Papi's Standoff

The T800 on T800 fight would have gone differently I think.

“We’ve been waiting for you,” Papi said, his voice almost perfectly human—carefully programmed by Sarah to carry just the right edge of sarcasm.
The newly arrived T-800 pivoted with inhuman precision.
Its left leg lifted, rotated, and stamped down, cracking the concrete beneath.
Synthetic skin at its knee split open, leaking a thin thread of reddish-brown fluid.
Its head lowered, eyes locking onto Papi as it initiated a scan—a process so fast it barely registered, mere microseconds.

Then it charged.

Just four seconds after Papi’s signal, the two machines collided.
Their mechanical strides thundered against the concrete, each footfall shaking the ground with brutal intent.
But when they met, they froze—only inches apart.

To Sarah, it was as if time itself had stopped.

The two machines stood locked in silent battle, feet rooted, hands raised, occasional twitch of finger and toe betraying the torrent of calculations raging beneath their cold exteriors.
A faint curl of smoke rose from Papi’s ear.
His older components were overheating under the strain, pushed to the edge by the invisible duel.

The standoff lasted ninety seconds.
Then Sarah fired.

The .50 caliber round from her Barrett smashed into the new T-800, severing its power connection.
It dropped to its knees, eyes dimming before shutting down completely.

Papi lurched forward as the opposing T-800 sank down to its knees in abrupt shutdown.
Papi’s combat routines suddenly resolved to kinetic action, his hands grabbing the T-800 by the skin on its chest, hoisting the machine clear of the ground.

The skin tore as Papi lifted and a metallic pinging sound sprang from his left shoulder as that actuator drove Papi’s arm and hand into the T-800’s chest cavity.
But as suddenly as the action began, it stopped.
Papi’s CPU caught up with the fact that the opposing machine was now non-viable. Zero threat.

Papi stopped all motion and turned his head towards Sarah’s firing point.
Despite the organics covering his eye lenses, Sarah could see the flash of electronic light through her Barrett’s scope.
Papi grinned, a leering horror of a smile, and gave her a thumbs up.

“Well, maybe I shouldn’t have taught him that smile. Creepy as crap!”
Sarah thought as she took her eyes off the scope and started disassembling the bulky weapon.
“Hope to God the cops don’t get here now.”

Below her, Papi had stooped and was bending the newly arrived T-800 into a carry position.
The lower limbs folded backwards impossibly, slotting in close to its back, the arms also twisted backwards forming the thing into a ball with two hands palm up like a plea.
Papi seized the hands and lifted the whole thing up onto his shoulder and then began walking back the way he had come.
In contrast to his prior movements, now they simply appeared stiff, unexpected but still within human norms.

Sarah finished disassembling and stowing the giant Barrett in its case and then took off back to the truck.
Her short stature belied her strength as she carried the thirty-pound case easily in a two-handed grip.
The truck was less than fifty feet away and her jog brought her to it within a minute.

She heaved the Barrett’s case into the bed of the truck and slid into the driver’s seat, looking out the front window anxiously for her T-800 to appear.
She sighed with relief as Papi stomped up the steps, marching up to the parking deck.
She almost leaned out the window to yell at him to hurry, but that never did any good.

Papi never ever hurried.
He simply moved as he was programmed and as the situation demanded.

With his extra load—the 800 pounds of the newly arrived T-800—his steps were slower than normal, slightly mechanical and with a hydraulic spring to them.
Arriving in front of the truck, Papi offered a thumbs up again and continued to the rear where he dropped his load.

Reinforcing the chassis had been a great idea, Sarah reflected, as the thing took the sudden load in the bed with barely a wobble.
Papi getting into the passenger seat, however, did make the whole rig tip.

Time to go.