Let’s all just ignore Celes’s poop bucket.
“[Rebels]!!!” Celes blurts out in response. “I used to be General CELES… Now I’m just a common traitor…” I’m pretty sure she is still Celes. I’m also pretty sure Winona knows who she is, and not just because he told me. He tries to get her moving so they can, like, escape, and she goes, “!? You’d take me along?” I know already that my Word spelling check is going to be unhappy with that quote. Anyway, Celes just can’t imagine holding Winona back for her little old self, so she turns down his offer of rescue. “I can barely walk…” she says. She walks a few steps, as if trying to make herself look stupid, and goes on, “I’m grateful, but… Even if you got me out, you’d never be able to protect me. No, I think I’m better off here.” How would she be better off there, even if she is right about his inability to protect her? (Side note: more barf.) Worst-case scenario, she just gets beaten to death somewhere else. Mitt Romney’s basement can’t be that posh, right?
Lamely, Winona replies, “I’ll protect you!!! Trust me! You’ll be fine!” That should assuage precisely none of Celes’s admittedly lame concerns, but she agrees to go with him. But first, she points at her still-sleeping guard, who is maybe the most incompetent person in this game so far, and I’m counting Guile here. He has “something important” on him, according to Celes. Winona folds into her as she examines the guard, finding a clock key in his pocket. She could have just said it was a key, without the cryptic bullshit. Celes has the option of taking it or deciding that “Stealing is wrong,” and unlike Winona she doesn’t pitch a gigantic existential hissy fit over the idea of becoming a thief.
Right when she’s done rifling through his clothing, naturally, the guard wakes up so violently that Celes is thrown across the room, Don Knottsing the whole way. But then he mumbles, “…’n some bread, too…” and drops back into his chair. Ha! She was scared because a man who’d helped beat her half to death woke up during her escape attempt! This game is so wacky!
Celes leads Winona into the next room to make use of a save point and put on some better equipment before entering the last door in the hallway. This room contains more of Mitt’s expensive clocks, spittoons, armoires, and other doodads, but all the chests have either been plundered by the Imperials, or he had Ann stash their most expensive items in the panic room upstairs. Celes ignores all of this and heads toward the clock in the back of the room, which is not ticking. When she winds the clock with her stolen key, it reveals a secret door behind the armoire. Why would they have left this key in the room with her? Shouldn’t it have been held by one of the officers, and not the worst soldier in the Imperial army?
Oh no! They found Mitt’s steak knife!
This door leads to the secret passage that can get our heroes out of South Figayro. On the way, they fight a bunch of random Imperial soldiers and open whatever chests Ann missed in her scramble to keep all the family riches out of the hands of thieves. She is gonna be pissed when she finds out Celes nabbed her favorite pair of earrings. She only has ten other pairs like those!
When they reach the exit, because this conversation simply cannot wait, Celes asks Winona why he’s helping her. Clearly, she’s skeptical that he’s an altruistic do-gooder, and with good reason. He replies, “You remind me of someone…” What, you mean the other skinny, leggy, blonde magic user? Why would Celes remind you of her? Sigh. “But what’s it matter anyway?” he snits, all defensive again. “I just want to, okay!?” Celes wordlessly accepts this ridiculous explanation, and together, they leave South Figayro. What follows, of course, is 20 minutes of me bumbling my way across the world map, trying to remember how the hell to get to Narshe. I’m hoping to become reasonably competent at finding my way between two clearly marked points by the time the game is over.
Eventually, they find a cave passage that maybe leads to Narshe. Only one way to find out! They fight through several screens of dank cave with inexplicable perfectly formed stone staircases and doorways, mostly encountering live, sentient fossils, which is not weird or anything. Finally, when light is almost in sight, a rumbling noise announces the imminent presence of a boss. As the screen shakes, Celes cries, “Something’s coming outta the wall!!”
The thing ejaculating through the wall, Celes tells us, is an obviously phallic giant drill called a Tunnel Armor. “I’ll draw its magic attack,” she informs Winona. “It won’t hurt us.” What happened to her needing his protection? She abandoned that quickly for the joke it was, didn’t she? Anyway, what Celes is getting at is that she has a special ability, Runic Blade, that absorbs magic into her sword. She offers to demonstrate for Winona, who hopefully won’t jump out of his skin again when he sees magic used.
