdam is the capital of the Netherlands. Sarin is a chemical weapon classified as a weapon of mass destruction by the United Nations.

 

Page 214 reveals that Sector agent Goldberg is stationed in Vienna, Austria.

 

Page 217 reveals that Cyberdyne president Paul Warren lives in Beverly Hills. Beverly Hills is an affluent city in Los Angeles County.

 

Page 217 mentions the beverages Kauna coffee, jasmine tea, and sacher-torte. Presumably "Kauna coffee" is referring to "Kona coffee", coffee grown in the Kona districts of the big island of Hawaii. Jasmine tea is that which is scented with jasmine blossoms, typically a Chinese blend. Sacher-torte is a type of chocolate cake originated in Vienna, Austria.

 

Page 218 mentions Waterford crystal.

 

Page 220 reveals that it was money from Paul Warren's wife's family that gave Cyberdyne its start and her political contacts gave it their first government contracts.

 

On page 229, Labane and the filmmakers are heading for a New Age event in Virginia called Starburst. As far as I can tell, Starburst was a fictional event. New Age is a form of spirituality that embraces both Western and Eastern philosophies, metaphysics, and science.

 

Labane mentions possibly submitting their film to the Toronto Film Festival.

 

On page 229, Labane and the filmmakers pass a Wal-Mart.

 

On page 232, Marco Cassetti thinks of some nasty neighborhoods in the viviendas temporarias of Asunción. "Viviendas temporarias" is Spanish for "temporary housing".

 

Also on page 232, Cassetti thinks that he has a pretty good name for a private eye, though the Italianess of it makes it sound somewhat villainous. He muses that a worse Italian name would be Buttafucco. This is a reference to Joey Buttafucco, the Long Island owner of an auto body shop who became involved with an underage girl, Amy Fisher, who shot his wife in the face in 1992.

 

On page 233, Cassetti wishes he could afford a Burberry trench coat. Burberry is a high end fashion company, most famous for its trench coat, designed by company founder Thomas Burberry for the British military during WWI.

 

In classic P.I. fashion, Cassetti wears not only a trench coat, but also a Panama hat. A Panama hat is a brimmed straw hat that became popular in the 20th Century when immigrant California gold miners picked them up while passing through the Panama Canal to the U.S., though the style actually originated in Ecuador.

 

On page 243, Sarah tells John they could give Griego an incentive to keep quiet about them by offering him their buried weapons cache in Parque San Luis near the Brazilian border. I've been unable to confirm the existence of a park by that name along the Paraguay/Brazil border.

 

Page 248 reveals that Sarah once had a relationship with a British man named Peter Gallagher when John was younger.

 

On page 249, John tells Griego that the weapons cache includes SAWs. SAWs (Squad Automatic Weapon) are one-person automatic rifles, usually with a bi-pod attachment for ground fire, and designed to hold more ammunition and handle more continuous fire than typical handheld weapons.

 

On page 254, Tricker reveals the severed arm from the T-800 that was caught in a giant gear at the plant (as seen in Judgment Day) was recovered by government agents after the steel mill incident and held all this time before now being handed over to Cyberdyne for research. However, the novelization of Judgment Day states that John recovered and destroyed that arm in the vat of molten metal. (In Timeline JD-3 of PopApostle's Terminator chronology, in Dark Futures, in their haste to escape the arriving police officers at the steel plant, John and Sarah were not able to recover the severed arm. It is later found by the police and eventually handed over to Cyberdyne. And in Timeline JD-2, the arm was left behind at the plant and discovered by Detective Weatherby in "Lost & Found".)

 

On page 256, Griego thinks of Sarah as a loca killer. "Loca" is Spanish for "crazy".

 

On page 257, Sarah greets the Kaisers with, "Mba'eichapa?" This is Guarani for "How are you?"

 

On page 273, Cassetti decides not to trudge through the brush to get closer to Dieter's house, reflecting he's a P.I., not a Backlands Scout. The term is capitalized like a proper name, but I am unaware of any formal organization going be the name of Backlands Scouts. Maybe it is intended as just a generic term to describe an organization such as the Boy Scouts of America. Cassetti goes on to muse that this is supposed to be The Maltese Falcon, not The Treasure of the Sierra Madre; these are both Humphrey Bogart films, the first featuring him as the private eye Sam Spade and the second as a gold prospector in Mexico who must engage in a long wilderness trek to mine and return gold to the city.

