Re: Derek/John
Derek chuckled. "That role only works if people let you be in charge. I'm sure you've noticed that I don't do well with orders.." He put an arm around John's shoulder. "But I know that asking you not to worry is as useful as asking me to follow orders. I'll try not to worry you too much."
He sighed. "He never said not to kill Andy, because he didn't know Andy, or at least he never talked to me about it. He... Andy was my best friend, but I didn't even know his real name. When we got captured, he told me about what he'd done, told me his real name, told me about the Turk. He never told him not to kill Andy, because I never told him about Andy. You and your mother told me, but I don't take orders from either of you." He wasn't trying to mean or insulting, but Derek had never really taken orders from either of them. He'd gone along until he hadn't. "You know, I've never really disobeyed any of his orders. I questioned, bitched about it, skirted, avoided mentioning things that could lead to an order, but I never disobeyed him. I .... I trusted him to do anything necessary to end the war, anything at all, even work with those damn machines, because it takes a special kind of bastard to work with machines that have the faces of the people who tortured you or your family, who killed your loved ones. I think he might have forgotten that people aren't so cold, and there was no way in hell that people would live in peace with those monsters. From what Jesse said, that's when he lost the support, but he wasn't that bad when I was there. I can work with Cameron; I can use everything she knows, but the day Skynet is down, I'll put a bullet through her head, destroy that chip, melt her body and throw the biggest party ever." He shook his head. "I'm... I'm sorry, I don't want to into this with you. I know how you feel, I know what you want to do, and maybe people will let you. I don't know. I'll never be part of that world." He'd really eat that bullet like he'd meant to do years ago, but living in a world full of machine was not a world he wanted to see.
"What do you want me to do, John? There's nothing we can do there, and there's nothing we can do here. They want me to play the contrite act, fine, but there's nothing real that can be done," he said with another shrug. "And they are not mine, anyway. I'm just helping out until we go back home, until we found those four people. This isn't my war, and these aren't my people. I can't care, not when there's nothing to be done, and even if there was, I still can't care. Shit happens, you move on. It's how you survive. Not by caring."