He spent loops and loops trying to learn how to fight when he'd never even gone through more combat training than Basic and that had been at Fort Jackson, which he'd figured out pretty quick was softer than the other two training Forts on the Guard and ROTC signups.

Kid, she'd called him once just before she'd shot him again. For what seemed like the millionth time, but was somewhere in the second hundred at least. He'd lost count while trying to train in her bay.

"Vrataski, just wait...wait a second." He held out his hand as she started towards him with her pistol.

"You're knee is dislocated, Cage."

"Right, right. I know I have to reset, but I've got a question first."

She narrowed her eyes at him in that way he'd long ago come to recognize as her about to shoot him anyway.

"Seriously. One question and you can shoot me, okay?"

She squatted down beside him. "Fine."

"Thank you." He pushed himself up as much as the exo-suit's still intact arm would lift him. "Before Verdun, were you even half as bad at this as I am now?"

Rita snorted. "Really, that's your question?"

"Yeah." He shrugged one shoulder. "I didn't have combat training. I was just a pretty face with a good voice that could spin the propaganda machine."

She glanced over his exo-suit. "Do I frown at you as much as when you started coming to me?"

"What?" He grimaced as his knee protested its existence. "No. Maybe?"

"Good. Then you are getting somewhere." She lifted her pistol.

Loops later, William leaned, exhausted, against the wall of her bay as she lectured him on ducking faster. "Why is your exo-suit a different color?"

"What?"

He grinned up at her as he maneuvered his suit upright. "Different color." He lifted his chin at her. "It wasn't before you looped, right?"

She flicked her eyes up and down him. "Right." She checked over her shoulder for stragglers hanging around the front of the bay before stepping closer. "What's your point, Cage?"

"You got it painted different because you knew that you were going to become the face of the war. No one had ever seen anyone move with an exo-suit on like you can until you did it, but how many loops did it take you to get that comfortable with it?"

She stocked over to the bay's controls. "Break is over." She hit the start button with enough force he could hear the button creak clear across the bay.

He expected the death that got him seconds later.

He got tired of dying in the training bay somewhere in the four hundreds. One loop, far too early to be actually useful to getting them anywhere at all, he told her she'd said she thought he was ready to drop and get them off the beach.

She'd frowned the frown he knew meant she thought he was shitting her, but agreed to meet on the battle field the next morning.

He got back to J Squad and went about learning more about them as they played poker several cards short of a full deck before turning in for the night.

The next morning he endured the drop and left the squad to their deaths. He avoided Vrataski's dropship and headed across the beach, noting placements of Mimics as he went.

It took her longer to catch up to him than he expected.

"What the hell, Cage? I thought you were meeting me."

He kept moving forward. "Doesn't matter."

She easily kept pace with him. "What?"

He stopped. "It doesn't matter. None of it. They die, you die, I die." He leaned in towards her face. "None of it matters."

She pursed her lips for a couple of moments and then she nodded. "Take the next loop and talk to the soldiers. Low level. The cannon fodder. Talk to them, Cage." Then she brought up her weapons and trained them on him.

He jolted up as he was yelled at again. He looked around at the soldiers busy doing their PT and prepping as the boots and clothes were shoved into his cuffed hands. "Talk to them."

Master Sergeant Farell frowned at him as he approached. "What'd you say, maggot?"

He straightened his shoulders. "Nothing, Master Sergeant."

He followed along dutifully until he was released to the mercy of J Squad. "I know you all don't like me and that's just fine. I don't expect any of you to watch my back tomorrow. I just...I have a question for each of you." He held up his hands as they all started frowning at him. "Nothing bad. Nothing...illegal. I just...want to know why it matters."

Nance narrowed her eyes at him. "Why what matters?"

"The invasion tomorrow." He shook his head as Kuntz started to move towards him. "I'm not trying to tell you not to go. Honest. I just...Someone told me to ask why soldiers fight. Why...why you go into the face of death. Why does it matter?"

Nance stared at him. "You aren't fucking kidding?"

"No." He settled on the end of the bed they'd had the poker game on. "I'm serious."

Ford came around and squatted down in front of him. "You high or something?"

He shook his head. "No. I'd explain, but it'd take a while to get any of you to believe me."

