A massive nude stone angel stands sentry on top of the building before the three men, looking simultaneously completely out of place and perfectly appropriate in this universe created for teenage boys who think True Detective was, like, so deep. Is this building part of Labyrinthos? Because of course Joachim Mizrahi would put this statue here. Jin says the U.R.T.V.s are in the lowest level of this place. I’m not sure that ends up being true–the designer boys were definitely hanging out on some high-up Donkey Kong level in prior flashbacks–but whatever. Jin is ready to leave them to it–since he’s obviously got to finish decoding that MacGuffin Data, which he will surely do with great success–when he decides to stare off into the rain for what feels like an hour. Canaan and CHAOS!!! try to track whatever it is he’s looking at, until a lightning bolt splices the stone angel clean in half. Lest we believe this was any kind of coincidence–after all, lightning has been striking all over the place since it starting raining buckets of ambience–a gaunt figure with sleek fuchsia hair and crazy eyes emerges from the rubble and the rain. Why, it’s Margulis! Whatever could he be doing here? Maybe he can help find those cute boys!
It’s hard to see here, but the angel’s vagina gets blown off in a big stone chunk.
Unfortunately, Margulis doesn’t seem to be in a helping mood. Very fortunately for me, he’s making total batshit fuck-me eyes at Jin. “I gave you far too much credit, Uzuki,” he purrs. “I thought you were smarter than this. A better thief.” I imagine we are meant to believe that Jin in fact stole the MacGuffin Data from Margulis. We probably aren’t meant to believe that he fished it out of his lover’s utility kilt, strewn carelessly on the floor, while Margulis was snoring away in bed, but I don’t like being told what to think.
Really, Margulis? You’re going to make it that easy?
Anyway, Margulis is disappointed that this sexy, sexy thief would just walk right up to Labyrinthos with the goods like a dumbass. “Well, I thought you might be getting lonely, Colonel,” Jin replies, “so I figured I’d come pay you a visit.” Daaaaaaaaamn. Finally, two people in this series got the goddamn memo to make with the sexually loaded banter. And they’re neither related nor fighting over a 12-year-old girl! Maybe this won’t be so bad after all.
Margulis straight-up lies that he doesn’t care about the data Jin stole, because U-GEE is totally cool without it and he didn’t get yelled at in front of everyone, THANKS. Jin’s basically like, “My long hard sword here thinks we have some unfinished business, though,” and Margulis pulls out his own matching sword with an impassioned cry of “Uzuki!” and a flash of magical sword-fire. The boss fight is on, and Canaan is shunted to the sidelines, where he types his real-time fanfic furiously into a laptop.
I really wish CHAOS!!! would butt out of this fight as well, because he’s ruining my sad fantasy, but I’ll admit Margulis can be a bitch of a boss so CHAOS!!! is sadly necessary from a gameplay perspective. The trick to this is moving Jin or CHAOS!!! around until they are forming the bread in a meaty Margulis sandwich, and Jin can–yessssssss–strike him from behind. CHAOS!!!’s only real job is to help Jin keep the attack chain going, to heal when necessary, and to keep poor Canaan hydrated during his marathon slash-writing session. After the two of them pin Margulis to the ground and spam away, pantsless, with their break attacks, Margulis does some fancy calligraphy with his fire sword and goes into an “anti-break” stance, which makes this whole thing harder. Hee hee. Hard. But by then he’s been damaged so much that it’s only a matter of time anyway. Margulis pointlessly uses more sword magic to collapse some a few buildings around them before doubling over, panting and exhausted. Nice.
He might need to buy some ointment for that.
A cutscene picks up where the boss battle left off. CHAOS!!! and Canaan run after Jin and Margulis, and watch helplessly as the dueling swordsmen/lovers hop up to the rooftop. From the ground all the two Cs can see are sparks flying from their swords, or from their electric sexual chemistry. Obviously I have my opinions on which it is. But the game has to go and disappoint me by switching to a direct, and admittedly awesomely choreographed, view of Margulis and Jin’s sword fight. They’re matching each other blow for blow (heeeeeee) but Margulis seems to have a slight edge, as Jin is resorting to a lot of acrobatic hopping and parkour bullshit to stay ahead of the swipes of Margulis’s fire sword. (If it wasn’t obvious from his earlier ice dance routine with CHAOS!!!, Jin’s blade is enchanted with ice. Is it hot in here? It feels hot in here.)
Uhhhh…I’ll be in my bunk.