 

On page 279, Mary Warren chides Alice for wearing a fox-fur coat and warns her that there is a huge crowd of PETA people in San Francisco. PETA is People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, an animal rights organization.

 

On page 283, Serena and Colvin discuss Mary's airplane crash and the FAC investigation. I think "FAC" was a typo and is meant to be "FAA", the Federal Aviation Administration.

 

On page 285, Griego's office is described as cluttered with junk, including old 3.5-inch floppies. This refers to a type of digital storage disk that was popularly used in the 1980s and '90s and rarely used now.

 

On page 286, Griego thinks of Cassetti as a hijo. "Hijo" is Spanish for "son", often used affectionately, but here, more insultingly.

 

On page 288, Griego uses the words estanciero and vaquero. These are Spanish for "rancher" and "cowboy", respectively.

 

On page 295, Dieter watches the footage of the Terminator that attacked the LAPD station back in 1984 (from The Terminator) and muses on the unlikely possibility that it was a man hopped up on PCP. PCP is a hallucinogenic drug that can have an analgesic effect on the body as well, deadening pain receptors for a time. Detective Vukovich also suggested this possibility to Sarah in the film.

 

Page 286 states that the helicopter pilot who was made to jump from the copter by the T-1000 in Judgment Day died in the fall. In Dark Futures, he is said to have survived the jump, though he was badly injured and had no memory of the events.

 

On page 298, agent Patricia Paulson and Dieter discuss the retirement of Jordan Dyson from the FBI to join Cyberdyne and she says the bennies at Cyberdyne are just as good. "Bennies" is a slang term for "benefits".

 

Page 299 states that the company that owned the factory where Sarah and Kyle had taken refuge at the end of The Terminator was the fledgling Cyberdyne. However, the novelization of The Terminator states that the company was Kleinhaus Electronics and two workers there, Simmons and Kroll, found the Terminator parts and used them as the impetus to start their own company, Cyberdyne.

 

Page 299 reveals that Cyberdyne had initially pressed for prosecution of Sarah Connor for destruction of property, vandalism, trespassing, etc. after the incident at the factory in The Terminator, but after another day or so, more compassionate heads prevailed and the charges were dropped.

 

Page 300 states that Sarah had hit a number of A.I. companies around the U.S. before being captured and placed in Pescadero State Hospital.

 

On page 304, neo-Nazi Viemeister has Cyberdyne's latest, greatest computer reciting passages from an anti-Semitic text in order for it to learn syntax, etc. Serena speculates that this may be where Skynet's desire to destroy what it sees as a dangerous, devious species in humanity originated.

 

On page 307, Serena sends one of her Terminators to capture a young human female of childbearing age to act as a surrogate for implantation of one of Serena's own eggs for parthenogenesis. She tells the robot that if the victim is found to have AIDS or any other incurable disease, she is to be terminated. AIDS is Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome and is usually contracted through sexual contact or blood transfer.

 

Chapter 16 opens on U.S. 20 near Shreveport, LA. This refers to Interstate 20 in Louisiana.

 

Page 308 describes Labane's book achieving a place on the Times bestseller list. This refers to the New York Times Best Seller list, which has been reporting the bestselling books weekly since October 12, 1931.

 

On page 309, Labane laments the truth of an old saying, "A prophet is not respected in his own country." He is presumably thinking of a quote by Jesus in the King James Bible which actually goes, "A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house."

 

The four men Labane meets at the diner are named John, Paul, George, and Louie. At first, Jordan guesses that Louie is named Ringo. That's because he assumed after hearing the first three names that they were named after the Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. The Beatles, of course, were an extremely popular English rock band from 1960-70.

 

Page 312 describes George as looking like an angry Buddha. Buddha was the Indian spiritual teacher Siddhārtha Gautama whose teachings began the Buddhist religion.

 

On page 312, Labane tells the fabulous four they've got to think like frat boys crossed with Navy seals. The Navy SEALS are the United States Navy's Sea, Air, Land Teams, a special operations force. 

 

Page 313 reveals that Sarah has a code name of Perry to some of her contacts who provide her with privileged information. I could be wrong, but maybe the author borrowed the name from English writer Sarah Perry, because of the Sarah in her name and the fact that she looks a bit like actress Linda Hamilton! (Photo from Wikipedia.) Alternatively, the code name could be based on the name of Reese's commander when he served in the 132nd from 2021-27, as stated by Reese to Sarah in The Terminator.

