The Red Rose
-Alexandrian airship. Brahne aboard.
-Brahne now has Dark Matter (was that the gem from the harp?) and the power to summon eidolons. Well. I’m sure she’ll use that power responsibly and not just summon Bahamut to attack her enemies.
-Test time. She summons Odin.
-Cinematic.
-The deep purple orb in her hands shimmers, and a fiery explosion opens up in the sky, lancing a beam of fire down onto the Cleyra tree below.
-HOLY SHIT ODIN LOOKS AMAAAAAAZZING
-NOOOOO DUDE NOOOOO
-HE LAUNCHES A FIERY LANCE DOWN ON THE CLEYRA SETTLEMENT THAT DESTROYS THE TOWN
-Then rides off through the sky towards whatever dimension he lives in when not forced into our world.
-Brahne has a look of pure delight. She’s the WOOOORST.
-OK JUST SAYING IF QUINA DIED IN THAT EXPLOSION I WILL
PUNCH
EVERYTHINGGGGG
My hand will hurt a lot and I don’t care because
I WILL PUNCH EVERYTHING IN MY UNBRIDLED RAGE
-Freya is devastated. She keeps seeing her people destroyed.
-The party hides behind some stairs as they watch Beatrix walking across the ship.
-loving the piano music right now.
-Now this is interesting. One of her soldiers praises her as so clearly about Steiner’s Knights of Pluto, but she doesn’t want to hear it. Some regret?
BEATRIX: “That was ridiculous. My troops would’ve been more than enough to take Cleyra.”
Definitely. Brahne did not engage in anything remotely like proportional warfare. Though it’s hard to say if this is a moral objection to Brahne’s overkill or one that’s protective of her role, not wanting to be phased out.
-Sounds like it’s the latter. She doesn’t want to “take a backseat to anyone,” and my guess is that as the black mages and eidolons rise in stature, so rises Kuja.
-It’s even possible that we could reach the point where Beatrix teams up with us against Kuja, at least temporarily. That’d be AWESOME. It’s also far from guaranteed, but the seeds are possibly being planted here.
-!!!!
She may embark on a similar journey to the one Steiner is dealing with. The limits and precise responsibilities of duty.
-We get control of our party back and move up towards where Brahne might be.
-Beatrix approaches Brahne as we spy from above.
-Brahne asks if Beatrix brought the item. I guess this means that the Dark Matter is something different from the harp gem. Something perhaps that was already in her family, or something Kuja gave her. So what’s the harp gem for?
-Brahne: “With this, I can finally…! No, I need one more.”
So whatever she’s trying to do, this gem is part of a set.
-Actually, speaking of moral journeys, Beatrix reminds me a bit more of someone other than Steiner. Someone from a past game. Cecil. Still very much to be seen whether she continues down a similar path beyond the initial doubts.
-And again, Beatrix’s doubts are more grounded in dissatisfaction with how she’s treated than moral objections to the orders themselves.
-Beatrix is sent after the last jewel and agrees to be on her way.
-Beatrix asks after Garnet. Brahne replies that all the eidolons are extracted and so Garnet will be executed for the crime of stealing the jewel. (AHA! Maybe that pendant she wore was the Dark Matter.)
-Now THIS is something that Beatrix almost verbally objects to. What attachment does she have to Garnet? Or perhaps her loyalty is to the royal family – ALL of them, not just Brahne, and this might nettle that loyalty in a way that the slaughter of a foreign nation didn’t.
-Back with the party members aboard the ship who saw that. Zidane is enraged. How do they reach Alexandria before Brahne?
-Vivi leads the group down to the portal pots (hee! Portal-potties. I clearly have the sense of humor of a 12 year old. )
-Moogle sighting before we leave! Serino is aboard the ship. We give her Mopli’s letter expressing Mopli’s worry that they won’t make it out alive, despite Stiltzkin’s protestations. Oh lord. I hope they survived.
-Serino gives us a letter for Moodon. My notes tell me that Moodon was the moogle in the Lindblum inn.
-Into the pods. They warp us away. Nice thinking, Vivi.
---
Alexandria
-Steiner and Marcus in the cage, plotting escape.
-Success! They rock the hanging cage enough that it crashes into the side.
-I’ve written pretty extensively in FFVIII about my dislike of timers. What FFIX does is much more elegant.
This is a situation where we escaped from prison, so they want to add an incentive for us to hurry our asses out of here. Fine! It fits. But instead of a timer (ugh), they include a softer ticking clock in the form of a steady stream of Alexandrian soldiers chasing after us. We can dawdle and explore, and I do a bit, but the soldiers provide an incentive to get moving.
-I equipped Steiner with the Man-Eater passive ability, which lets him one-shot the soldiers and frees Marcus up to steal.
-We reach the exit. Marcus leaves to head for the Evil Forest, and quite conveniently the other three party members port in exactly here and now from the Red Rose.
-Zidane tries to tell “Rusty” (lol) to hurry up, and he gets mad. Vivi tells him the same thing, confirms that Brahne plans to execute Dagger, and you can almost hear Steiner’s loyal heart break.
-….ok. FFIX. Look. We need to talk.
I just got finished praising you for finding an alternative way to inspire the feeling of haste without using a timer.
And then you bust out a timer like two minutes later.
-I’m not mad, just disappointed. 30 minutes to save Dagger.
---
Next time: Dagger on the clock.