The action is so hot and heavy fast and furious that I can barely get a freaking screencap of them touching swords in an erotic fashion. At one point Margulis slices a concrete column in half. And somewhere in there he kicks Jin right in the stomach, causing me to shout out, “BUT THE BABY!!!” I have issues. They’re having such a marathon sparring session that CHAOS!!! and Canaan even have time to get up to the roof themselves, just in time for a break in the action so Margulis can do a little more evil monologuing. He tells his, I imagine, ex-boyfriend, “You’re a sad sight, Uzuki, even with your so-called reinforcements.” I’m not sure at what point Jin referred to the Cs as reinforcements, but whatever. Margulis has never been one for sacrificing narrative pizzazz for accuracy. As Margulis is gloating, CHAOS!!! realizes that Jin is hurt, and indeed we can now see a large bloody patch on the left side of his uniform. Jin insists it’s from “earlier,” because even now he can’t give Margulis the satisfaction. And even if he does admit who gave it to him, he has to add, “If you’ll pardon the cliché, it’s just a scratch.” These two have a lot of issues to work out. Naked. On a bearskin rug.
Shion has to be adopted.
Everyone stands around uselessly for a moment as the ground shakes. Margulis makes this completely unsurprised “Hmph” noise before letting Jin know that he, like Miltia itself, is about to go tits up. And I’m not just saying that because I realized Jin’s uniform has nipples, like George Clooney’s Batman suit. The two of them face each other with their swords, um, extended, Margulis incredulous that Jin is still game for another go-round, “maimed as you are.” Rowr. But Jin won’t back down, so Margulis begins summoning a ball of fire in his non-sword hand. In response, Jin forms a ball of ice around his blade. He’s injured and needs the swelling to go down, after all. The two magic balls–wow–launch at the same time, and as the choir in the background reaches a crescendo, and right as I expect the balls to collide in midair, they actually sail past each other and both Jin and Margulis explode, screaming in a masculine fashion, in a white ball of light. When CHAOS!!! and Canaan can see again, it’s just in time to watch Jin collapse to the ground. Margulis is still standing, but has a bloody gash across the right side of his face that will obviously leave him with the eye scar he sports 14 years later.
‘They said 50 Shades of Grey wasn’t a safe depiction of BDSM. We should have listened. WE SHOULD HAVE LISTENED!’
As CHAOS!!! helps Jin to his feet, Margulis decides he isn’t quite done gloating yet. Man, I know it’s tempting to rub it in your ex’s face–ahem–but get a hold of yourself. He’s in the middle of mentioning “that old fool” who never realized how much better Margulis was than Jin–an old fool who is, in fact, Jin’s grandfather, so I can’t imagine why Margulis finds that surprising–when Jin raises his chin with a look of unmistakable satisfaction, and the roof collapses under Margulis’s feet. Our three protagonists leap out of the way and let Margulis fall into the dark, abandoned parking garage below. Where he totally dies! Why even bother to verify?
Jin does at least seem to learn a lesson from his sexy encounter with Margulis. He hands the drive with the MacGuffin Data to Canaan, who transfers it into his hard drive brain or whatever, and then he tosses the drive into the night. “Storing it with you is safer than carrying it around,” Jin understates. “Besides, there’s somewhere else I must go.” We won’t find out until the third game where Jin is going, but spoiler alert: it is a waste of his time and will make us all sad. CHAOS!!! tries to convince him to get off-planet with them, but Jin won’t be dissuaded. “This is my own way of atonement,” he says. Boy howdy. He instead implores them to escape themselves and use the MacGuffin Data to let everyone know “the truth of this conflict.” Clearly CHAOS!!! and Canaan are wildly unsuccessful in this mission, since nobody 14 years later seems to know jack shit about the true roots of the Miltian Conflict. Nice job, dudes. Clutching his side and clearly in a lot of pain, Jin leaps away.
Approximately two seconds later, CHAOS!!! and Canaan see an opaque black cloud emerge from the vague direction of Labyrinthos and slowly start to engulf the entire city. Ehrmagerd. It’s UUUUUUUUUUUU-DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. As it closes over them, we get an Extreme Close-Up on Canaan as he feels its effects and, whatever nonsense Wilhelm told Mace Windu, starts to go cuckoo bananas. And on that cheerful note, the flashback ends and I am prompted to save. Next time, we’ll catch up with everybody in the present. I’m sure they’ll all be just as we remember them, too!