Only Edgar can make him do that.
Sure enough, Celes selects Runic on her battle menu, and when the Tunnel Penis tries to zap them with a bolt of lightning, she absorbs it and even gains a little MP. Winona keeps it together and doesn’t Don Knotts at this, or at Celes using magic herself, for that matter. He must have remembered to fill his prescription before leaving South Figayro. In short order, the Tunnel Penis is defeated, and Winona thinks they’re “in the clear.” This is true, but only because his scenario ends here and I don’t have to worry about battling with the world map again.
The Black Screen of Meta-Game Commentary lets us know that our principals have all safely reached Narshe, “and a decisive battle is about to take place…” Given that we’re only about five hours deep in the game at this point, I doubt it’s that decisive of a battle, but whatever helps the Text God sleep at night.
Inside Baron von Oldtimer’s house, the Sunflowardly Lion, Edgar, Twiggy, and the Baron are meeting with the town elder of Narshe. “I understand all of it…” the elder probably lies. “Except… How can WE be encouraging bloodshed?” The Baron tries to clarify that he doesn’t want bloodshed exactly, to which the Elder basically responds, “Nuh UH.” At this, TSL breaks rank with his companions to stare moodily at the wall, and tells the Baron that the elder is right. “Our blood will spill because of you,” he adds dramatically, except I have no idea whom he is addressing. The elder? The Baron? Twiggy? Probably Twiggy. But he breaks his wall-gazing reverie to stare down the elder. Let’s just pretend that last exchange didn’t happen and move on, because TSL is about to vomit exposition all over the Baron’s imported rug. “Emperor Gestahl’s racing to acquire Magitek power,” he duhs. “He’s set his sights on the Esper that was found here! The increased use of Magitek power will surely lead to global destruction…” This was the height of social commentary back when this game was new, wasn’t it?
The elder shrugs his little sprite shoulders and replies, “The War of the Magi… The mythical battle that set mankind back a thousand years… Can this really be happening?” Well, I’m pretty sure it’s not a thousand years ago, so…no? But maybe something similar. He sighs, “People will never learn…” So true–fucking humans, right? We should give the deed for Earth back to the dinosaurs.
Side note: I hate it when this happens.
Before TSL and the elder can discuss turning Narshe–speaking of being environmentally responsible, a fucking COAL MINE–into a hippie commune where they’ll make their own yogurt out of breast milk and have nightly drum circle poetry slams, Guile storms in, Kyan and Gau in tow, screaming for his brother. As soon as Edgar has established that his idiotic brother did not die a completely deserved idiotic death, he frowns at his hangers-on and asks, “Who’s with you?” Guile lets them introduce themselves, and poor Kyan still refers to himself as “retainer to the lord of Doma.” Oh, that is so sad. I thought he’d put that behind him when he put literally put Guile behind him! I guess some scars take time to heal. Gau is just all, “GAU…GAU!” because he’s the worst.
“The people of Doma were wiped out by the Empire…” Guile tells Edgar, as he and Kyan make sad faces. “Kefka poisoned…everyone…” Kyan adds with a sniffle. Edgar shouts, “Barbaric!” in Kyan’s face, which is neither helpful nor sensitive, but it’s probably the closest Edgar gets to either. Meanwhile, TSL realizes that the horrible attack that killed everyone in the world Kyan supposedly cared about can be used to make the town elder feel bad. But the elder is still being a huge dick about it. “But…that was only because Doma was collaborating with the [Rebels]!” he argues. Or it was because Kefka is insane. Plus, Narshe doesn’t have a giant river Kefka can pour poisonous purple Koolaid into, so they should be fine. But I guess those arguments aren’t good enough, so it’s time for Winona to barge in. “That’s nonsense!!” he shouts, as he and Celes enter the house. “The Empire’s poised to attack Narshe right now!” Everyone is shocked at this news, for some reason, and TSL demands to know where he heard it. “On the espionage mission you sent me on,” Winona does not reply. Instead, his terrible judgment leads him to open with, “CELES, here, was one of the Empire’s generals…” and everyone freaks out.
