Dozens of drunken, excited women enjoyed the performance of another stripper as part of the Women's Night, organized by the owners of the village club Desert Star, not even knowing that at the whim of unknown forces they were doing this for the third time. The music thundered at full speed, and the clouded female eyes were directed mainly to the stage, so at first no one paid attention to Terminator who literally burst into the hall.

Like an icebreaker, he began his movement through the crowd, not caring much that the jolts of his powerful body made one or the other lady jump to the side, and some, unable to stay on their feet, fell to the floor. Every now and then there were indignant exclamations and curses addressed to the unknown boor, even if he was so attractive and completely naked.

But being a gentleman was something T-850 had never memorized, and he didn't have time to be more careful. It was necessary to get clothes and transport as soon as possible and go to the rescue of John Connor and Catherine Brewster. Terminator quickly scanned the figure of the stripper, who was on the stage at the time, and the system immediately gave a negative result. There was only one person whose parameters almost perfectly matched the body structure of T-850, but since Terminator had arrived at the Desert Star much earlier this time, that man was still in the dressing room backstage. Terminator headed there.

The presence of two muscular, attractive men on the stage at once, one half-naked, the other completely devoid of clothes, drove the ladies in the hall into a frenzy of delight, but their pleasure was destined to last only a few seconds. Under the bewildered gaze of the stripper, T-850 quickly walked across the stage and disappeared behind the scenes.

There were several men there, all sturdy jocks with manly but handsome faces. They rested between performances, smoked, joked, laughed. Some were wearing clothes, while others were just changing. When Terminator arrived, the laughter and conversation abruptly stopped. Strippers had their own little circle in which everyone knew each other, but no one had seen this guy before.

In turn, the cyborg scanned everyone in turn and quickly identified the one it wanted: a certain Larry. He was just finishing getting dressed and was about to go on stage. Terminator stared at the man with a straight face and said his famous words, "Take off your clothes."

These words caused a friendly laugh from those present, who decided that it was some drunken weirdo who had wandered to them from the street. Who is not here, in this backwater! And Larry himself, encouraged by the reaction of his comrades, tried to say something original in response, "Well, I don't even know... Maybe if you ask me very well."

More chuckles followed. Terminator quickly grabbed the guy's wrist and squeezed him so hard that his bones cracked. Larry howled in pain, and the others immediately stopped laughing and rushed to his friend's aid. Terminator, letting go of Larry's hand for a moment, quickly tossed the men around as if they were rag dolls, and then back to the poor guy who was crouching on the floor.

At that moment, their colleague, who had just finished his number, entered the dressing room. At the sight of the scene that opened to him, the man's eyes widened with fear, and he preferred to return to where he had come from. Terminator followed him with a glance and then finally turned his attention to Larry.

After receiving the clothes, the cyborg ended up in the parking lot, from where he disappeared in a Dodge a minute later.

As he entered the highway, Terminator turned his head west toward Los Angeles, accidentally glancing in his rearview mirror. Just in time to see a bouncer in a wide-brimmed hat, who was sitting at the entrance to the club and whom he had knocked out with a door, rushing after him, waving his raised fist in the air.

The road was almost empty in the morning, except for the truckers. After checking the on-board sensors (including radar), he accelerated the pickup to a speed of more than one hundred miles per hour.

Connor suddenly woke up in a cold sweat. I raised my hands and saw that they were shaking. He was back in his shabby camp, a couple of blocks from the construction site, where he had settled for the night on July 24, 2004. Everything was still there: his motorcycle, his belongings in old bags, and a small fire lit on a metal sheet nearby.

As soon as he looked at the flames, John turned away. The memory of him and Terminator dying in the flames of a nuclear explosion was still too fresh, and his transfer here was almost instantaneous. But he's still alive, which means there's one more replay ahead and another opportunity to fix everything. The thought cheered him up, making John smile.

He wasted no time, but immediately threw all his unpretentious belongings into sacks and saddled the Triumph-Bonneville. He needs to go to Kate's at once — they've made a deal! And then both of them are to move to CRS in order to prevent the general from making a fatal mistake on the spot.

However, after walking about two hundred meters, John suddenly found himself unable to remember the address Kate had given him. The frustration with himself was so great that Connor almost lost control of the bike and flew off the saddle. Only that wasn't enough! John cursed under his breath. As dirty as he could, was the expression taught to him by one of the "idiots" with whom his mother had lived. It seems as if fate is mocking him, giving him the opportunity to start all over again and at the same time depriving him of such valuable information.