 

Page 316 states that Serena is bringing Jordan his company car, a conservative but serviceable Excel. The only Excel automobiles I can find reference to are by Hyundai or Lotus and both ended production in the early 1990s. It seems unlikely a major corporation like Cyberdyne would present a new executive with a vehicle that old.

 

Cassetti meets one of Serena's Terminators at Aeropuerto Silvio Pettirossi. This is a reference to Silvio Pettirossi International Airport near Asunción. Page 317 refers to the interiors of the airport as International Style; this is a style of architecture, the term first coined in 1932 at the Modern Architecture - International Exhibition.

 

On page 318, one of Serena's Terminators says, "I'll be back," the phrase popularized by Arnold Schwarzenegger's performance as a Terminator in The Terminator and Judgment Day. On page 345, Dieter, who will go on to become the model for the 101 body type, also speaks the phrase to Sarah, and later thinks it to her at the end of the novel.

 

On page 319, Griego has a copy of the Madonna and Child in a rococo frame on his office wall, which hides a recess holding smuggled assault rifles. Madonna and Child was painted by Italian artist Filippo Lippi in the 15th Century. Rococo is a French artistic style from the 18th Century.

 

On page 319, the Terminator examines a Galil assault rifle in Griego's office. The Galil series of small Israeli assault weapons were designed by Yisrael Galil and Yaacov Lior in the late 1960s.

 

 

 

On page 320, the Terminator selects a Steyr machine pistol and a grenade launcher that looks like a fat single-barrel shotgun. The grenade launcher is probably the M79, the same model the Terminator uses a number of times in Judgment Day and which fires 40mm grenades as stated on page 322.

 

On page 324, Sarah spots armadillos, a wild pig, and some vampire bats around her estancia. These are all animals known to dwell in the wilds of Paraguay.

 

On page 327, Sarah has an Uzi concealed behind a cushion on the couch during her meeting with Dieter. The general Uzi line of weapons was designed by Israeli Captain Uziel Gal in the late 1940s and named after him.

 

On page 335, John uses a 12.7mm heavy Barrett sniper rifle against attackers trying to enter the house. Barrett makes several sniper rifle models.

 

On page 336, Sarah grabs up an M-16, while Dieter is armed with his Glock pistol. The M-16 is the most widely distributed U.S. military semi- and full-automatic rifle from 1962 to present day. Glock is a line of popular plastic guns made by Glock Ges.m.b.H.

 

On page 337, after knocking down a Terminator with several shots from her M-16, Sarah tells Dieter that will "...put it out for about a minute or so. It'll have to reboot." How does she know? In this timeline, the only T-800 she's faced as an enemy before this was the one in The Terminator and neither she nor Reese had anything as powerful as an M-16 rifle to shoot it with. It's possible that Reese gave her some knowledge from his battlefield experiences in the future, but it's also pointed out in the following novel, Rising Storm, that "Uncle Bob" explained the weaknesses of a T-800 to John.

 

Also on page 337, Dieter sees that one of the Terminators is holding either a Galil or Kalashnikov. These two rifles do look somewhat similar from a distance. The Kalashnikov is another name for the AK-47, designed by Mikhail Kalashnikov in 1947.

 

On page 340, Sarah fires a Carl Gustav at the Terminators. A Carl Gustav is an anti-tank recoilless rifle manufactured by Saab Bofors Dynamics.

 

On page 347, the author capitalizes the term "Frisbee". The name has come into general use to describe a toy, plastic flying disc, but is properly capitalized as a trademark of the Wham-O toy company.

 

In Chapter 19, the Connors and Dieter use some Coleman products during their campout, in hiding from the forces of Skynet.

 

On page 363, Dieter tells the Connors they will drive to São Paulo, Brazil, where he has some contacts who can help them. São Paulo is a state in the South American country of Brazil.

 

On page 368, Dieter and the Connors arrive in Bogotá, Colombia. Bogotá is the capital of that country.

 

On page 370, Sarah reflects that airport food exists in a multinational Twilight Zone where difference was abolished. This is a reference to the classic Twilight Zone TV series of 1959-1964, an anthology of fantasy, horror, science-fiction, and suspense.

