Anyway, battle breaks out all up in that shit and, as usual, is punctuated with thrilling commentary from Cesario, Delita, and Dubya. Delita plays to his usual motivation, that is, getting his wench sister back, and in response, Dubya utters quite possibly the most mangled line we’ve seen to date:
“Correct me if I’m wrong… Either way, the girl was to be released anyway. We had no intention of keeping her. But first things first! If you want the girl back, you’ll have to beat me!!”
I’m so confused regarding Dubya’s motivation right now, my head is spinning. Well, you know what they say. “Fool me once… shame on… you, fool me twice… uh, you won’t fool me again.” Yeah, I think that’s how it goes. Anyway, the point is, shouldn’t the Happy Sunshine Cult consider a GED requirement before doling out the memberships? This guy is so not somebody I’d want to be following into war, that’s for damn sure.
‘Bitch, I will so totally Internet slap you in your Internet face!’
Anyway, Cesario and Jeanne move in on Dubya to give him the old one-two, but their progress is hindered by two things: Delita’s unconscious body and the female Monk!Cultist from before. Well, after an open-mouthed slap from Cesario and a long-distanced “Wave Fist” from Jeanne, the only things that stand before Dubya are two unconscious bodies. This would be all fine and dandy if Dubya didn’t have the same cheap Ice Sword attack Heidi has and use it to freeze Cesario in his tracks, making him an easy target. Somehow, through Cesario’s unrivaled stupidity and none of my own, the party suffers heavy losses and Samantha spends much of the battle running around healing dead recappers and Ben and whichever member of the team is currently conscious dispatch Dubya’s remaining lackeys.
When the party finally brings Dubya to his knees, he wheezes that he can’t die here without avenging Miluda and prepares to make his dastardly exit. When Cesario goads him for being a coward, Dubya gets all in a tizzy and exposits all over Cesario’s blouse. “Who do you think had Gustav kidnap the Marquis?” …Um, a wizard?
‘Deceived?’ Is that what they’re calling it these days?
Apparently not. Dubya confirms what we’d previously suspected, Foulfellow and Gideon put out the hit on the Marquis. Cesario, bless his ignorant little heart, can’t believe that his brothers would do such a terrible thing, so Dubya tattoos it to Cesario’s forehead with the help of our old friend, the COLORED LION ANALOGY.
“Two lions are fighting for power after the king died!” he prophesizes, “One is the white lion, [W!LL]. The other is black, [B!LL]. Both want to know who their allies are. But, it’s hard to read strangers’ minds. Especially when they don’t speak the goodly engrish. So, why not kill ’em all and bring in your own people?” Dubya’s obnoxious rant carries on for a little longer, but obviously, Cesario doesn’t believe Dubya, tells him as much, and the Cultist flares out. Scene. Also, I guess we can assume that King Omdoria is dead now. Thanks for the heads up, NPCs. *grumble*
Delita bursts into the Windmill, screeching for his sister. After moving his head from right to left once scouring the area, he whines to Cesario that Rinoa is nowhere to be found. Much head scratching ensues, and Cesario finally reads the script and decides that Rinoa must be at FORT ZEAKDEN, for no reason other than it’s already the ultimate destination, so why not?
Delita turns to Cesario with tears in his eyes, wondering what Rinoa did to deserve this horrible fate. For a second, it totally looks like they’re gonna snog, but Delita drops to his knees at Cesario’s feet instead. Oh my. Just as a wailing saxophone harmony hits the soundtrack the camera phases into the ceiling, and thus, I am saved the horrid fate of gargling bleach and taking shots of hydrochloric acid in a vain attempt to dislodge some serious CesarioxDelita horizontal tangoing from my mind.
We rejoin Chibi!Cesario on the world map, and he scuttles along the path to FORT ZEAKDEN. After I split the party into two groups and watch “FORT ZEAKDEN” scroll across the screen, the camera descends slowly onto the scene, where we can see Rinoa and Golagros teetering precariously on a catwalk high above the ground. Also, it’s snowing for some reason. I mean, that’s perfectly logical, seeing as how it was freaking summer a few minutes ago and the in game calendar tells me that it’s June. Whatever. Let’s say that the snow is …um …a symbol of Rinoa’s purity that’s about to get blown away. Oops, hope I didn’t spoil that for anybody.
Golagros looks down from the catwalk to the throng of Hokuten troops assembled below, led by Gideon, and who else is standing next to him than our old friend PPP. Oh joy, oh rapture. I sincerely hope we get to re-enact a Jerry Springer-styled reunion. Golagros yells for the Hokuten to get the heck out of dodge, otherwise he’ll do something bad to Rinoa. Like force her on Squally. Golagros also ambiguously warns the troops that there’s “tons of powder inside the fort!” Sweet Jesus, he must have stumbled upon Squaresoft’s secret stash!
Gideon shouts back that the Hokuten will never be threatened by the likes of a Happy Sunshine Cultist, just as Cesario and Delita clamor onscreen. They both screech to their respective siblings, and as Rinoa tries to move to see her brother better, she throws Golagros off balance.
Holy Impending Doom, Batman!