Still, Connor continued to follow the familiar route. He rightly judged that Kate most likely lived somewhere near the clinic. That is, in any case, his direction is still correct. Well, you need to remember the address at all costs on the way.

Once again, he found himself on Hollywood Freeway, Highway 101, heading north on a lightly trafficked highway at 1 a.m. Approaching the turn to the Topanga Canyon, he turned and wound along the winding road into the mountains.

A small doe jumped out into the middle of the road and froze, mesmerized by the light of the headlight, and Connor was completely lost in his thoughts, forgetting about it as well. The guy slowed down, slammed on the brakes and turned sharply to the left, trying not to crash into the deer. But not as abruptly as the very first time.

Then his stomach twisted as the front wheel fell flat on the road and he was thrown onto the gravel side of the road. The motorcycle rolled further and crashed into a tree, and John injured his knee and left shoulder and scraped his back, rolling on his back on gravel like an ice cube on a hot frying pan.

But now, with almost unbelievable agility and reaction speed, he managed to maintain control of his two-wheeled iron horse. His breath caught in his throat, his heart pounding wildly in his chest. But the cherished "Phew, it's gone!" flashed through his mind, and a few seconds later John suddenly realized that he remembered the address. He wanted to exclaim at the top of his lungs, "Ye-e-e-s!" but instead he just grinned contentedly. It was too early to really rejoice.

This time, Kate wasn't awakened by the vibration of her cell phone on her bedside table — the insistent knocking on the door, which had been going on for more than a minute, finally snapped her out of her dream realm. And the girl was glad to wake up, so terrible was what she had seen in her dreams. Although, to put it bluntly, it was not a dream, but a memory of the previous July 25, 2004, which she lived and in which she died, lying in a room in the clinic, recovering from a gunshot wound.

There was a bright flash outside the window, and just as Kate turned to see what had happened, the shock wave shattered the walls of the room, and the unbearable heat, along with a fountain of concrete and glass, enveloped her. Catherine didn't even have time to be frightened or feel pain before the terrible image in front of her eyes turned to darkness.

Kate's eyes widened, her heart beating with joy at the knowledge that she was alive again. That means John didn't succeed and they're going to have another replay. She was about to jump out of bed and head for the door, but Scott managed to get ahead of her. With the words: "What the hell! Who needs to bang on the door in the middle of the night?!" he moved to the knock with the unsteady step of a man who was not yet fully awake. However, Kate also stood up and slowly followed her fiancé. She thought it must be John, but she had given him the address and told him to come right here.

Sure enough, Connor was there outside the door, a look of relief on his face at finally being opened.

"Who are you? What do you want?" Scott asked rather sharply. Kate found herself thinking that she had never noticed him talking to someone in that tone before. However, when a person is woken up in the middle of the night, you can hardly expect much politeness from him.

"Hello. My name is John. I'm an acquaintance of Kate's—" Seeing the girl come out of the back of the apartment, John immediately turned to her. "Kate, hurry, we need to go! It didn't work. We need to get to your father as soon as possible."

"What?" Scott said without giving Catherine a chance to answer. He was now fully awake, and now he was bewildered to realize that some strange fellow, whom he had never seen before, had fallen into their house in the night, knew Kate from somewhere, and demanded that she go with him to her father at once. Suspicion began to grow in the guy's brain.

"Kate, who else is that?" He said defiantly to his fiancée.

"Scott, please calm down, I know him. His real name is John."

Scott looked at Connor, who threw up his hands as if to say, "Well, you see!"

"Okay, I need to get dressed... Come on, John, I'll be right now," Catherine said.

"Stop, stop!" Scott blocked the passage with his hand. "Where are you going in the middle of the night?"

"John and I need to talk to my father about a very important matter — I don't have time to explain it right now, Scott!" Kate said as she walked, turning on the lights and looking for her things.

The guy was even taken aback by what he heard. His fiancée has some business with some guy that needs to be done in the middle of the night, and no one is even going to explain anything to him! Scott stared at Connor again, who in turn pushed his hand away and walked into the apartment. Mason had no choice but to close the door so that the neighbors wouldn't overhear their conversation.

"So you didn't find him?" asked Kate, referring to T-850, of course.

