“He is here?” Catherine Weaver said aloud when she watched Tyler choke TJ.
She pulled all the data stored about him: “An amazing human. He would have been most useful, but alas, he joined forces with John Connor.”
“Who are you talking to, mommy?” A tiny voice from the backseat asked sleepily.
“Go back to sleep, Savannah. We’ll be going home soon,” Catherine said while she mimicked motherly warmth into her voice.
The Tyler before this one; he had nearly destroyed her with that incendiary grenade. His death had been in vain and not very useful. She looked at the boy and zoomed in. TJ was running out of air fast. Should she intervene? The boy Tyler could and would be very beneficial to the development of Skynet, but if the man Tyler killed himself as a boy it would take him out of the game and she had one less thing to analyse and adjust her calculations to.
Data analysis showed that the loss of Tyler Jess Devlin prevailed over the asset he would be to Skynet. She started the towncar and drove off.

Derek watched as a car drove by and returned his attention to Tyler and TJ. It was why John Connor had asked him to put TJ Devlin on the list. The General had feared Tyler’s mental instability and had assessed the threat level of Tyler towards himself right.
He hated Tyler with every fiber in his body but he couldn’t let the boy die. Besides without the boy to become the man he was destined to be, the Human Resistance would suffer a major setback in the future. So General Connor had given him the order to protect the boy, even if it meant that he had kill whoever threatened the existence of one Tyler Jess Devlin.
After taking a deep breath, he thought about his options. He could just shoot the older one dead but he had no idea what the older one’s missions were.
“Damnit, John Connor,” he grumbled while he looked around for something he could use to stop the older Tyler from killing his younger self.
He noticed a thick tree branch on the grass just a few feet away from him: “That’ll work… Hopefully,” he said amused.
As quietly as possible he moved towards the branch and picked it up. He had seen what the older Tyler could do and knew that he needed the element of surprise. For a moment he weighed the branch in his hands, not too light so Tyler could counter-attack, not too heavy to beat Tyler’s brains in.
Stealthily he snuck up behind his target and took a full swing at Tyler. The branch snapped in two on impact. He watched as Tyler went down like a ton of bricks, letting go of the boy.
“Come with me if you want to live,” he said with a warm voice while he held out his hand to the young Tyler who sat on the grass trying to catch a full breath.
When the boy did not take his hand, he glanced at the man he had just knocked out and kicked him full in the ribs: “That’s for my little brother, you goddamn halfbreed!”

His lungs were burning, aching for a full breath: “Who is that man?” TJ asked hoarsely while he struggled to his feet.
“It’s not important,” the scruffy looking man said gruffly. “We need to get out of here.”
“Who are you?’ He asked while he looked from the scruffy looking man to the unconscious man on the floor.
“Not important either, kid. We really need to leave. The cops are coming.”
At that moment he heard sirens approach fast.
“I got a car parked a few blocks away from here. Come.”
Hesitation clouded his heart and he looked back at his home.
“That won’t help, kid. Your dad’s dead.”
Why was he lying face down in the grass? It was the first thought that went through his mind when he came to again. The back of his head felt like it had been split open with a battle axe and the headache was killing him.
Only now he noticed that he was cuffed and he suppressed his first instinct to break them. A chain was only as strong as it weakest link. Instead he smiled wryly and turned his head a little. The street was bathing in red and blue flashlights from police patrol cars.
How long had he been out?
“Sir, he’s coming to,” a man’s voice said a little to the left of him.
“About time,” another man said gruffly.
“We were lucky, sir. Caught him red-handed.”
Two pair of hands closed around his upper arms and he got pulled to his feet. He stretched himself for as far as possible and looked at the two men who had been talking about him. One was in uniform, the other in street clothes.
“I am placing you under arrest on suspicion of the murder of Thomas Devlin,” the man in normal clothes said with authority. “ You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney present during questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you. Do you understand these rights I have just read to you?”
“Yeah,” he answered in an arrogant manner.
“With these rights in mind, do you wish to speak to me?”
He snorted with contempt: “No.”
The man in civilian clothes motioned the uniform to come closer: “Bring him downtown for booking and interrogation.”
“Yes, sir.”

TJ swallowed nervously while the scruffy looking man dragged him along by the arm. The man might have saved his life but after all that had happened, he didn’t trust anyone. Finally they reached a black SUV.
“Get in!” The man ordered him after unlocking the car. “Now!”
He looked at him and decided to take a chance. The night could not get any worse anyway. Quickly he climbed into the passenger’s seat and buckled up, watching as the man got behind the steering wheel.
“Who are you?” He asked hesitantly when the man started the car.
The car pulled away from the curb while the man kept checking every mirror.
“Derek,” the man answered, flooring the pedal.
“I’m Tyler, but everybody calls me TJ,” he muttered, trying to keep his voice from trembling.
He noticed that the man smiled a little but kept his mouth shut and his eyes on the road.
“Why did that man want to kill me?” He asked, tears etching into his voice.
“Not now,” Derek said gruffly. “I’ve to get you to safety first… Are you hurt, TJ?”
“Don’t think so. Where are you taking me?”
“Somewhere safe.”

