Out of the battle screen, Nash is unconscious on the floor, and no longer in the Magic Wand Suit. In fact, the suit is nowhere to be found. Maybe it shattered into pieces and then the pieces flew off to some closet, like Iron Man. Taben sighs that its performance was “disappointing,” though maybe he’s referring to Nash. If you know what I mean. His penis. “Enough of the games, though,” he goes on. “The time is at hand for the main event! The unveiling of my life’s work…the GRINDERY! Bah hahahahahahaha…” Maybe my settings have been permanently recalibrated after all these years of caps and punctuation murder, but that is a really low-energy laugh. Sad! Taben hobbles off so our heroes have someone to follow, but for the moment they’re still concerned with Nash. Or…Mia is. And Alex, I guess.
Nash sits upright and stammers for a moment. “Say something stupid, Nash…” Kyle growls. “Give me a reason to slap you silly, you mentally castrated nincompoop!” Again with the vivid imagery. Kyle’s been on a roll today. Nash just looks sad and keeps his mouth shut, which is the only valid play left to him, and it seems to mollify Kyle into taking his erstwhile soulmate back. Even Jess seems conciliatory: “I think Nash knows what he did was stupid. I mean, REALLY stupid… And if Mia didn’t slap some sense into him, nothing will! I…forgive you, Nash.” Whew! I was worried she wouldn’t be able to tone it down to her usual simmering hostility toward him. Crisis averted. Squeak, meanwhile, has to ask Alex if he’s forgiven Nash as well. (Nobody asks Mia if she’s cool, even though she has the most reason to feel personally betrayed. Obviously she’ll just bend over and forgive him, because LOVE!) Alex, obviously, forgives the first friend he ever made from outside his podunk hometown. Aww!
Alex, more practically, points out that turning down any help in the battle against Ghaleon would be hella dumb. Which reminds Nash of the dude who just scampered out of there: “Taben wasn’t lying about the Grindery…it’s an armored castle that moves! In fact, it’s very nearly complete! And, once it starts moving, it can’t be stopped…so we mustn’t waste any time!” Oh, you mean like you’ve been doing for the last five minutes? Whenever you’re all ready, then. Does anyone need a quick breather? Maybe y’all should down a Clif Bar and some Gatorade?
“What?! A moving castle?” Kyle asks. “I think you’re still dizzy from that slap Mia gave you!” This totally seems like the time for skepticism. Nash wails that it’s true, which they would see if they’d only haul ass to “the activation room.” I guess that’s where Ghaleon ferments his homemade yogurt.
Alex steers his whole-again conga line up the steps, through a door at the back of the platform, and down a hallway. It leads outside, where the kids come face to face with Ghaleon, Taben at his side, across a metal gangplank. Ghaleon congratulates Alex on making it out to his coming-out housewarming party, and adds, “And you even stole the title of dragonboy!” Ghaleon, YOU WERE THERE. He literally became the Dragonmaster in front of you. Why is everyone forgetting this? Did I hit my head, or was it all of them? But, Ghaleon says, they are too late to stop him, despite Kyle’s protestations. Alex, of course, absorbs none of this and only demands to know where Gams is. “Resting peacefully in a slumber of my design…” Ghaleon replies, “but I shall awaken her soon.” A slumber of his design? The fuck does that even mean? Did he handcraft her guest bed out of Vile Tribe miner bones? Or are we straight-up talking roofies?
OHHHH NOOOOOO
Alex figures it’s probably the roofies and charges the Magic Emperor, only to be stopped in his tracks by a purple force blast from Ghaleon’s hand. “Tsk. Tsk. Apparently our little hero isn’t a patron of the theatre,” Ghaleon says. Ugh. He’s so European, that’s how you know he’s evil! “This isn’t the time for our final confrontation, dragonboy!” he goes on. Well, yeah. For starters, this platform is nowhere near big enough for a final boss fight. “As any dullard with an ounce of culture knows, that time is reserved for the third act! Your amusing little trials and tribulations just brought our second act to a close.” I’m all for the occasional, winking sledgehammer shot to the fourth wall, but take it down like five notches, Ghaleon. Jesus.
But Ghaleon apparently needed to chew the scenery for an hour to buy Taben some time, as he now barks at him to get this show on the road. “Yes, Magic Emperor!” Taben replies. “The Grindery is operational. How lucky you are, human! You survived the journey to the Frontier and the attacks of my magical weapons… And now you’re alive to witness the most important event in the history of the world!” Speaking of taking it down several notches. As Nash wails that they’re too late, Taben rattles through his technobabble checklist and activates “THE GRINDERY!!” To my great disappointment, the edifice does not suddenly blaze with neon lights, and human cages filled with erotic dancers do not descend from the rafters.
