By Daniel
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Ellison's confronted by a doppleganger terminator that's destroyed by Chrome Artie, because Chrome Artie's got faith Ellison's going to lead him to the Connors. That might be difficult from jail, because Ellison's arrested by the cops for the murder of some guy named Peter Myers. Myers is clearly murdered by another visiting terminator, and when the eyewitness tells the full story, involving the naked man appearing in an energy bubble, the judge throws out the statement and the charges are dropped. The detective's acting oddly like a Terminator himself, which makes sense when he later morphs into Catherine Weaver, and it appears this was all a big test of Ellison's steadfastness and discretion.
The Connor Compound is broken into and robbed, which could cause them problems if their credit cards and fake IDs fall into the wrong hands. Which turns out to be a problem, because Chrome Artie is circling around, with a magic computer that alerts him whenever someone scans in a picture of Cameron. He finds the halfway house where Cameron wound up a couple episodes ago, where he meets Jody, who's all too eager to help him find "Miss Queen Bitch." Chrome Artie finds the grocery store where Cameron had her meltdown, and manages to find the Connor Compound, only to be greeted at the door by Riley, who's making a pain of herself in so many ways.
Miss Queen Bitch is out with Sarah, tracking down the thieves, which takes them to a diamond fence acquaintance of Derek's who, pretending to help them, actually leads them to terrorize a dentist who owes him money. So the Connor Compound breaks out the muscle, and Moishe points them to a loser wannabe filmmaker celebrating the theft with his buddies at an empty bowling alley. Moishe winds up dead at the business end of Jesse's gun, because he's been dropping her name a little too often for her liking. Or for Derek's, for that matter, because after Moishe mentions "Jesse" and Sarah asks Derek about it, he takes advantage of the androgynous name and pretends Jesse is a he who came over with him and was killed by a terminator.
At the bowling alley, Cameron executes three of the thieves, because they know where the Connor Crew lives. Sarah can't bring herself to kill the younger one, and hides him from Cameron, sparing him, which may prove to be unwise when he winds up in the hands of Chrome Artie.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Ellison sits alone at home, all mopey, eating food, when his doorbell rings. My VeggieTales DVD!, he thinks and goes to the door, which is kicked in, knocking him down, by ... himself! Ellison, flat on his ass, is stunned to be staring at another version of himself (with absolutely no regard for personal property). "Agent Ellison?" asks Metal Ellison, who raises a gun. This is about when I figured this was just a dream sequence. Suddenly, there is a large metal object rammed out through Metal Ellison's chest, then withdrawn, then a hand bursting through, clutching a presumably crucial piece of internal hardware. Metal Ellison collapses, revealing Chrome Artie! Ellison says, "What? Aren't you on the same side?" and Chrome Artie says, "Skynet does not believe in you like I do." Ellison's all, huh? And Chrome Artie says Ellison's going to lead him to the Connors. I hope Ellison is insulted that Chrome Artie's faith kinda stems from certainty that Ellison will destroy the world as we know it.
John, Sarah and Cameron arrive home at the Connor Compound to discover that someone has either ransacked the place, or some teenagers had the kind of house party that winds up making the local newspaper. They split up to check out the house, Sarah with her gun drawn. She doesn't find anyone, and finds the back door slightly ajar and banging against the frame. Why this makes her relax her guard I have no idea, but she lowers her gun, only to raise it again and almost blow off Cameron's head. Cameron appears unfazed, and says there's no one there.
So where's Derek? Where any good soldier should be: asleep in bed with his AWOL girlfriend. His cellphone rings, and he wakes up, grabs it, hits the redial. It's Sarah. "Where the hell are you?" she says. "Where the hell am I supposed to be?" is his non-helpful response. Sarah drops it to tell him they've been robbed of everything: diamonds, cash, credit cards, ID. Derek, having snuck out of bed, quietly asks if it was done by metal. At the compound, an annoyed-sounding Cameron says her leather jacket is gone, and John says most of the food is too, making Sarah conclude it was done by humans. Or maybe that's just what the terminator WANTS you to think! She's worried about what could happen if their IDs fall into the wrong hands. Credit-card fraud? Derek tells her to head downtown, and he'll call back in half an hour with an exact location.
After he hangs up, Jesse stirs to ask him who it was. "Real life," says Derek, and they have a little back-and-forth about whether Derek couldn't have just let it ring, like good advice from the war deserter, JESSIE.