Pilot (After War)

Pilot is the first episode in the first season of Terminator: After War. It premiered on October 26, 2019.

Synopsis
(Present)

A man and a woman are driving in the desert as they see small spacecrafts picking up and rebuilding houses in the distance of the Nevada desert. They're listening to the radio and hear a male voice speaking over the radio.

"You're listening to the best of oldies you listen to magic 8.95---" The voice is stopped from speaking as a blue, bright light ball appears.

Causing the couple to drive off and swerve the car into a desert ditch. The ball dissipates, revealing a skinny, naked, young male. The man and woman of the car get out of the car and look at the road from the ditch and see the man but cannot see his appearance due to the darkness.

"I need your car and your keys," The skinny man says in an emotionless expression.

"What?" The unnamed man says in response.

The skinny man walks down to the area and get's close to the husband. He grabs his shirt collar before knocking him out with a head bud. The female, looking terrifying, looks at the skinny man.

"Take it! Just take it, please!" The unnamed woman says.

The skinny man crouches down to the unconscious man, digs his hand inside his front pocket and pulls out his keys before grabbing the back of the car and pulling it from the ditch. He gets in the car and puts the key in, causing it to start and the song, Bad To The Bone by George Thorogood plays through the radio before driving off.

In the morning, a man wearing a blue hoodie is walking with his backpack as he listens to Frank Sinatra in his earbuds. A female biker in color guard clothing appears behind him and taps on his backpack. He looks at the biker swerving at him.

"Hey. Good morning," Clare says.

"Oh, hey. Good morning. How's your leg?" Charlie asks as she looks at her strap that is wrapped on her left leg.

"My leg is a little strained but I'm able to ride my bike, so I'm good" She explains. "Well, whatever helps you through the day," Charlie replies.

"Indeed," Clare says. "Well, I gotta go. I'll see you at lunch"

"Yeah. You too!" Charlie replies as Clare rides off at her bike and he continues to walk to school.

"You'd be shocked to know that I'm actually a cyborg. Yeah I know, you probably don't see it but I'm one. I don't know a whole lot about myself other than that I'm a T-779 Cyborg Unit but that's it. You also may be wondering to yourself, how did you become to be? Well we gotta go all the way back to 2004..."

"On July 24, 2004, Skynet caused a nuclear genocide against the world, believing that humans were an error for humanity's survival after it gained sentience. One man, John Connor, and a resistance managed to defeat Skynet along with his life sacrificed to defeat the machine on May 8, 2029."

"Because of John Connor's story with the T-800 that saved him in 1985, humanity decided to make the original Terminators into functioning members of society and other, new, Terminators were built and they too had sentience that wasn't violent or emotionless like Skynet itself."

"The T-779 Unit was created afterward. Interesting enough, my unit was a blueprint by Skynet during the war but was created after the war ended. The only reason why I know this was because every unit knows about their unit's history once they were created. Speaking of units, I have a few units of mine. Well, friends."

(Flashback)

A young 7th grade Charlie is walking as a football strikes him stomach before three junior kids in red, white and brown letterman jackets begin hitting him with the ball over and over before one of them pulls out knuckle braces and strikes Charlie in the face, knocking him over. He gets up while adjusting his busted jaw and groaning in pain.

"Come on, fuckin' Terminate me you fucking robot!" The main bully in the red letterman jacket says.

"Hey!" A female voice says, revealing a brownish blonde hair girl with a switch knife.

"What are you going to do about it? Fucking stab me? Ohhhhh, so scared-" Red Letterman is cut off from talking as he looks down in pain to see a knife stabbed through his leg. He begins screaming, which causes his two friends to run after her. Only for them to be stopped after she grabs one by their arm and slams him onto his other friend, causing them to fall on the ground.

She walks to the guy as he holds his leg in pain before being kicked in the nose by the female. She then walks up to Charlie and puts her hand out before helping him up.

"You okay?" The female asks.

"Yeah, thank you," Charlie replies to her.

"No worries. You took that punch like a champ but your jaw looks crooked. Don't worry I got you. Come on" The female says. "Wait, what's your name?" Charlie asks.

"The name's Amber but you can call me Shiny," Shiny says as she gets on her dirtbike and gives enough room for Charlie to sit on.

Charlie sits on the bike with his arms out and holding on the seat.

"Hey, no need to worry. I'm not gonna scream, trust me," Shiny explains. An awkward Charlie hesitantly put his hands on sides of her stomach and hangs out before riding off from the school.

"That was my friend and my close friend. You already know her name so you don't need to explain what country origin her name was from. You also may be wondering to yourself why I couldn't fight back, I mean I'm a "Terminator" after all. Well, all the Terminator units after the war were either created or reprogram to be more human. Which I mean, T-1000s can't shapeshift into other people in ensure identity fraud wasn't a thing or T-800s can't be emotionless people unless they're cops that look like the T-800 that saved John Connor in fear that they'll gain sentience like Skynet and attempt a massive murder riot against humans and other Terminators... You get what I mean"

"Even then, they're so downgraded that, once they are sentient, they feel emotional, physical and mental pain like us. The hysteria even went as far as to segregate classes between cyborgs and humans in all America. Which I personality think is fine since we are able to communicate with other humans and freely interact with them without dealing with separate water fountains or some retarded conservative bullshit like that. Either way, it's alright"

(Present)

Charlie is walking to his geoscience class as a teacher is using a stick to point at an endoskeleton replica of a T-800 Terminator. He aims at the heart part of the machine.

