And I always thought that a terminator was the dividing line between the bright and shaded regions of the disk of the moon or an inner planet

Kyle Reese had arrived maybe 30 minutes after the Terminator as traveling back in time is not an easy task. After collecting what leftover clothes he could get from what remained of the two punks, he followed the cyborg’s trail (actually not too difficult of a task) to its target. Kyle Reese prayed that he wasn’t too late.

When the time displaced commando saw the fireball erupt into the sky from the direction of the junkyard, he knew that was where he needed to be. Tumbling into the junkyard, he saw the burning oil drums. He didn’t see the Terminator, but he did see a figure silhouetted in the darkness. Reese quickly sprinted up to the man.

“Come with me if you want to live,” he said.

“What?”

“My name is Kyle Reese,” he quickly continued. “We don’t have much time. I’m from the future, there’s a Terminator that was sent back to kill you!”

“I know.”

“Well, we have to get out of here. A Terminator’s unstoppable, it doesn’t feel pain. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.”

“Yeah, I would imagine.”

“It was here right?” Reese asked. “You saw it? What are you doing just standing there? Where’d it go?”

“It’s up there.”

Reese looked up and saw what was quite possibly the most amazing and unusual sight that he’s ever seen in his long, hard life. Hanging forty feet in the air, the killer cyborg was stuck fast to the end of the steel arm of a crane.

“Whu—what’s that?” Reese sputtered.

“I dropped a crane magnet on it. It thrashed around for a little bit, but then it stopped moving, I assume that it has a hard drive inside it, right? You know, to drive it’s OS, store information. Stuff like that.”

“Well, I guess,” answered Reese. “I don’t know… I don’t know tech stuff.”

“Yeah, I figure I’d just leave the big guy hang there for a while. It might have something redundant in it or something. Does he?”

“Uh, I don’t know.” With his mouth hanging open, Reese looked up at the machine stuck to the magnet. “I can’t believe that…”

“Are you telling me that you guys get chased by these things all the time and you never tried to magnetize them?”

“Well, I… uh…”

“Electromagnets? EMP’s? Even a refrigerator magnet? Nothing?”

“Well, yeah yeah, sure we did,” Reese answered. “We used magnets all the time.”

“OK. Well, I guess that’s it, huh? Thanks for coming back in time to try to save me and stuff. You going to head back now?”

“I can’t.” Reese was still looking up and the metallic creature. “The trip was one way. I can’t go back home.”

“OK, that’s no problem. I have some friends that might be able to help you get back. Maybe Captain Picard or Professor X. They can probably get you back to your time.”

“Back to… my time?”

“Sure.”

“Screw that,” Reese said. “I’ll stay here. Let’s go get a beer.”