A few minutes later Shion gets an email from Grimace, which contains the picture he took of his new friend. Except that picture is of Shion, not of Jailbait. Oh, how lame. And creepy: Grimace points out in the email that there is a weird “ghost” in the photo, which turns out to be Corey’s head floating in the corner, leering at Shion. “It seems like this ghost is really fond of you, Shion,” Grimace points out. So fond that he…died, dismembered his ghostly head from his ghostly body, and floated as the head to Shion’s location, just to look at her. Let’s just say I’m glad we can’t see what the body is doing.
Eek!
And that reminds me, it’s long past time that Shion went back to the Elsa to help Corey work on their adopted robot daughter. Once Corey is satisfied that Shion got plenty of action rest, they head down to the hangar to start maintenance.
But we will leave them to it for now, as we cut to the Asteroid Pleroma, which, I just realized, has random glyphs and religious symbols orbiting around it. Sigh. It’s like the asteroid has been branded with a tramp stamp. Inside U-GEE headquarters, Margulis is being inundated with technobabble via videophone by a fat guy with pink hair and tiny sunglasses. The gist of it, per Margulis, is that it is impossible to “open the door to Lost Jerusalem.” And the doors and the opening of them again. I need a moratorium on videogames with door metaphors. I am reaching my limit.
Shoot me!
Margulis isn’t thrilled about this, but his friend, the result of playing “If They Mated” with Pink and Marlon Brando, chides him for ignoring his previous warnings about this, and for thinking the Fake Golden Penis Plates would be sufficient to find and open the door. He also whines about how he’s done the best with what he has, and says, “Even Mizrahi couldn’t pull this off without the Original.” Those of you with Joachim Mizrahi Bingo Cards might want to pull them out, as the mention of the name gets a typical reaction out of Margulis, who asks, “So, have you finally come to acknowledge that lunatic’s work?” Ah, “lunatic”! B-5! The other man merely admits that Mizrahi was the best in “this field,” whatever this field is. Galactic supervillainy? Plot wizardry?
Margulis, meanwhile, does not want to disappoint their commander, and decides to proceed with “Plan 401.” For the nth time, no, I have no idea, either. The other man thinks that’s a bit much, but goes on to talk about MOMO at length–I have to assume that means she’s involved in this plan–including the fact that she has all of Mizrahi’s research, as well as some top-secret access codes to reach Old Miltia, stored on her pink, Sanrio-brand hard drive. “Treat it too roughly,” the man says, “and you’ll lose everything.” Also, you may want to keep her away from magnets.
Margulis replies to all this, “I’m well aware of the importance of spaying and neutering my pets. That’s why I’m using him.” Yes, Margulis is referring to Albedo here, but let’s just assume, for the sake of my Margulis Mad Libs, that he means Bob Barker. The man replies, “I do not like him. His eyes share the same look as Mizrahi’s.” I will say that Bob Barker does get a bit wild-eyed, especially when he’s leering at the Barker’s Beauties. Margulis retorts, “The same look as yours?” Wonderbra, next to him, snaps her fingers, all, “I know you di’n’t!” The man has no comeback to this, so he simply says he’ll be waiting for news and ends the communication. Take that, fatty! You’ve got Bob Barker eyes!
The second the other man is gone, Margulis asks Wonderbra to get his boss on the line. “I want to report this and discuss our plans for landing the job to replace Barker on The Price Is Right.” Margulis, or Drew Carey? Tough call.
Out in Space!, Albedo is in his A.G.W.S., chatting with Margulis. Margulis warns Albedo not to interfere for now (interfere with what, I don’t know), as things are going according to plan. But he is worried that the Federation and the Kukai Foundation will not just hand MOMO back to them. You think? “If the situation warrants, we may have to use…the Song of Nephilim [!],” Margulis says. Albedo raises his sculpted eyebrows. “Now this is a surprise,” he says. “I thought you hated it with a passion.” Margulis replies, “I’m just saying, even your toys have their uses.” It would be so like Albedo to have a sex toy with a name like that. Margulis even says he isn’t into Albedo’s “perverse taste in hobbies” when Albedo offers to let him have some fun with the Song of Nephilim too. It’s probably a dildo modeled after CHAOS!!!’s wang.
