A/N: Cage time-looped repeatedly with the aim of aiding Rita get off that beach. Their route planned out in great detail, specific and precise always ended in disaster after another. Trial and error was inching them across too slowly. With so many variables to consider, the approach seemed an impossible task.

We know they succeeded eventually as Cage and Rita made it to the farm house. So how did they succeed exactly? This story explores an ALTERNATIVE approach, an iterative interpretation (my version) of what was left 'off-camera' (film-wise)

This one approach met with success, and was the one plan that Cage was glad to have devised as it turned out to be a very critical iteration, gleaming much information through the iterative process of time-looping, helping him to acquire and remember details, both personal and informative, that helped ensure their victory by the end of the film.

I made Cage personally dubbed this as the J-FACTOR - LOL - Hmm, those notes seemed like a good prologue, oh well. Let's call this a missed opportunity. I will time-loop so you guys and gals don't remember these notes ever existed :D

Chapter 1

"No matter how carefully we plan, we'll never get off that beach."

The words repeated in Cage's mind in a dream-like fashion, slowly fading away as he begun to regain consciousness.
Cage had enough. Between the deaths from the Mimics on the battlefield and Rita's executions during their training sessions, Cage needed a break. He needed time to clear his thoughts. While his body readjusted itself with every time-reset, his mind was continually being overworked. Cage's physical state was always in top form at the beginning of each time-loop. His sustained injuries and fatigue always disappeared, always starting out fresh. His mind however, was a different story, always retaining every bit of information prior to his countless deaths. The time-loop did not allow his mind to relax for even a second. He decided it was time he took charge of his destiny.

Once again, he awoke around familiar surroundings, rested upon piles of military duffel bags at Heathrow Airport, the military's designated F.O.B. or Forward Operating Base. He wasted no time jumping through the hoops of what had become his time-loop routine; timing movements, minimizing conversations and avoiding unnecessary confrontations.

An hour after his initial introduction to J-Squad, Master Sergeant Farrell always led the group in their daily P.T. - a military acronym for Physical Training. Cage always used this opportunity to escape and separate from the group in order to find Rita, now fully aware of her location, just one of numerous information embedded in his memory acquired from his time-resets. Upon reaching the training facility, he found himself mentally psyching himself to be more assertive, to not allow Rita to sway every decision of their battle-plan, as he made his way to her location. As always, Rita was in the middle of training, always in that familiar position of intense concentration, which Cage had become so accustomed to by now.

Cage approached the training block with confident strides, a plan playing through his head in how to speed up their re-introduction. Cage crossed the red-line that was marked on the floor with the words, 'do not cross.' Sidestepping and weaving his way towards Rita, he avoided the attacks of the robotic assailants that were used for combat training, their mechanical design mirroring the likeness of the Mimics, the alien threat the world was facing. Rita looked astounded and bewildered. She had never seen such defensive maneuvers being executed with such effortless precision. As Cage reached Rita, he held up his right hand towards her with his palm wide open, signaling for silence but Rita ignored his indicative intent.

"Who said ... " Rita began as Cage interrupted her familiar dialogue by placing his index finger on her lips.

Rita instinctively reacted, brushing Cage's hand away and looking very annoyed.

"Listen Rita," Cage casually addressed assertively, following up with a string of sentences.
"William Cage. I'm you at Verdun. You lost the power. Now I have it. You trained me. I'm ready. Your Jacket's left shoulder-cannon rotor gets jammed. Get Dr Carter to take a look at that. Tell him he's a genius. He loves that. Meet you both at the Hall of Justice in a couple of hours," Cage completed, winking at Rita.

Upon seeing Cage's smile of amusement, Rita knew he was telling the truth. The smile was an indication to her that Cage also knew about the obvious goofiness of Dr Carter's codename for their usual meeting place, the Weapons Repair Room, where they privately discuss their crazy theories and plans, upon Carter's insistence, for secrecy. "The Hall of Justice," Cage thought to himself as he smiled and recalled a particular time-repeat when he invited Dr Carter for a drink and became drinking buddies, talking about theories, time travel, life, superheroes, women and The Angel of Verdun, the latter topic being Cage's primary interest. As Cage's amused expression faded and replaced with seriousness, he started to leave with haste.

"Wait," Rita shouted.
"They know we're coming. Tomorrow is a slaughter. We can't get off that beach," Cage responded.
"We have to talk," Rita ordered.
"We will. Look, you took charge of your destiny at Verdun, allow me the chance to do the same," Cage replied as he started to leave.
"I need you to trust me," Cage shouted out as he continued his way out of the training block.

Rita felt an aura of confidence within Cage, a familiar feeling she once had and could relate to, which reassured her.

TO BE CONTINUED

A/N: I've finished the next three chapters but I'm still proof-reading'em, trying to seal off plot holes and inconsistencies, which I realized had so many upon re-reads. I'll have'em up once I'm past my self-criticism stage.

DISCLAIMER: I thought maybe I should add this because well, life in general can throw you a curve ball, even when you think you're just having fun and think you're not deliberately hurting anyone.

The characters and story premise are not my original works. I saw the film, loved it and created a derivative interpretation with how I related to the characters, their motivations, their relationships and their actions, using the existing backdrop of the film's story premise. This film has a lot of opportunities for writing, stories that "fill in the blanks," so to speak. I think it's a great fandom for fanfic authors for that reason alone.

The term "Hall of Justice" is the fictional headquarters of the Super Friends, which has been incorporated into the DC Comics main shared universe as the new headquarters of the Justice League (according to wikipedia, which I am quoting, not plagiarizing :p)

This disclaimer applies to this and all following chapters. And oh, what the hell, may as well apply it to my other two stories that been made publicly accessible here in FFNET because I'm lazy to edit.

I'm just a normal person with a writer's itch who wants to write stories. Please don't sue me. I'm only rich in imagination.