“Mom?” Sarah heard her son call from the living room. “Mom! You gotta see this?”
She looked up when he came running into her bedroom.
“Mom, you really gotta see this,” he urged, grabbing her by the hand and dragging her with him into the living room.
“In other local news today. An unknown man was arrested earlier tonight in connection to the murder of Thomas Devlin this evening,” the news anchor droned.
She pushed a lock of hair behind her ear and frowned when she saw the footage of a man being pushed into a police car.
“Oh no. He didn’t,” she sighed while she rubbed her forehead.
“We need to bust him out, mom,” John exclaimed.
She noticed that her son looked at Cameron for support.
“It is not a mission priority,” Cameron said monotonically. “The Lieutenant General does not need our help with his escape.”
Milling over their options for a moment, she looked from her son to Cameron and back: “He might not need our help but we’re gonna spring him out of jail anyway.”
“It is not a mission priority. He has experience with escapes. He will be fine,” Cameron countered.
Suddenly she became ultra-alert and reached for her Glock tucked in the waistband of her jeans when she heard a car approach at high speed. Instinctively it felt wrong. Had Tyler escaped already and had he brought the cops on his tail? The car slowed down and she could hear the sand chirp underneath it’s tyres. A sandy road, their drive-way.
She checked the condition of her Glock one last time; standard condition one. With the grace and quietness of a big cat on the prowl she moved towards the kitchen door to check it out. A big black SUV stood sloppily parked in the driveway and she watched Derek and a young man climb out.
“Derek? And a boy?” She asked no one in particular.
“It is Tyler Jess Devlin,” Cameron answered from close behind her.
She whirled around, her heart pounding erratically in her chest: “Don’t do that!” She hissed annoyed. “Don’t sneak up on people like that. It’ll give them a heart-attack.”
Cameron looked at her with her head tilted a little: “You’ll live.”
She turned back to the door and unlocked it for Derek and the young man identified by Cameron as Tyler Jess Devlin.
“He’s just a kid,” she remarked ruefully while Derek entered the kitchen, followed at the safe distance by TJ.
“This kid will be one of John’s highest ranking officers,” Derek stated while he pointed at a kitchen chair.“I think the kid needs some rest. He had a pretty rough night tonight.”
“What happened?” She asked slowly.
“A run-in with Cromartie and the Devil,” Derek answered wryly. “Remember Cromartie? We should’ve taken care of that tin can months ago, but you wanted to play happy family instead.”
“And the Devil?”
“Oh, he just tried to choke the life out of the kid, just like he tried with my little brother,” Derek replied bitterly.
“What?”
“The Devil decided that the boy should die and tried to kill him.”
Her mind was whirling at that answer. Technically Tyler had tried to commit suicide by taking his younger self out. Could things get any crazier?
“Why?” She wanted to know.
“Ask Tyler. I’m sure that he will be hot on our trial and will come busting through the front door soon.”
“He was arrested earlier,” Cameron chimed in.
“Doesn’t matter,” Derek grumbled. “If Century can’t hold him, a police prison cell won’t hold him at all. He’ll be here soon, bringing the entire L.A. Police Department with him.”
“He won’t,” Cameron said mechanically. “Lieutenant General Devlin never cracked during Skynet interrogation. He never gave out information on the locations of bases or the whereabouts of John Connor.”
She shook her head, hoping it would rid her of the headache that was slowly forming. What had Tyler done? And why had he wanted to kill his younger self? She trudged to where the boy was sitting on a kitchen chair and sat on her heels, placing a hand on his knee in a motherly fashion before looking at him with great concern: “Are you okay?”
“He said he wasn’t hurt or something,” Derek answered for TJ when the latter remained silent. “He’s just shaken up. Bad night for the kid.”

Tyler was pacing back and forth in his holding cell, like a caged animal. The standard issued County Jail jumper itched like crazy and did not add to his feeling of well-being. He looked out the barred window. It was still night out. Locked up like this, it reminded him of all the times he had suffered a nano-attack and gone into Skynet-mode. Headaches that almost killed him, followed by blackouts only to wake up in a concrete cell.
A sound coming from down the hall caught his interest. Keys, footsteps.
“Hey, John Doe. There's someone to see you,” a man’s voice called from the other side of the cell door.