Someone got my recap style guide memo!
Instead, the whole of Ruid begins to shake. Ghaleon swans out of there, Taben in tow, as the gangplank pulls away from his side of the chasm, and that chasm starts to widen. Alex looks like he’s about to jump for it, since he’s dumb and supposedly loves Gams and stuff, but Kyle convinces him that they should live to fight another day. And sure enough, in the ensuing anime cutscene, the whole area is still quaking like it’s about to be leveled to the ground. Amid the green light of Ruid (boy, did it not look like that at all in-game, but whatever!) explosions of red light pop all over the base of THE GRINDERY’S structure. Pipes burst, load-bearing towers crumble, and all that is left standing in the darkness is the phallic tower. But then! Its roving spotlights turn on again and wave crazily around, as if to announce, “Hey! Super intimidating penis on the move!” as THE GRINDERY’S tank treads slowly grind forward and carry Ghaleon’s surrogate hog out of the crater and toward civilization. Still no dancers in cages, but he’s got time to make improvements.
Back in the hallway, which is somehow perfectly intact, Kyle no longer doubts Nash’s words, and even says, “By the Goddess…” like he just discovered religion in this exact moment. “We’re dead…” Nash breathes, “we’re all dead.” Probably! But these hot teens don’t give up that easily. Mia is sensibly terrified of what would happen if THE GRINDERY attacked a town, while Squeak just blurts out, “They’ve got [Gams] in there, Alex! We HAVE to stop it!” It’s probably the safest place she could be right now, dipshit! Fuck Gams, she’ll be fine!
*pinches bridge of nose to stave off migraine*
Once the party has filled in Nash–who doesn’t know how they’ll escape the Frontier–on the fact that they will be able to follow THE GRINDERY in the same airship they flew here in the first place (seriously, Nash, get your head in the game), the party speeds out of Ruid, which, again, is completely intact and shows absolutely no signs of the damage THE GRINDERY just caused by leaving. The only thing that’s different from when the group came in is that the front door is now open. I guess Taben unlocked it on the way out. That was nice!
Out on the world map, THE GRINDERY has left one major quality-of-life change: its treads ran right over the lip of the larger crater surrounding it and Cadin, so Alex and Pals can hike right over it and do not have to traverse the entire fucking mine again. They do, however, re-enter Talon anyway and backtrack to the room in the mines where they rescued Grape Goblin. (Somehow I memorized enough of its layout after getting lost repeatedly the first time that I manage this without any problem. Go fucking figure.) All of the monsters have respawned, but such is life when you’re a young Dragonmaster on the hunt for softcore pinups of your worst enemies, am I right? As such, the teens talk to a Vile Tribe NPC I didn’t mention before, because he had nothing of interest to say. Now, he’s a little more willing to chat. “I’ve always hated humans, even though I didn’t know anything about them except what I was told,” he says. “Now I want to learn more about humans and their ways of life…” THE MORE YOU KNOOOOOOOW. But I hope he doesn’t learn from these humans. He might pick up some less-than-optimal lessons, like “Show someone you love them by fighting with them constantly!” and “If you want to break the ice, try a Courtney Love joke!” This guy, and all his newly woke friends, deserve better. He adds, “We must learn more about humans and the Goddess Althena…[Xeboobia]’s words were all lies. I have no need for this picture any longer. Here, take it.” And he hands over Xeboobia’s Bromide. I feel like this should go in Jessica’s inventory, just to piss her off. Like she needs my help there.
That cat looks like it just woke up and has no idea how it got here.
Since all the Slag Sisters’ bromides feature animals–like the best senior pictures–Xeboobia’s is subtitled, “Cat Scratch Fever.” I just thought about the lyrics and somehow became even more grossed out by this reference. Thanks, Working Designs. Anyway, she’s reclining in prime photo-taking position (keep that chin up and boobs thrust out, sister) atop two snowy leopards, holding a glass of red wine. That is the least casual thing one could possibly be doing in a casual portrait. I mean, what if she spills the wine on their fur? That’s not going to come out easily!
This super-important errand taken care of, it’s now time to follow THE GRINDERY back to the non-shitty part of the moon, and stop Ghaleon once and for all. What even is Ghaleon’s plan? And whatever it is, how could these kids have a prayer of doing anything about it? These are questions for our next installment, in which Mia becomes a badass and we have an epic showdown between penis buildings. See you in part 13!