The Hagane and the Hiryu are underway to meet each other, thus giving us access to almost the entire roster of playable characters from here on. There's still a few to be unlocked here and there, but by now we've got enough that we'll have to start choosing who to deploy. Aya's still non-playable, for that matter: as the chapter opens she's still on Earth meeting her father, Kenzo Kobayashi
, about the progress on the R-3. He's kinda disappointed it's falling behind schedule, as Aya has trouble using its T-Link System because of the effect it has on her.
KENZO: Unlike the R-1's T-Link System, the R-3's is custom made. Only you can use it.
AYA: No, I can't. Every time I'm linked, I remember them...my mother...and Mai...
Great, so it's a machine that unintentionally brings back traumatic memories. That'll certainly help things along. By the way, the person she's referring to is Mai Kobayashi, her sister who died in an accident testing the same kind of system that Kenzo now has Aya work on. Kenzo, being the great dad that he is, at least tries to alleviate her fears by using another person's test data to help in further testing. Turns out said test subject is Ryusei's mom, who participated in these experiments long ago. So not only do psychic powers run in the family, but they also got recruited by the same organization. Seems like this has been going for a lot longer than previously established.
While Laker watches the Hagane leave into the atmosphere, he receives a top secret message calling him to a meeting at the EFA headquarters in Geneva. Sakae's left in command of the base while Laker's gone, and the ever-treacherous-looking Hans sees this as his chance to do his thing...whatever his thing may be. After all, Sakae is the only thing left standing in his way now that just about every other high-ranking officer either at a meeting or aboard the Hagane.
The Hagane is now in orbit, waiting for the Hiryu to arrive and checking out the White Star while they're at it. It's the size of a space colony, which is about 40km in this story — it's kind of a useless factoid, but I guess it was worth mentioning. Somehow this thing managed to remain undetected by sensors up until its arrival, which Excellen jokingly calls a "hidden ball trick". Naturally, Ryusei is the only one who laughs; Rai and Kyosuke just tell the two to shut up. Even Excellen notices the parallels between the two teams here, although Rai objects being equated to Ryusei's partner.
The two ships finally meet, the captains introduce themselves to each other, and Masaki makes his comeback for the Hagane crew. Sean's mostly interested in the girls that the Hagane has on board, to Lefina's consternation, but he quickly drops the topic. Ryusei's kinda surprised to see Masaki again, wondering if he got lost again since there are few other reasons for him to stick around after his departure from the crew.
MASAKI: Man...you really think I get lost that often?
Although everyone is pleased that they didn't immediately get attacked as expected, this naturally doesn't last forever. A single enemy is detected approaching their position at high speed, which immediately raises the question why they would only send one. It's not even an Aerogater but a DC unit, which usually boils it down to a very short list of nasty bosses. Rai briefly thinks it's Elzam, but everyone's expectations are shattered once the enemy mech actually arrives...
[BGM Change: Flapper Girl]
It's the Valsione, which is basically a giant mecha girl. It's either one of the stupidest or the most awesome mech designs in the game, but it's a fairly strong mech either way as it's based on the Valsion. Some of the pilots (Excellen, Ryusei and Tasuku) think it's awesome, but the others are understandably more concerned about this thing they're facing. They finally get in contact with the pilot, immediately making it clear that this encounter to be even more awkward than previously imagined.
LUNE: I am Lune Zoldark, daughter of the man you killed!
Yep, it's Bian's daughter and she's out for revenge. Not because she was such a loyal supporter — in fact, she considers it entirely reasonable that this happened — but she figures she should avenge him because he was still her dad. Ryoto tries to talk her down, but she's having none of it, while Masaki has slightly more success with flattering her looks. Well, it didn't change her mind, but at least he managed to confuse her enough to stop her for a moment. He asks her if she's with the DC, which she denies as the current DC is not what Bian originally had in mind. This promptly raises the question what the hitherto unnoticed DC fleet behind her is for, then.