Tyler looked at the cuffs again while he waited for his visitor. His right wrist might hurt if he were try and break them. The door to the interrogation room was opened and a man dressed in a nice business suit entered.
He leaned back in his chair leisurely and watched as the man sat down across the table from him.
“I’m agent James Ellison with the FBI,” the man said while he extended his hand to him.
He shrugged his shoulders, looked at James Ellison and shook his extended hand.
“Want me to loosen those things?” James Ellison asked as he nodded towards the cuffs.
“Nah, I’m good,” he answered with a grin.
He watched as agent Ellison studied him. Clearly he was looking for an opening to start the conversation.
“Why did you kill him?”
“Kill who?”
“Thomas Devlin… Did he panic, causing you to kill him? A robbery gone bad?” James Ellison offered.
He shook his head: “Was just passing by.”
“Witnesses saw you try to choke Devlin’s son. That implicates you in the murder of Thomas Devlin… Witnesses also say that another man hit you with a branch and knocked you out, saving that boy’s life. Sketch artists have put together a drawing of that man. And you know what?”
“What?” He asked in an uninterested voice.
“That man looks exactly like a man I had in custody for the murder of Andrew Goode. Which has me believe that those two murder cases are connected.”
“Interesting,” he remarked bored.
“Now what really ties your case and his together is,” James Ellison said while he took a picture from the folder he had brought with him and placed it on the table. “This tattoo.”
“It’s not uncommon.”
“Yes, it is. In my years with the FBI I only came across that kind of tattoo a few times. In an old case from nineteen-eighty-four, in a murder case of three drug dealers, in the Andrew Goode murder case and now this case… Whenever that tattoo turns up, someone ends up dead.”
He shrugged again: “So?”
“You’ve got a similar tattoo as his. Someone’s dead.”
“And you like me for the murder? That’s preposterous,” he said calmly.
“I like you for the murder of Thomas Devlin and the attempted murder of Tyler Jess Devlin, yes,” James Ellison agreed. “Your fingerprints were all over the house.”
He rolled his eyes: no wonder since the younger him lived there.
“So… You were found unconscious outside of the Devlin residence. Your fingerprints all over the scene of the crime. Witnesses saw you trying to strangle the Devlin’s son after shots had been fired inside the house. So what was it? Robbery gone bad? Retaliation?”
He shook his head, shrugged his shoulders again and kept quiet.
“You know what the most interesting thing about these cases is?” James Ellison asked.
“What is the most interesting thing about these cases?” He partially repeated Ellison’s question.
“They all connect back to one person.”
“And that person is?” He asked, already knowing the answer.
“Sarah Connor… You know her?”
Again he shook his head: “Never heard of her,” he paused. “Oh wait… I remember reading about her in the newspapers. Didn’t she die about eight years ago when she held up a bank?”
“Presumably she did,” James Ellison answered. “But I saw her… Not too long ago… The other one. When I had him in custody, he said “We’re all gonna die”. What do you think he meant with that?”
“How should I know? You said that all we had in common was this tattoo,” he countered, showing James Ellison his barcode tattoo.
James Ellison scratched his chin: “I know about the metal men. I’ve seen one wipe out an entire FBI HRT.”
He smirked, closed his eyes for a second and concentrate on the handcuffs clasped around his wrists. Sheer muscular strength and leverage were key in breaking them. It wouldn’t be the first time he would do this feat. Slowly the metal began to deform at the force until it snapped.
James Ellison jumped to his feet, knocking the chair over backwards: “What the hell?”
“Inferior quality,” he laughed. “This is a lot better, less constraining. You were saying?”
“You’re one of them?” James Ellison asked incredulously.
He laughed again, this time a little louder: ”Nah, I’m just incredibly smart… A chain is as strong as its weakest link.”
“But you didn’t break the chain,” James Ellison protested.
“Like I said, inferior quality.”
“Listen, John Doe,” James Ellison began annoyed. “You are toying with me and I don’t like to be jerked around… So you better start talking or I will personally see to it that you will be implicated in all those aforementioned murders.”
“What do you want to talk about? The weather? The birds and the bees?” He taunted, not even trying to hide the fact that this man thought he could intimidate him amused him.
“What do you know about the metal men? About Skynet?” James Ellison asked angrily, leaning over the table.
“Metal men? Skynet? What are you talking about?” He asked innocently.
“Metal men, robots from the future sent back by Skynet to kill John Connor, son of Sarah Connor. Skynet, a highly sophisticed computer system that will declare war on the world in the future,” James Ellison answered irritated.
“Interesting… Metal men, Skynet, John Connor, Sarah Connor… Sounds like a blockbuster movie to me.”

Chapter 13: The Tale Of Two Tylers

Chapter 15: The Devil's Advocate