Title: Music Lessons
Fandom: Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles
Rating: PG
Length: 785
Author notes: For fan-flashworks for the Music challenge.
Summary: AU where John and Cameron are John Henry's teachers, at Catherine Weaver's request. Implied John/Cameron and future!John/Cameron.



John watched the piano lesson with curiosity from the corner, a wary eye also on Catherine Weaver, who was watching from the doorway.

“This was written by Beethoven,” Cameron said to John Henry, playing a series of notes on the piano as she sat next to him on the bench.

He watched her fingers carefully and then imitated her exactly.

She nodded at his correct rendition but then told him, “John says that when you change the length and volume of certain notes, it changes the meaning.”

John has certainly not told her that; John didn’t know anything about playing the piano.

Which means that this whole thing was, like so many others, future-John’s fault. Which explained how Cameron knew how to play the piano but sure as hell didn’t explain why. Sometimes John wondered if his future self thought of Cameron as an experiment, someone to try and make as human as possible to see if it would stick. But then, Cameron probably wouldn’t be so loyal to a man like that, John figured. As much as Cameron remained (intentionally) a mystery, he knew this about her: she was nobody’s pushover and nobody’s fool.

John Henry played the lines of music again, this time drawing out the measures in the middle, quieting the early notes and then varying them at the end. It sounded livelier, quirkier.

“There are 879 recorded versions of this part of the Allegretto,” John Henry said, “But my version is distinct from all of them.”

“But is it good?” Catherine Weaver asked, neutrally, out of curiosity.

Cameron looked at John.

“I don’t know about music really,” John said awkwardly. He was starting to think that mortal danger was the least uncomfortable thing about being the only human in the room. He wasn’t qualified to be the spokesperson for all human culture (unless he was in the future – is that one more thing he should be preparing for?).

“What does the music make you ‘feel’?” Catherine asked John. It was hard to tell if she wanted to know, if she really thought music would help John Henry’s emotional-cognitive development, or if she was just humoring all of them.

“Fine…” John said.

“It makes me feel good,” John Henry said. “But also a little sad. Like remembering something that’s not there anymore. But also a little happy that I have the memory.”

Catherine Weaver stared at John Henry then, as if she were confused, as if she were moved. It was only John Henry that could get a reaction out of her, John knew, though he wasn’t quite sure if she were proud of John Henry himself or just incredibly pleased with her own work.

“Let’s try Chopin,” John said then, mostly to Cameron. “For variety.” John remembered listening to old records of Chopin in Mexico; Sarah would listen and hum along as she taught John how to clean guns every night. (Sarah would hate this, John knew – hate the idea of this deal, hate that he was helping John Henry become more human for some vague promise of possible peace, hate especially that he was trusting an alliance between Cameron and Catherine Weaver).

Cameron nodded and played an etude, perfectly and solemnly. John Henry played it then, flawed but playful, full of life. John studied Cameron’s face to discern what she thought – was she pleased at John Henry’s progress – did she, like Weaver, see it as a triumph of their kind? Or did she resent that John Henry learned easily what Cameron struggled with?

“What does the music make you think of?” John Henry asked Cameron, then. He seemed genuinely curious (he seemed so much like a child that it made John uncomfortable to think of all the ways he was a weapon – until John remembered his own childhood of course).

Cameron looked at John Henry, seeming to study him. Finally she answered, “It reminds me of when John told me about Mexico. He said he had trouble remembering how his mother looked back then. It was hard for me to understand how memory could be so… imperfect.”

John Henry smiled and nodded. He didn’t seem to think there was anything particularly personal about the story. He played the etude again, adding more flourishes, gleeful variations on the tune.

Cameron, apparently deciding that John Henry didn’t need further instruction from her, went to sit by John and continued to watch him play.

“You miss him, don’t you?” John said, swallowing. “Future John.” You wish I were him.

“I don’t miss people,” she said, staring forward.

“Right,” John said, and leaned back against the wall. For a moment, he wanted to ask her if hearing this music made her want to dance, to tell her that he loved to watch her dance, long balletic moves, the stretch of her arms expressing more than she likely wanted them to (unless of course John, as always, was fooling himself). But he didn't, and they continued to listen to John Henry play, the notes clanging, sharp and happy, throughout the room.