"I found him, but he flatly refused to go to CRS. You know he's only supposed to do your bidding—" John shrugged. "But he agreed to go to the clinic to pick you up and take you to a safe place... But we didn't have time — the missiles were launched earlier!"

Connor sighed heavily, but Scott's voice came back from behind.

"What are you talking about?! Who's supposed to do your bidding, Kate, and what kind of missiles took off ahead of time?"

"Look, it's a long time to explain—"

"Don't I have a right to know?" I'm your fiancé after all, in case you forgot!" Scott was starting to get excited.

"Looks like it's going to end in a quarrel again," the girl thought, and said aloud, "No, I haven't... I'll leave you for a minute..."

Taking her clothes and underwear, Catherine disappeared into the bathroom, leaving John and Scott alone, which was not the right thing to do.

"Well... Nice apartment!" Connor said after a moment's pause, during which Mason glared at him.

"What the hell? What does the apartment have to do with it? I don't understand, are you her ex-boyfriend?"

"Me? Well... No. We've only kissed a couple of times." John admitted honestly.

"When was that?"

"It's been a long time... about ten years ago."

"I think you're lying! And you're taking me for a fool!"

"Do it as you know!" John didn't have time to explain.

"Why are you going to see Kate's father?" The guy couldn't stop himself.

"Okay, I'm ready!" Catherine returned to the room, interrupting her and John's altercation.

As she dressed, she remembered an incident the day before, on July 24, when she and Scott were in the bridal accessories section of the Bloomingdale hypermarket in Century City, unsuccessfully trying to scan the barcode on the bottom of an elegant, engraved silver tray.

She looked at Scott fiddling with the scanner and knew she must feel the sentimental warmth of a fiancée for him. But instead, she just thought he was a nice guy. Pleasant, balanced. Moderately beautiful. Harmless. That's all she could think of.

With a height of about six feet, Scott looked good in a suit and tie behind the wheel of a rented Mercedes, albeit a "C" class, but still a "Benz". He was good, even working as a simple pharmacist, which echoed her specialty as a veterinarian.

They were the perfect match. Everybody said so. And she thought so herself. Or she tried to force herself to think so.

But after she told her fiancé that she had promised her father that she would come to Edwards Air Force Base with him for the weekend, Scott couldn't contain his irritation, which didn't sound like him at all.

"I can't believe you promised the general to go to the Mojave Desert! And all to show what an important person he is!"

Kate touched his arm conciliatorily.

"It's going to be okay."

Scott turned around to make sure no one was watching their little "skirmish."

"Do you remember that I wanted to meet him on my field?"

Kate turned away in exasperation. She didn't want to argue with Scott about her father. Not that day, not any other. She picked up a brass frame with a photo of a romantic couple walking hand in hand on a deserted beach in the moonlight.

"Yes, of course," she murmured back.

Even then, she wondered what this situation might tell about their future, and the prospect was not at all rosy.

Then, when the first replay happened, they had a really big fight — Scott showed himself to be extremely intemperate and jealous. Catherine then seriously doubted how well she really knew Scott Mason, her potential husband. And now he has reached the boiling point and seems ready to accuse her of all mortal sins.

But maybe Kate was being unfair to Scott? How would she behave in his place if some complete stranger came to his fiancée in the middle of the night, talked some nonsense and was going to take her with him in the form of an ultimatum, while not explaining anything, and the fiancée herself expressed her willingness to go with a stranger by her actions? Perhaps her behavior would not be much different from what Kate had observed a moment ago. Still, there was already a doubt about her choice somewhere inside her, and even if everything ended well and she and John finally managed to prevent Judgment Day, she wasn't at all sure that she would marry Scott Mason after all. That was her feminine intuition, if you will.

At one point, Kate even had the idea of suggesting that Scott go with them to CRS, but the girl almost immediately brushed her aside. In order for him to be of any use and help, he and John will have to tell him about Skynet, and about Judgment Day, and about Terminators, and, most importantly, about this damn "groundhog day" in which they find themselves. The probability that he would take everything adequately, and even believe her and John, was almost zero. So it wasn't worth trying, Kate reasoned.

Therefore, at parting, she only said, "Scott, if my words mean anything to you, please get out of town for a while! For a day or two. I'll be sure to get back to you after—" Kate looked at Connor hesitantly, "after John and I have done what we have to do—"

"If that's all you can say goodbye, you'd better not call at all!" She heard behind her as she followed John out the door.