Albedo laughs at Margulis, calls him a “gutless bastard,” and ends the communication, to go bugger himself with the Song of Nephilim, I’m sure. Wonderbra frowns at where his face was a moment before. “Albedo…a U.R.T.V. A monster born of Life Recycling,” she exposits for us. Since the recently deceased Jerkinov was also not right in the head, also thanks to the Life Recycling Act, Wonderbra is concerned that Albedo will similarly screw something up and get them all in trouble. Margulis is unconcerned, since he knows Albedo just wants to play Hide the Durandick with MOMO, and wouldn’t jeopardize his chance to do so. Wonderbra asks if he’s really considering using the Song of Nephilim. “[Wonderbra]…have you ever heard it?” he asks. “That song…draws everything unto madness…” Did he just use “unto” in spoken conversation? Shut up, Margulis.
And now we return to the light fixture in space that is the Kukai Foundation. Shion and Corey are, natch, watching KOS-MOS as she sleeps. Instead of, oh, I don’t know, doing any work, Shion is wallowing in her emo feelings about returning home to Second Miltia. She begs it off as “nothing” when Corey shows her his Concerned Face for what feels like the eighteenth time in ten minutes. Ass in full Waggle Mode, Shion struts over to a control panel on the wall and hits a button adjusting KOS-MOS’s something-or-other, which KOS-MOS responds is “fine.” Shion keeps hitting buttons–having no idea what they do–while Corey laments his lack of insight into Shion’s crazy, spacious brain.
You’re telling me!
We get a brief shot of Chesty and Busty directing the Durandick from the Kukai Foundation into Second Miltia airspace before joining MOMO, walking down one of the ship’s lengthy, masculine corridors. Jailbait calls out to her from down the hall. “We’ll be going our separate ways once we get to Second Miltia, right?” he asks. MOMO’s like, “Yeah, kid I barely know, and?” Well, for whatever reason, Jailbait has developed some tender feelings for her, and wants to give her something to remember him by. He says he doesn’t know if Realians “believe in good luck charms,” but he has one for her, even if her cold robotic brain doesn’t understand its lucky properties. He holds it out in his palm, showing us and MOMO that it’s a bullet. “It’s so pretty!” MOMO enthuses, because she’s like that. “Look, it’s got a good luck phrase on it!” Jailbait tells her, and reads it to her: “Sayonara, baby!” Right now, one side of my brain is saying, “What the hell is that? That’s not a good luck phrase. That makes no sense.” The other side, the one that pretty much takes command and leaves me vacant and drooling whenever Jailbait is onscreen, is saying, “Ohmigod, isn’t he darling?”
MOMO demonstrates my facial expression during Jailbait scenes.
MOMO, being MOMO, is just delighted by this gift, and is even more smitten when Jailbait uses some magical mojo to attach the bullet to a fine gold chain. He holds out the finished product, a bracelet, for MOMO to try on. Both of them are just aglow, and it’s adorable. I’m sorry, the snark is trying to come out, but Jailbait and MOMO in the same scene is like watching puppies gamboling around on a pile of teddy bears. It’s just too much.
Meanwhile, several phallic Federation ships are closing in on the Durandick and the Kukai Foundation. Chesty, intrigued, wonders if they’re going to get a special escort to Second Miltia today. Busty, who is not retarded like her sister, realizes that the ships are forming a blockade. As one of the ships opens fire–great–Busty cries, “This is no welcome!” Thanks for clearing that up.
MOMO and Jailbait, still having a Moment in the corridor, are knocked into each other by the force of the blast. We see power failures in Ziggy’s room, KOS-MOS’s room, and the bridge. A squeaky Realian informs us that the ship and the Kukai Foundation have been surrounded.