"That is the CPU part of the unit. Now, not a lot of schools tell you and you probably know this already because some teen or your older sibling told you this but many cyborgs are powered by nuclear fusion cells," The teacher explains as he shows off an empty fusion cell. "Skynet created these back during the war but one flaw was that, if damaged, the cell can explode and a mini nuclear mushroom and cause a small mini crater on the ground if not disposed of. Sadly, some of these units were not created with the ability to be powered without the use of these cells, hence the creation of the Pulowski Preservation shelters where you can simply put the core in and let it explode inside it and keep it contained."

A student raises his hand in the air, causing the teacher to point with his stick. "Yes?"

"The only thing I always wondered is how does a cyborg grow. How does that work?" The student.

"I thought you already knew," The teacher says.

"Well, I'm new to New America. Never been heard, so I don't know how things work." The student explains.

"In that case, I'm glad you asked. Even though it's repitive it's very interesting. You see, cyborgs that were either reprogrammed or made after the war, the people that were responsible either added mimetic poly-alloy or skin material that manages to change the appearance through someone's heat signature during the years of their life cycle but the endoskeleton, that is interesting because of I especially like how they did this. On the part that the skin grows and morphs into the older version of the cyborg if they were the person is simple as the endoskeleton managed to extend and it was programmed like this. Because of this, every time the endoskeleton extends the poly-alloy AND the skin material managed to pick up on this through the heat signatures and manage to morph one's face. Interesting, right?" The teacher explains.

The student, massively confused, says "huh."

"Well, back to the lesson," The teacher exclaims.

"Well, I guess I didn't need to explain that one"

"Despite what you first saw of her, no, she isn't a cyborg or a "Terminator" or else she wouldn't be in color guard and yes, as you guessed, I do have a "slight" crush on her. I know, I know, it's strange but unlike than Shiny, I always knew her since the beginning, probably when I was younger but either way, I had this crush for a while but I simply just don't have the courage (or the words) to even say how I feel about her. Either way, I'm just trying to take it slooooow"

During lunch, Charlie walks downstairs and sits next to Clare sitting on the side of the quad's tree platform as she is reading a book.

"Whatcha reading?" Charlie asks.

"I'm reading the Life of Pi for my English class. It's an assignment so yeah, I'd rather be helping out the girls but my dad is strict with stuff so, yeah-" Clare explains.

"Ah. Well, hope things go well" Charlie says as he pulls out his earbuds, plugs it up on his iPhone and begins listening to Emotions by ALEX. He takes a slight deep breath and closes his eyes as the music flows through.

At the Nevada Skynet Facility, Myron is walking through the hallway when another scientist speed walks to him.

"Hey, Myron," Frank says to him.

"Hey, Frank. Do you have the diagnostic to the Cyberdyne's T-799 Unit?" Myron asks.

"Yes, I do. In fact, I made one without the fusion core power" Frank explains.

"Good, now set up the expanding locks and the functions. With those things, the unit is complete" Myron explains.

"Alright, I'll get right into this. Also, did you hear about the two shops that were robbed at night?" Frank asks.

"No. Why?" Myron asks.

"Well, the break-ins were close to your family and my family's neighborhood. There's also a lot of police in that area. Be careful" Frank explains.

"Hm," Myron explains.

At the sidewalk, Charlie is walking home on the sidewalk when he catches his close friend and greaser, Shiny and her boyfriend, Richard Fischbach are talking to each other on the side of the wall next to the building near the sidewalk.

Shiny sees Charlie walking, "Hey, kid!"

Charlie recognizes and looks at Shiny with glee. "Hey, nice to see you!"

They both hug, "How you've been, man?"

"I've been good. Mostly tired but good," Charlie explains.

"Well... That's something. I gotta go, so we'll catch up later," Shiny explains.

"Yeah, hope so," Charlie replies says as he walks away.

As he walks, he looks on his right and sees many police officers having tape over a gun place and the thrift store.

"Huh..." Charlie says.

At nighttime, Frank is driving home in the desert from the facility. He turns on his radio and begins listening to Sh-Boom Sh-Boom by The Crew Cuts before seeing a bright light to his right.

"What the?" Frank says before being struck by the car that was seen on the desert road.

The skinny figure from the beginning, now appearing with a tuxedo and sunglasses, walk out of the car with his IMI Desert Eagle in his left hand. He goes to the car and sees an unconscious Frank Moon and realizes they're the same.

"Target required."

The man proceed to pulls him out of the car, unknown to what happens next.

Trivia

 * First appearance of Charlie Singh.
 * First appearance of the T-779 unit.
 * First appearance of Shiny Moon.
 * First appearance of the T-900 unit.
 * First appearance of Synth.
 * First appearance of the T-850 unit.
 * First appearance of Clare Lynn.
 * First appearance of Myron Singh.
 * First appearance of Frank Moon.
 * First appearance of Richard Fischbach.
 * The Pulowski Persvation was a reference to the Pulowski Safety Shelters from the Fallout franchise.
 * This is especially notable as the creator is a big fan of Fallout.