Hunkered down, the resistance fighters whispered to each other wondering what was happening. The machines were not advancing as usual, but any attempt to break away was met with discouraging fire to keep them pinned in place.
Fields vehemently argued and shut down the rumours that a collector unit was on its way and that they would all be sent to the incinerator camps. Skynet had a policy of wiping out any organised resistance rather then gathering them up after all.
He was looking at options for a break towards the LA River, hoping that they could keep cover from the aerial HK's when he was shouted by Emerson.
"I've got no idea what the hell that is, but it just appeared between those two HK units" the African-American soldier pointed through the dust billowing in lazy swirls.
Fields squinted and saw a pair of red shining lights, almost like unblinking eyes in the dark.
A second pair, then a third, all told they counted eleven pairs of red in the darkness. It was obviously some machine but what?
"Brandt, get your optics up here, we need that data!" Fields ordered, forget about command, he wanted to know what it was.
Brandt bellied forwards removing the cable from his radio set to use for the data transfer. He placed the infrared scanner Infront and coupled the cable to his plasma rifle, the blue screen flickering to life showing data from the scanning laser.
"Reinforced chassis, gyro-stabilized, fusion powered? Sir, is this the thing command wanted us to send them data about?" Brandt asked uneasily, "It's a damn monster, how the fuck are we meant to fight that?"
As he asked the new machines moved, in lockstep they took a step forwards. Firelight illuminated their skeletal appearance and glinted off of the polished hardened steel alloys. Each massive machine crunching forwards over rubble and bones of the slain. Huge Plasmaguns held steady by metallic arms glowed red as they powered up, outshining the unblinking stares of the grinning silvered skull faces above.
"Open fire!" Fields screamed and all the humans shook themselves out if the trance like state they were in and fired from their concealment.
Bullets sparked as they pinged off the armoured plates. Grenade launchers gave their throaty roar as their explosive payload dropped amongst the Terminators approaching.
Fields, Brandt and Waller fired bright purple beans of plasma concentrating on one of the machines, which seemed to shrug the firepower off. Until a shot hit the spine above its waist and severed it in two.
Fields and Brandt moved onto the next in the line as they machines opened fire chewing through the scant cover available and immediately causing casualties amongst the humans. Waller kept her eye on the fallen terminator watching with horror as it discarded it's broken gun and crawled onwards towards their position.
The radio burst into life causing everyone to jump but carry on fighting.
"Gamma patrol, if you can hear this, concentrate your fire on each T-800 in turn. I repeat concentrate your fire on each unit in turn, we are two minutes out, inbound on your position, over" the gruff voice rang out of the speaker.
Fields slid down to grab the microphone, "Who is this? How do you know what we're fighting? Godammit!" His last outburst in response to Brandt being thrown back by an explosion with half his head missing.
"This is John Connor, if you can hear this, you are the resistance!"
*****
The second post of Terminator Genysis deals with the forces of the AI Skynet, everybody's favourite genocidal cybernetic organisms, the Terminators!
The entire force together:
Painting was very simple as might be imagined.
A Leadbelcher base, Nuln Oil wash, then drybrushes of Leadbelcher and Stormhost Silver gave a nice bright metal, like the original T-800 in the first (and best*) Terminator movie:
With upgrades in camera and special effects technology (to the detriment of using CGI constantly), the on screen Endoskeletons transformed into this:
Which is what the River Horse miniatures were based upon:
Just like in the first (and best*) Terminator movie, once an Endoskeleton has suffered catastrophic damage it has a chance of returning to the battle as a "Crawler".
Granted they're not the most detailed miniatures ever produced, but they do the job.
I didn't go crazy on the basing as I wanted them to be an easy project and one which wouldn't take up ages. Also the fact that the models are moulded attached to the bases limited your options unless you're willing to risk breaking the models ankles trying to remove them.
You get one of these per two Endoskeletons on the sprue, however they don't come with bases, mine are attached to Two Pence coins as I wanted them to match the force overall:
Lastly, the optional extras:
On the left are a Flamethrower unit and a Rocket Launcher unit, both started as metal miniatures, but the ankles were so thin and weak they bent under the weight of the Endoskeleton and broke as I was assembling. A spare Endoskeleton sprue yielded two bodies to attach the metal arms onto.
The last Endoskeleton on the right is a Command Unit, I cut up a spare Crawler to give the open hand and repositioned the Heavy Plasma Rifle. I may go back eventually and add an uplink aerial to Skynet at some point to make him stand out on the field a little more:
That rounds out the forces of the Machines.
There are rules in the game for aerial and ground Hunter-Killers like seen in the future war segments of both The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
Produced by Pegasus Hobbies, they're just a tad too expensive if you can even find them in the UK. Most of the time I can find them for sale they're in the US, as they have to be shipped to the UK the international shipping costs are ridiculous.
In the next post, we'll look at the movers and shakers of the future war, the character models!
Until next time, have nice day...
*Change my mind?
To my choice The Terminator is the best of the franchise with T2 a close second. Everyone says T2 is the better film, but I love the grotty, low budget style of the original. It has a real suspense/thriller feel and doesn't showboat with high tech special effects or a big budget.
And the soundtrack *chef's kiss* pure eighties synths!
If you feel like you have a compelling argument as to why a different film in the franchise is better, leave a comment!
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