For a long-winded explanation on the reasons for this siege, we turn to Fifth Jerusalem and the cavernous chambers of the Federation Parliament. It is unclear to me why any of these Galactic Senators even need to be in this large meeting room, because they all just use their space-age videoconference technology to communicate, even within the same room. But this chamber does look just like the Senate chambers from the new Star Wars trilogy, and it has been a whole hour since the game designers ripped off George Lucas. So there’s that.
On a larger screen, a video is playing for the benefit of the Galactic Senators, showing the Durandick blowing up the Hoglinde with its powerful laser beams. We know, because we had the “benefit” of witnessing this stuff, that this is a doctored version of the Durandick blowing up the U-GEE mothership. Some Senator is saying that this is an act of aggression toward the Federation by the funders of the Kukai Foundation: that is, Second Miltia. Ergo, the Senator moves to remove Second Miltia’s right to autonomy. Some other douchebags weigh in, mostly to whine that the Kukai Foundation should have been reined in long ago and that they, the Federation, should have control over all the Golden Penis Plates. As usual, it comes down to people fighting and arguing because they want everyone to think they have the biggest dick.
Nice Larry Bird mustache.
There’s a whole load of unimportant exposition about the origin of the Kukai Foundation that I’m not going to bother repeating, because I don’t care and I bet you don’t either. Blah blah disarmament, yadda yadda Gnosis. The only interesting point made in this entire political exchange is one Senator claiming that another is “jus jellus” because his planet hadn’t gotten the same cushy post-war treatment that Second Miltia received. Oh snap! I hope someone compares Gaignun and Jailbait to the Nazis next!
After some more bleating, someone requests a statement from the Jedi Council, and on command Dr. Yuri Mizrahi appears on the main screen. She’s all, “I moved the Lolita to Second Miltia like you assholes told me to, step off.” In response to this, one Senator says, “But I wonder…? Have you forgotten that it was Miltia that produced the lunatic that summoned the Gnosis and tried to destroy the Federation?” One of these days, when I’m feeling suicidal, I’m going to write up a Xenosaga Drinking Game, and the word “lunatic” is going to figure into it very, very prominently. Dr. Yuri, who looks like she needs a good stiff drink herself, basically replies, “Yeah, I did totally forget about that. You’re only talking about my dead husband and all. Nimrods.”
There’s a lot of “Robble! Robble robble!” until the head of the Senate shuts them all up, because he’s got Mace Windu on the line to speak with them on behalf of Second Miltia. But instead of getting to hear what he has to say, we cut to the bridge of the Durandick, where all the important characters are listening to an announcement regarding their fate. There’s a lot of penal code numbers that amount to the Kukai Foundation housing traitors and terrorists or some damn thing. Essentially, they’re all under arrest and none of them have any idea why, until Chesty pulls up a news feed with the doctored Durandick-Hoglinde video. After watching the clip, Gaignun says, “Even I’m starting to think we did it.” Hee.
Busty brings the slow people present, Shion, up to speed: given that the only way there could be available footage of that attack would be if the U-GEE Organization had recorded it, this is proof that U-GEE is in cahoots with someone in the Federation government. Shion, her resemblance to a grotesque bobblehead doll growing with each passing minute, insists that she and Corey, as witnesses, could provide testimony proving this footage to be false. Gaignun points out that they’ll just be labeled as conspirators. Anyone who knows them would doubt that Shion and Corey are clever enough to help conspire in anything, but that’s beside the point. The point being that they are all more screwed than Shion at the Vector Christmas party.
A few moments later, a woman from Flowers By Irene the Federation Bureau of Intelligence, named Captain Lapis Roman, shows up with some military policemen to place them all under arrest. The Captain takes Shion and Corey as witnesses and tells them all their Vector property, including KOS-MOS, has been seized. Oh, and they’re taking MOMO too. Jailbait, ever the gallant soul, struggles against his captor when he sees a policeman manhandling his lady love, but he gets clubbed in the head for his trouble. It’s pretty bad when this scene is mostly talking heads, like every other scene in this game, but it feels more exciting because there’s dramatic music and Jailbait got hit with the butt of a gun.