 

On page 371, Dieter and the Connors arrive in Georgetown. This is the capital of the Cayman Islands.

 

On page 374, John makes reference to Skye's "two-gig Pents". This refers to Pentium processors in the 2 gigahertz range, manufactured by Intel for personal computers.

 

Also on page 374, John asks Skye for a couple cans of Jolt. This is a reference to Jolt Cola, a high-caffeine energy drink.

 

On page 375, the Connors and Dieter learn that Cyberdyne keeps their offsite storage at Advanced Technology Systems Inc. in Sacramento, California. This appears to be intended as a fictional company, though there are companies with similar names outside of Sacramento.

 

Page 380 has Serena reflecting on one of John Connor's future sayings, "Allowing yourself to have contempt for your enemy is a betrayal of common sense."

 

On page 381, Serena refers to the "original" 101 model Terminators (modeled after the body of Dieter Von Rossbach) as the T-101A series. Again, this seems to disregard the T-800 series number of endoskeletons, with the "Arnold Schwarzenegger" cloned flesh covering being a model 101.

 

On page 385, the Terminator called Third passes through Owen Roberts International Airport, seeking Waybright Charters. This is the main international airport of the Cayman Islands. Waybright Charters appears to be a fictional airline.

 

Page 385 describes the idling engines of a small jet airplane as smelling like kerosene. Kerosene is actually used as a component of many types of jet fuel.

 

On page 386, John appreciates the comparative luxury of their Waybright Charters plane, saying, "No Greyhound with wings this time." Greyhound is a long distance bus service in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

 

On page 386, the pilot of the small jet mentions Corpus Christi. This is a Texas coastal city on the Gulf of Mexico.

 

The Connors and Dieter pass through Tamaulipas to gather some weapons from a Connor cache and connect with a contact of Sarah's. Tamaulipas is one of the states of Mexico, on the Texas border.

 

On page 397, John decides he'll have to build a Faraday cage to store the severed Terminator head. A Faraday cage is made of conducting material which prevents the transmission of electrical fields to objects within, or transmission out.

 

On page 400, John asks his mom if Napoleon's mother treated him this way. She responds that Napoleon's mother didn't know he would be anything but a Corsican dropout. Napoleon Bonaparte was the high general, First Consul, and Emperor of France from 1799-1814. He was born on the French island of Corsica in the Mediterranean Sea.

 

On page 402, Sarah mentions Interpol. Interpol is the shorthand name of the International Criminal Police Organization.

 

In Chapter 21, the Connors return to Charon Mesa and the Salceda camp. The Salceda family are Sarah and John's friends in the desert from Judgment Day; they reappear in several of the post-Judgment Day stories in various timelines. Issue #2 of the Judgment Day comic book adaptation places the camp at Charon Mesa, northwest of Calexico (though it appears to be a fictional location).

 

On page 405, Sarah jokingly thinks of their luck as Murphy's Martial Law. She seems to have invented a sort of portmanteau phrase from Murphy's Law and Martial Law. Murphy's law is basically an adage that "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong." Martial Law is a declaration of temporary military rule in time of emergency by the government of a region.

 

Page 406 reveals there was previously a cousin of Enrique's named Carlos who had been living with the Salcedas when the Connors were last at the compound. Enrique tells John he moved to Austin and was probably playing guitar. "Austin" probably refers to the city in Texas. In The Sarah Connor Chronicles, a nephew of Enrique's also named Carlos appeared in several episodes.

 

The Salceda son who was just a toddler in Judgment Day is 7 years old now. Sarah calls him Paulo, though in the novelization of Judgment Day he is called Paco.

 

On page 407, Yolanda says "niño" and Enrique says "sí". These are Spanish for "boy" and "yes", respectively.

 

On page 408, Enrique says, "Ay, caramba!" This is a Spanish exclamation used to express surprise.

 

Also on page 408, Yolanda tells John they have Classic Coke and Mountain Dew. These are both soda pops, though Classic Coke was officially known as Coca-Cola Classic at the time and is now (since 2011) labeled simply Coca-Cola.

 

On page 409, Enrique says "hombre". This is Spanish for "man".

 

Also on page 409, Enrique shows Sarah a Marquis. This was a car model manufactured by Ford from 1967-1986.