She's genuinely surprised to see them, and it seems they tracked down the Hagane of their own accord. The commander of the fleet, Siebel Mistrel, tries to convince Lune to join forces, but she promptly refuses their offer by wiping out most of their fleet with the Valsione's Psychoblaster attack. It's really just a palette-swapped Cyflash, but it works well enough. Aside from vague ideological issues, the reason she states for not joining them is because they gassed an entire space station to conquer it, which is something Bian would never have allowed.
SIEBEL: Hmph. Maier and Bian died because they were too soft. But, they're gone! I'm going to do things my own way!
TASUKU: Typical villain stuff, huh?
Not that she's on our side now, mind you. She just figures she'll deal with these guys first, and then with the Hagane. If Siebel has one remaining trump card among his forces, it's probably the fact that he brought Leona along. While ordering the rest of the units to attack, he orders her to defend him, but she too starts having a crisis of loyalty. Her allegiance was to Commander Maier, not this guy, and ponders who to fight for. Anyway, the battle has started, and we've got more than enough firepower to take these guys on.
Pretty cramped space level, which means we can start shooting right away. Although Lune's not on our side, she does a good job of attacking every enemy in sight...perhaps too good even, when it comes to the Battle Mastery for this map. The goal's to destroy Siebel's ship, but he runs when his health is low, so we can't have any stray attacks causing problems. So, everyone forward and make a beeline for Siebel before Lune is finished tearing through their fleet, using any spirit commands they need. They've got Lion V's, which aren't too tough, although their railguns still hurt if they hit. I try not to kill too many of them, just to keep Lune busy, but enough that my weaker troops don't remain at risk. As long as I kill everything standing directly in my way, it's enough.
At the start of the second turn, Leona decides she doesn't owe Siebel loyalty, and just charges ahead to die fighting as the last living member of the Troye Unit. Would've been nice if she just switched sides like villains usually do, but I guess fighting her isn't too bad either. Still, she's not very tough and goes down in a few more hits than the average mook. Tasuku eventually deals the final blow, and instead of finishing her off, decides she should have more appreciation for the luck that ensured her survival up until now. She's taken to the Hagane, and as a special bonus for having Tasuku finish her, we get her busted-up Guarlion as well. Score!
Siebel himself has lots of hit points, but they're pretty empty hit points that go down easily. Attacks like Alteisen's Heavy Claymore and Weissritter's Oxtongue Rifle D do a nice job, and we're almost there after a single turn of attacks. Now let's just hope...oh dammit, Lune attacked him, this had better not end badly. Miraculously it didn't, and Siebel ended up being brought down to about 10000 HP. Now it's just a matter of using Irm's Darkness Slash (with Valor) to deal 11000 damage, and claim our Battle Mastery. Got really lucky there, no doubt.
Now it's just a matter of mopping up the few remaining enemies, after which Lune returns her attention to finish what she started. This is pretty much an empty threat, though: a single Akashic Buster is enough to reduce her HP into surrender, and victory is ours. Still, she's pretty happy: she went into this knowing she couldn't win, and mostly did it to make herself feel better. Because the Hagane pilots seem to be good people to her (and because she thinks Masaki is kinda cool) she spontaneously forgets about her revenge and wants to join the crew. Ultimately, Ingram decides they need all the firepower they can get, and agrees to talk to the captain about it. Two new people on board in a single chapter? It's a good thing this doesn't happen often, because at this pace we'd have a miniature society living aboard the ship in no time.
In the briefing room, Irm and Tasuku discuss the latest catch, who Irm finds to be a total hottie. Then again, he probably says that about almost the entire female cast, so take that however you will. Tasuku's claiming the right to ask her out first, which Bullet guesses is only because of her looks. A prompt reminder follows about him and Kusuha, and he immediately shuts up. Excellen thinks Bullet's going in the right direction, of course, glad that Bullet finally shows an interest in girls after all. The conversation about Leona briefly resumes, particularly about her relation to Rai and the rest of the Branstein family, eventually leading to the conclusion that she must be an officer and pretty rich.
