After John throws the parts from the first Terminator into the molten metal, the Terminator tells him that he too must die to stop his technology from being used to create Skynet. He tells Sarah that he cannot kill himself, and she must lower him into the steel. As he goes down, he reaches up with a thumbs up, the last thing to go under. The movie ends with a dark highway at night, and Sarah's repetition of the phrase that Reese told her in the first movie. "The future is not set."