 

On page 410, Sarah recalls how she first met Enrique and Yolanda when she was pregnant with John. They are the ones who got her started in the survivalist lifestyle and helped her make contacts.

 

Page 410 reveals that Sarah's father died of a heart attack when she was 17. This would have been just two years before the events of The Terminator. However, the novelization of The Terminator, states that he died when she was a young girl.

 

On page 411, Sarah looks at the "NO FATE" she carved into the Salceda's picnic table with a K-bar (sic) bayonet years ago (as seen in Judgment Day). Ka-Bar makes a variety of knives, most popularly the combat knife used by the United States Marine Corps. However, PopApostle reader Richard K. has pointed out that Sarah's knife is not a Ka-Bar at all, but a SOG Specialty Knife, a replica of a knife designed for personnel of the U.S. Studies and Observations Group in Vietnam during the Vietnam War.

 

Also on page 411, Dieter learns on a conspiracy website that some of Sarah's online "followers" think she is the victim of the government working in collaboration with aliens.

 

On page 412, John is attempting to break the code of the CPU from the Terminator head and is getting frustrated with the time it takes, saying, "In the movies they always break a code like this in a couple hours," and Sarah responds, "Ah, but this isn't the movies." This is probably a wink to the reader in reference to the Terminator film series and the fact that the current story is being told as a novel. 

 

In an attempt to make her Terminators look like different people, Serena makes cosmetic alterations to their hair and beards, even giving one of them a Fu Manchu. This is the style of mustache worn by the fictional crime character of that name created by writer Sax Rohmer in 1913 for a series of books and who has appeared in numerous films and comic books. (Right: Christopher Lee as Fu Manchu in The Face of Fu Manchu from 1965.)

 

On page 420, Serena teaches one of the Terminators to walk more like a real person by having it mimic a sort of James Dean dawdle. James Dean (1931-1955) was an actor and cultural icon.

 

On page 422, Serena tells Jordan she's booked him a room at a Holiday Inn in Sacramento.

 

In Chapter 22, Serena gives her three remaining Terminators the names Tom Gallagher, Dick Lewis, and Bob Harris. This may be a joking almost-reference (as Jordan seems to infer on page 424) to the placeholder phrase "Tom, Dick, and Harry" to indicate multiple generic persons.

 

On page 422, Jordan thinks of Serena's three men (the Terminators) as being so robotically similar he compares them to the ancient clay warriors that guarded the tomb of China's first emperor. He is thinking of the Terracotta Army, statues found guarding the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, discovered by farmers digging wells in 1974; each soldier's face is different from the next.

 

On page 424, Jordan notes that Tom, Dick, and Harris are armed with Israeli Desert Eagle .50-calibers.

 

On page 425, the Connors and Dieter stop at Roy's Diner just outside of Sacramento. Roy's appears to be a fictional diner for the area.

 

John wonders when the plasma guns of the future war got invented and who invented them. The novelization of Judgment Day refers to a Westinghouse M-25 forty-watt phased plasma pulse-gun, implying it was made by the Westinghouse corporation, presumably before the war.

 

Looking at the diagram of a plasma rifle on page 426, John says, "This is a Buck Rogers in the twenty-fifth century ain't-no-doubt-'bout-it blaster..." He is, of course, referring to the famous science-fiction character of Buck Rogers, first appearing in 1929 in a comic strip titled Buck Rogers in the 25th Century A.D.

 

On page 426, John refers to the offices of Advanced Technology Systems as "...butt-ugly Bauhaus Office Building." He is referring to the German Bauhaus style of Modernist architecture, originating at the Bauhaus art school in Germany from 1919-1933.

 

On page 427, Dieter wields a Heckler & Koch submachine gun.

 

On page 433, Jordan thinks of Tom, Dick, and Harris as the Three Stooges. The Three Stooges were a comedy act from 1930-1975, best known for their short comedy films.

 

When Jordan dresses John's wound on page 440, John says, "Good field dressing," and Jordan responds, "Glad you like it. It's my first." This is very similar to dialog spoken between Reese and Sarah in The Terminator. Here, John even smiles after the exchange, apparently recognizing it, even though he wasn't even born yet at the time of the original exchange! I guess his mom must have told him about it.