Kyan pops his eyes back into his head long enough to shout, “Grrr! I knew she seemed familiar. Sir GAU, out of my way!” And he doesn’t wait, either–he throws Gau across the room like a rag doll. Guile is totally turned on by this display of strength, but shit is way too serious at the moment to act on it. Plus his brother is right there and would undoubtedly feel left out. Anyway, Kyan is expositing to the room. “This is General CELES!” he needlessly repeats. “She torched Maranda! She’s an Imperial spy! Now, stand aside!” Yeah, she’s an Imperial spy. That’s why Winona introduced her as General Celes. The perfect disguise!
Winona, who doesn’t even know who this shouting man with the cute ponytail is, jumps between Kyan and Celes. “WAIT!” he cries. “CELES has joined the [Rebels]! She’s fighting with us, now!” Is she even allowed to join without talking to TSL? I thought that was the whole point of dragging Twiggy to see him. Anyway, Winona is prepared to engage in the slap fight of the century to protect Celes, because he gave his word that he would. Again, I’m sure the military general who can use magic totally needs his protection, but ladies be faintin’ or whatever. This game. Edgar asks if Winona’s ridiculous macho chivalrous bent is because of something he will only refer to as “that,” and I’m betting “that” is totally stupid, but Winona doesn’t respond. Instead, Twiggy finally remembers she has a working mouth and says, “I was also an Imperial soldier.” Kyan screams, “WHAT!!” as he suddenly and uncomfortably finds himself as the meat in an Imperial vagina sandwich.
Edgar, meanwhile, walks away, having his own stare-off with the wall. His back still turned, so you know this is Deep Stuff, he says, “The Empire’s evil. But not ALL of its citizens are!” I’m not sure how that is relevant when the two ladies in question were officers of the Empire, and not just humble Imperial villagers, but nobody feels like ruining Edgar’s point with facts. And it’s a good thing everyone’s kind of decided to get along, because a Narshe guard runs in to tell them, “Emergency!! The Empire cometh!!” Don Knottses all around, again. Also: hee hee. “Cometh.”
If I only had one screenshot to sum up this game, it would be this one.
Out in the Figayro sand dunes, Kefka is marching–on foot, for some reason–toward Narshe, Imperial soldiers and Magiteks trailing behind him. “I don’t care what you do here, JUST GET ME THAT ESPER!!” he yells at no one in particular. Just when I’m wondering if he’s suggesting they sleep their way through town until some kind Narshian coquettishly tells them where it is, a soldier gasps that there are civilians in Narshe–duh!–and Kefka responds, “Exterminate everyone!” I have to say, it’s times like these that I am so glad this game was made before the era of voice acting. Kefka would sounded like Albedo and Ghaleon had a baby and abandoned it to be raised by Juggalos, who pumped it full of helium and Red Bull.
The soldiers keep arguing with Kefka, like that’s going to do anything. He howls at them to march harder, hopping up and down in place, first with a constipated lemon face, and then swapping to a Don Knotts. Are we really supposed to believe an all-powerful, world-dominating empire would put this guy anywhere near a position of power and influence?
Back at the Baron’s house, the elder relents and says they should get ready for battle. Probably the best choice, since Kefka would probably kill them all even if they placed the Esper outside the gates for him with one of those big red Lexus bows on top. Speaking of the Esper, the elder says they moved it to the hills. “Then we’re going up after it!” Edgar bellows as they all awkwardly face the camera at once. Wait, so it’s not being guarded right now? Good thinking, everyone.
Our heroes leave the Baron’s house and begin their single-file march toward the Esper. We haven’t even met the whole cast yet and already it’s quite the conga line. In the back, Edgar is walking with Twiggy and Celes (CHICKS!!!) and tells Celes, “WINONA has a complicated past. I wouldn’t go thinking he’s fallen for you or something!” He may as well have shrieked “BITCH STEP OFF MY MAN!” in her face. Subtle, Edgar. Celes, to her credit, replies, “I’m a soldier, not some love-starved twit!” Edgar decides she is “cold as ice” for not melting into a pile of Mary Sue mush at the mention of Winona’s name. Edgar is an asshole.