Kimmel lumbered forward and leaned in to look him over carefully. "Drunk maybe?"

"Not drunk." He looked up at Nance. "Please?"

"Sure, why not." Nance sat down on the cot across from him. "If we don't, who will fight?"

Ford rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. "I fight for my fellow soldiers." He glanced up at Cage. "If we don't stand together we're all gonna die."

Kuntz snorted. "Soldiers protect. With our lives if necessary."

"Yeah." Nance nodded. "We protect. We fight so others do not have to make the choices we do."

Griff uncrossed his arms and moved a little closer. "We're good at what we do."

He nodded. "Right. Those are all things you hear on the recruitment posters."

Skinner crowded closer. "Shut up, asshole."

William looked them over. "Listen, let's say, for shits and giggles, that I'm stuck in a time loop and I'm worn down from looping. Pointless looping and I needed something to keep me going so I could figure out how to win us the war, then what would you say?"

They scoffed and dispersed except for Ford.

William looked at his hands as Ford watched him.

"How many loops?"

"I lost count. Somewhere in the four hundreds."

Ford blinked. "Okay. You're batshit. That's awesome. I love the prospect of going into combat with another crazy ass person." He cocked his head. "But...let's say, for fun, that you're doing the whole Groundhog Day thing. Fighting matters because giving up won't help either."

William blinked. "What?"

"Giving up won't do you any good. Running won't help. The war is still there. The enemy is still heading for London. They won't stop just because you're tired. They won't spare you because you're scared or tired or just done. No one is libel to get through tomorrow alive, but we all know we're going because we are soldiers."

Nance clapped Ford on the shoulder. "And that's why you'll last longer than deserter boy there. You're optimistic."

William stood up.

"Where you going?"

"I need a pistol."

"Were you taught nothing in Basic? You call it a weapon, never a pistol. It's a handgun, deserter."

"Fine. I need a weapon. A handgun."

Skinner exchanged looks with Ford. "What for?"

"I need to kill myself."

William sat up. It'd taken him far too long to get a weapon to reset himself with all of J Squad literally sitting on him. The fading memory of broken ribs was not anymore fun than some of his deaths in Rita's training bay.

He hurried through the loop until he could get away from J Squad. He didn't go straight to Vrataski. Instead he spent most of the day talking to various soldiers. He learned they believed the values he'd just been spouting. They would stand together against nearly anything as long as the soldiers they stood with were right there with them.

He found himself an American soldier with a soldier's handbook in her cargo pocket. She loaned it to him after some persuasion. He read the whole thing. He looked over her worn soldier's values card from her pocket as she told him that she was what stood between the Mimics and her country.

William gave her book back to her and went to find Vrataski.

"What?"

He shrugged. "Short version is I'm like you were and I'm been looping. I did what you said and I need a reset. You seem to like shooting me so I thought I'd give you the opportunity."

She blinked, tilted her head, and narrowed her eyes at him. "You can't shoot yourself?"

William swallowed. "I'd rather not."

"Huh." She pulled her weapon from its holster. "You must be early days then."

He started to ask her about it when she pointed her weapon at him.

William ran through the invasion day a few times as he thought about what it meant that she'd said that. He quit trying to save Kimmel because he still wasn't always fast enough to get there without getting crushed himself sometimes. He wasn't sure if maybe that was in the top ten of his most hated ways to die.

He got more Mimic placements memorized before giving in and going back to Vrataski on the next reset.

She watched him enter her training bay. "What do you want?"

"You know, you don't always say the same thing from loop to loop. I wondered about that, but you'd just say that you were changeable."

She stood up and came closer. "Who are you?"

"I'm Major William Cage and I'm stuck in a time loop like you were. You've been training me to fight."

She nodded. "Alright. Ready to go again?"

"Can I ask a question real quick first?"

Rita arched an eyebrow at her. "What?"

"Did you ever need to take a loop off?"

"Why are you here if you aren't ready to train?"

"I am, I am. I just..." He frowned as she stared at him. "Ever?"

Rita's expression softened. "Yes. I sometimes had to remind myself why I was fighting."

"Yeah." William took a deep breathe. "Okay. I'm ready to go again."