 

On page 451, Dieter tells Sarah that Kurt Viemeister is a Nazi, "...genuine article, no Haider pussyfooting." By "Haider", he is referring to Austrian politician Jörg Haider (1950-2008) who made assorted remarks through his career that were somewhat sympathetic to the history of Nazi Germany.

 

On page 453, Serena muses on Sarah Connor's almost supernatural ability to escape certain death and wonders if it's the continuum's way of working to keep as close as possible to the original timeline.

 

Page 457 reveals that Major Ralph Ferri had been a member of Delta Force. This is the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta of the U.S. Army, popularly known as Delta Force, a Special Mission Unit and the primary counter-terrorism unit of the U.S. military.

 

On page 457, Dieter tells Ferri that his cattle ranch in Paraguay is pretty boring compared to Srebrenica. This is likely a reference to the Srebrenica Massacre in Bosnia in 1995, during the Bosnian War, in which the troops of Bosnian General Ratko Mladić killed over 8000 Bosnian Muslims. The reference would seem to indicate that Dieter and Ferri were on an operation there for the U.S. at the time.

 

On page 458, Jordan is on Route 5 outside of Los Angeles. This would be Interstate 5.

 

Page 461 reveals that Serena has hired a company called Aadvanced Security (yes, with two "a's") to guard the automated factory site that has been attacked by the Luddite Liberation Army. Both the company and the army are fictional.

 

Serena had considered having the Army Corps of Engineers construct the Cyberdyne automated factory. This is a U.S. federal agency dedicated mainly to public engineering works.

 

At the Fort Laurel base hospital on page 465, Ferri purchases two cups of coffee from the vending machine and gives one to Jordan, saying, "I got a flush, you got bupkiss." This is probably intended as a callback to the scene in Judgment Day where the Pescadero guard called Lewis purchases coffee from a vending machine in a Wildcard Poker cup and tells Gwen he got a full house.

 

In Chapter 25, Dieter has borrowed the Chamberlains' army-surplus Humvee. Humvee stands for High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, manufactured by AM General mostly for the U.S. military. The vehicle has replaced the former high-mobility vehicle, the Jeep, in the U.S. military.

 

Page 468 mentions that Ferri prefers a certain, unnamed Danish brand of beer, sneering at mere Tuborg. Tuborg is a brewery in Copenhagen, Demark.

 

On page 470, Ferri has a gray-and-red Formica table in his kitchen. "Formica" is capitalized because it is the brand name of plastic laminate used on the table's surface.

 

On page 476, the base doctor tells John he should be ready for another shot of Demerol for the pain caused by his shoulder wound. Demerol is a drug sometimes used to treat moderate-to-severe pain.

 

On page 477, Jordan tells John he always thought Sarah was the victim of some kind of combination traumatic-stress/Stockholm-syndrome thing as far as her belief in the Skynet/Terminator future war. Stockholm syndrome (also known as capture-bonding) is a psychological phenomenon in which a hostage begins to identify with and feel empathy for their captor(s).

 

Also on page 477, John is given a dish of Jell-O to eat. Jell-O is a gelatin dessert made by Kraft Foods.

 

On page 480, Ferri tells Dieter he told the PX to order some of his favorite Danish beer. PX stands for Post Exchange, a retail store on U.S. Army bases for base personnel.

 

On page 483, John reveals he discovered a verbal override command in the CPU of the Terminator head he hacked earlier. The override phrase is "Terminal Mission Override XY74". It seems to work on the Terminators constructed by Serena in "present time". Whether the same command would work on other Terminators is unknown.

 

Also on page 483, John says, "De nada." This is Spanish for "not at all."

 

As Jordan agrees to help Dieter against the Terminators on page 486, he thinks, I guess that means I've crossed the Rubicon for certain. "Crossing the Rubicon" has become an idiom standing for "point of no return", in reference to the crossing of the Rubicon River in Italy by Julius Caesar's army in 49 B.C., launching the Great Roman Civil War of 49-45 B.C.

 

During a low point in her battle against Serena on page 505, Sarah tells herself, On your feet, soldier! This refers back to the same phrase used by her to Reese in The Terminator and by a vision of Reese to her in the Extreme Edition DVD of Judgment Day.

 

On pages 506-507, John observes as Serena plunges her hand into his mother in a classic knife hand. This refers to a martial arts strike called knifehand, more popularly known as a karate chop.

 

On page 507, Dieter wields a Browning Hi-Power. 

 

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