Seizing the opportunity, Gideon gives PPP the signal, and PPP blows Rinoa away with a crossbow. Never mind the fact that PPP is a knight and therefore can’t use projectile weapons, look at the cool animation we gave Rinoa as she falls over, dead as a doornail! Golagros, now vulnerable and clearly shocked, stands there like a moron with his maw agape until PPP shoots him too.
A Hokuten!Knight emerges from off-screen to alert Gideon to the presence of more Happy Sunshine Cult troops, one of whom resembles Dubya, and Gideon orders PPP to “take care of the rest.” If PPP wasn’t such a pantywaist, I’d totally be thinking that Gideon meant for Cesario and Delita to die. And that would make him eeeeevil. But, PPP is a total loser in battle, so I’ll reserve that judgment for later.
Gideon marches off-screen and the camera swoops back over to Golagros, who hasn’t yet died. The fallen Cultist swears and shuffles backwards into the Fort, slamming the door shut behind him. Delita cries for Rinoa and tries to run to her side before PPP stops him. PPP and Delita bicker amongst themselves like they always do, PPP calls the commoners animals, and reinforcements stumble onto the screen. Well, fuck, I suppose we have to fight now?
The Battle Objective, “Kill PPP,” is pretty obvious, so the party sets out to do just that. On Cesario’s first turn, he demands to know why PPP is being such a prick, and PPP snots that he’s been ordered by the elder two Beoulves to prevent Cesario from sacrificing “the Hokuten pride, all for a common girl.” Then, on his turn, PPP grills Cesario: “Why are you arguing with me? You’re a traitor to the Hokuten!”
Cesario waffles some response about PPP’s actions being inexcusable, and PPP shoots Delita with his crossbow, but he doesn’t instantly die because we’re in battle mode now. Like, what a lame scene this is shaping up to be. I don’t Nobody cares about Rinoa, we already knew the Beoulve Bros. were evil, and I everybody already hates PPP. I suppose my only motivation now is that the end is mere paragraphs away.
On Delita’s turn, he swears that he’ll kill PPP because BORING! and goes upside the Princess’ head with his Fists of Sibling Aaaaangst. The bazillion enemy units take their turns all in a row because that’s totally fair, Delita gets knocked unconscious by three consecutive Bolts to the head, and Cesario and PPP insult each other about being spoiled and obstinate, respectively. Then, randomly, after the argument, Cesario yells to Delita’s unconscious body to ask if he’s okay, rousing the peasant from his stupor. Robbed of choice naptime and thoroughly irritated, Delita snaps, “Leave me, Cesario! After [PPP], you’re next!” Yawn.
“As a Beoulve, surely you know our mission?” PPP creeps on his next turn, “Your mission took precedence even when I was attacked on the [MANDALIA PLAINS]!!” You know, ’cause Cesario refused to save the little wanker from the Happy Sunshine Cultists. Cesario doesn’t apologize for the decision, in fact, I’m sure he’s regretting saving this festering ass-boil more now than ever, and layeth the smack down on PPP, bringing him so close to death it hurts.
I want to be your dominated love slaaaaave~!
Then, as is their wont, the bazillion enemy units raze my party members with an assortment of Black Magic spells cast one after another, and one of the few survivors, Samantha, the sly thief that she is, Steals the Heart of one of the bazillion enemy units, Charming him and turning him against his own. If only we could turn certain sects of self-righteous videogame fans as easily.
In the end, it is Jeanne who delivers the final crushing blow (for a whopping 12 HP) that knocks PPP down for the count. I find some sense of poetic justice in the fact that it was Jeanne who smote the biggest wanker of the game, but that could be due entirely to the fact that deep down, I’m a big, sensitive teddy bear. And if you believe that, I’ve got a Ski Lodge in the Sahara you’d just love this time of year.
The screen fades to black to give the Generics ample time to clear out the dead bodies (and, apparently, the still living bodies of PPP’s former comrades), and when the scene resumes, Delita has clamored to the catwalk and tentatively approaches his sister’s body. The snow, which was peacefully descending before, is now being whipped in various directions by a particularly violent Foreboding Gust of Wind. Delita kneels down next to the fallen Rinoa and makes with the mourning. Cesario wonders if they make “I’m sorry your sister just got killed by a total ass monkey” Hallmark cards.
‘Whee!’
Just then, the Fort rumbles and sputters out an ominous black cloud of smoke. Oh yeah, Golagros is still skulking around inside there somewhere. Maybe somebody should have checked up on him. Cesario yells for Delita to get down from the precariously high height so as to not get exploded into a million pieces and then fall to his doom, but the swift hand of Irony ignites the powder in the tower opposite the one Golagros slithered into and sends Cesario flying to a fate we could only hope involves severe head trauma and a severed spinal cord. Then, the other tower also explodes in a big fiery ball that is visible from space, presumably incinerating Delita, Rinoa, and Golagros. Even though we already know Delita survived the blast to go on and become a successful Princess-napper. Whatever.
Aaand, here’s where we end Part 2. Next time, we’ll spend a few moments reviewing the events directly after the Exploding Fort before finally advancing to Chapter Two. Until then, I’ll be reading the Oxford Dictionary, cover to cover. The linguistics center of my brain needs some serious detox. Ciao!