Leona herself, however, is entirely uncooperative at first. As she's been brought to the bridge and questioned, she presumes they'll want to torture her for information that she won't give. Daitetsu's only interested in getting her support, though, as they can always use capable additions to their forces. DC, UCC or EFA, as long as they agree to fight the Aerogaters it's all fine with him. They try to get it into her head that it was Maier's will that they do this, but what ultimately sways her is hearing that Rai speaks highly of her.
LEONA: (He does?) Understood. I suppose my life is now in your hands.
Her mech's not too bad, and her evasion stats are just dandy, so this is another welcome addition to the crew. I still don't think she's over the whole fighting-to-die thing though, judging from her words. Lune is likewise welcomed aboard the ship, and soon Ryusei and the others are discussing the Valsione with her. It's a Valsion, but she claims that the original model is "not her style at all", so Bian came up with a new design for her. Why he designed it like a giant magical girl, no one knows. The others belatedly express their sympathies for her deceased father, but she actually objects to this:
LUNE: Don't wuss out on me. He died following his beliefs. So, I'm OK.
Aside from that, she could see all that power he had was consuming him, so all in all she considers it a good thing he was stopped. Lune's relationship with her father is...strage, I'll say that much. Having enough of this weighty discussion, she asks Masaki for a tour of the Hagane, which he of course agrees to give. Despite his previous claims of not being as clueless as he looks, Ryusei and Ryoto just know Masaki's gonna get lost again, so they go after him. At least someone is learning from previous incidents here.
Katina's not exactly satisfied with the standard PT she's currently got, and is having a talk with Ingram about being allowed to pilot one of the prototype mechs. She thinks she could do a better job piloting the R-1 or R-3, given that they're currently being used by inexperienced pilots, but is told she simply can't pilot those because they're custom-configured for Ryusei and Aya. Probably wouldn't work anyway if a non-psychic tried to pilot a mech with a T-Link System, I think. Upon her suggestion, Ingram does allow her to pilot the R-Gun, though Radha questions her brash attitude. Of course, since she's the one saying it, the first solution Ingram proposes is yoga, which leads to a rather funny scene of Ingram being talked into trying Radha's painful yoga. Still, the only reason he agreed to try was because he was told Viletta could actually do these poses. She must be a whole lot more flexible than he is, then.
INGRAM: Nevermind...did Viletta stay on the Moon?
RADHA: Yes, Sir. She was given an important mission...
INGRAM: I see... (Then, I must hurry mine too...)
Meanwhile, Daitetsu receives the strange order to return to Earth again, not moments after they had left. He wants to confirm this order with Laker, who is of course unreachable because he's just left for Geneva. Poor communications planning, I'd say. While they figure it might be interference from another government entity like the EOT Council, they decide to follow this order anyway for now and see what's going on.
Finally, off the coast of Peru we once again meet Elzam and the rest of the Kurogane crew, now fighting the war on a solitary basis rather than as members of the DC. Well, actually, at the moment Elzam is mostly preoccupied with cooking rather than anything else. Apparently he's a pretty good cook and manages to keep his troops happy by making their food. Such a great commander. They also decoded another message from the aliens, which probably wasn't heard by most of its intended audience:
???: In the name of Levi Tolar, I declare to all Earthlings...you have 30 days to disarm all of your weapons...and surrender to us.
Might've been better if they found a TV spokesman or such for this stuff. Ah well. So, as mentioned, I have two new pilots and two new mechs, as well as a Multi Sensor I got when I defeated Leona. Her Guarlion gets that one, as well as all the available upgrade money to increase its mobility. Sorry, Lune, your Valsione will have to wait until the next chapter or so before I start upgrading it. You'll survive until that time anyway.
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