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In the movie Edge of Tomorrow, Tom Cruise recovers a particular item from the General's office.

This item

is a prototype tracker Carter built that will allow Cage to discover the Omega's true location. After several failed loops they obtain the device and get it out of the General's office. During the course of recovering this tracker Cage and Vrataski are injured as they flee and an unconscious Cage is given a blood transfusion, losing the ability to reset.

However, because

Vrataski knows the tracker simply needs be activated and driven into Cage's leg to find the Omega, why did they have to leave the General's office and risk losing the ability to reset? i.e. why didn't they simply activate the device in the General's office, jam it into Cage's leg, learn the Omega's location and have Vrataski shoot Cage to reset the loop.

This approach would have had the benefit of being able to use the full loop time.

Also, because the ministry

did not believe Carter's explanation about the Alphas and Omega, it seems unlikely that Cage and Vrataski would have any reason to believe the tracker would be "jammed" or otherwise not function within the Ministry. Also, they could have easily used the General as a hostage to buy enough time to jab Cage, learn the location and kill him to reset the loop.

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  • I'd wondered the same myself..
    – Andrew Thompson
    Mar 7, 2015 at 3:57
  • The Omega could remember the resets as well, but I don't recall if it could track back and know if its location had been discovered
    – Izkata
    Mar 7, 2015 at 4:20
  • My suspicion is the reset takes the risk of the Omega recognizing the attempt to penetrate its location and would simply not be there AFTER a reset. It would move and their knowledge would be useless. I don't think Cage had planned to reset the day before the transfusion, but the transfusion merely upped the ante and forced him to make the trip without the safety net. A common writing trick. Introduce the hero. Make his life hell. Amp it up. Turn it to 11. Kill the Redshirts. Win the day. Epilogue.
    – Thaddeus Howze
    Mar 7, 2015 at 7:56
  • @Izkata, that's incorrect. If the Omega remembered, it would be able to adapt. It could not. Only Cage could learn from the previous battle, which is why he fought the Mimics so effectively.
    – Paul Draper
    Jun 13, 2015 at 22:55
  • 2
    @PaulDraper Remember how they had a limited number of iterations before the Omega could successfully find Cage? That was because the Omega was remembering from Cage's resets. Maybe not as completely as him, but some knowledge was being transferred
    – Izkata
    Jun 14, 2015 at 5:30

1 Answer 1

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They couldn't have planned to do that ahead of time due to the number of unknowns.

  • How long would it take to discover the Omega's location?
  • Given that this device had never be tested, would it even work?
  • Would Dr. Carter need to adjust the device to get it to work?

These uncertainties preclude the plan to "have easily used the General as a hostage to buy enough time to jab Cage, learn the location and kill him to reset the loop"

(That Dr. Carter was able to know so much about Mimic biology and how to create a telepathic device that worked on the first try is the real surprise. He must be one smart nerd.)

As it turns out, the device did work, and it worked quickly. And then the car crashed seconds later.

There isn't a reason why they couldn't have killed Cage within those few seconds; they just didn't do it.

Cage and Vrataski are used to going as far as possible, dying, and then trying again. (Live, die, repeat.) This circumstance was unusual as there was suddenly was no need to repeat the mission. But "getting as far a possible" was still their mindset.

Also, recall that Rita bled out on the battlefield, not when she was put in psyche ward or dissected. Cage losing his power in London was a bit of surprise.

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