neko’s thinkbox

Uhhh… What an awkward view. Very honestly, I wouldn’t want to die burnt. Anything is fine but fire… That’s why most of my nightmares revolve in and around volcanoes. But I digress. Anyway, since I missed out on these two episodes and since they are linked anyway, I decided to summarize both of them. And, of course, don’t read any more if you don’t want the story to be spoiled. Nevertheless, I will say that these episodes have some kind of fiery atmosphere, and as always our beloved guys from Section III are investigating matters. I say, this is HOT!!!

Click here to read Episode 15 Summary
Click here to proceed to the thinkbox

Episode 14 - The Flame Is Still Burning

After the war, many people who lost their home took refuge in a sewage network that belongs to the Mione waterworks company. Section III is to bring these people out of those dark sewers to relocate them to public farms where they could finally make a living.

At the same time, some cheeky officers working under Mione are harassing a young woman to pay her so-called “rent” and threaten to rape her. As the leader of those bullies, Metz, reaches out to touch the woman, Oreld beats him to it and gropes her first, like the gentleman he is. Just before Metz starts a conflict with Oreld, Alice jumps in and announces to the war refugees that they can now get out of their hole.

Although most of the people welcome this good news and immediately prepare to move out, a minority still wants to stay in that lugubrious place. The reason why is soon uncovered: Thanks to Mercury’s playfulness, Metz falls over and some tiny envelopes slip out of his uniform pocket. And those envelopes contain a white powder called “Himmel” (German for “Heaven”), obviously a drug.

The dealers are arrested and Metz is interrogated by Alice, who uses some quite powerful questioning methods. In the meantime, Captain Hunks is getting scolded once again by Major Connery because of the trouble they are causing. Hunks justifies his section’s actions as war relief, and drugs definitely have no reason to be sold, especially to poor people. As they speak, the owner and president of Mione Waterworks, Albert Mione himself, enters the room and redeems his imprisoned subordinates.

While it would be illicit for Section III to conduct investigation for such misdemeanor, it is not the case when catching them offenders red-handed. Alice and Co. set off to the sewage and arrest the same drug dealers once again. And once more, President Mione bails them out. This vicious circle goes on and on, much to Mione’s discontent: in reality, it is Mione himself who makes his inferiors sell the “Himmel” drug, which is why he always pays to get them out of jail. As he states a decrease in drug customers, he decides to take it out on Section III: he gives his officers some brand-new automatic rifle guns that use the same automatic reloading technique as that one tank in Episode 2, and on top of that he also decides to release Hans, a weird person shrouded in some sort of bullet-proof diving suit armor who possesses a very lethal weapon: a flamethrower, weapon which had been banned by the Empire due to the inhuman killings it caused in the war. Paradoxically, he’s always cold… “Burning people warms my heart a bit”, he claims.

Later on, Section III, roaming around the sewage network in their all-terrain vehicle (which is a Volkswagen Schwimmwagen, in case you didn’t know), suddenly gets fired at by the drug dealers. In order to avoid casualties, our protagonists decide to break through the resistance; Orland even needs to resort to his blue lantern to intimidate the enemy - he doesn’t kill them though.
At the end of the sewage stands their next opponent, Hans. A warm welcome is awaiting Section III!

Episode 15 - Astray Choice summary:

Resuming from episode 14, Hans is burning to burn our heroes (pun intended) and creates a wall of flame (no pun intended) around them. Meanwhile, the drug dealers finally arrive and spot that weird diving suit guy. One of them even dared to get near Hans, thinking of him as an ally, but realized his mistake way too late and got burnt. The killed guy’s comrades promptly retaliate with a fusillade but nothing seems to pierce that armor. And yet another flame gushes forth the lance, killing a fair deal of people. The remaining militants manage to escape as Orland decides to face Hans.

Hans immediately recognizes Orland’s lantern and tells him they are comrades since they’re from the same section (The Invisible 9: Orland - 901 ATT; Hans - 908 HTT). But Orland refuses to believe that and convinces himself that he belongs to Section III now. At the other end of the sewage, the runaways suddenly are stuck in a dead end: a grid which previously wasn’t there blocks their way. Even worse, a huge wave surprises them from ahead and sweeps them all the way back to where the fiery action is, flooding the whole place. Everyone gets away unharmed, except Orland who couldn’t make it out of the water in time and drowns.

Orland wakes up the next day in a hospital bed. Alice who is sitting on a chair next to him tells him everyone was safe and asks him what he and Hans had been discussing about, but Orland doesn’t answer. Alice doesn’t ask further and leaves the room.
A while later, doctor Kauplan’s assistant (who claims to be Kauplan herself now) enters the room. Orland asks her about section 908 while he is being treated. She tells him that the soldiers in that section always ended up burning themselves, no matter the armor or protective suit they wore. So in order to protect them it had been decided to fill their suits with some kind of heat-insulating liquid she invented. But that was just a lie to make it easier for the soldiers to wear those suits; in reality, the protective liquid turned out to be an anesthetic, so the soldiers eventually burned themselves but since they were totally numbed, they couldn’t feel any of the pain.

At the same time, Alice, Machs and Oreld head to the sewage once again to arrest the drug dealers, but as always, they get redeemed by Mione at once. Again and again, Alice keeps arresting Metz every day, only to have him released hours after the arrest. It even goes as far that Stekkin is making coffee for Metz, while he is waiting at Section III’s office for his boss to bail him out. Of course he is free to go a few minutes later.

Sitting on a park bench at the army base, Hunks hands Major Connery an envelope containing the torn insignia of Section I’s secret investigation squad. Hunks asks Connery why they didn’t take any important measures whereas he was very well aware of the drug issue, but Connery does not respond, which raises Hunks’ suspicion. As they speak, Oreld and Machs are roaming the streets in their car as they spot the woman they saved earlier in the previous episode. Marielle is her name, and of course Oreld runs to greet her. He also compliments on her new looks, which makes her cry.

In the sewage below the city, Marielle’s father prepares to take some more of the “Himmel” drug. In that moment, Oreld throws his wallet to his feet, claiming that he will buy his daughter Marielle so the father would have enough money to pay for the drugs. To emphasize his point, he fumbles with Marielle and tries to undress her. Of course, it’s all part of Oreld’s plan, to make Marielle’s father realize that he shouldn’t give in to the drugs and prioritize them over his own daughter. But Marielle herself is not aware of his intentions and thus offers violent resistance. The other refugees just stand around and watch powerlessly how Oreld is trying to rape a defenseless woman.

Seeing that Oreld’s efforts aren’t having an immediate impact on the people, Machs kicks in and hesitantly demands to have some fun as well… but he really is not convincing at all. In return, he makes up for his blooper and provokes the people by making fun of their poverty. The last straw takes place as Oreld is about to “eat” Marielle up, and finally her father acts up and punches Oreld, causing a general revolt among the locals.

Although Machs and Oreld get beaten up badly, they have fulfilled their goal: they ignited everyone’s will to work and to survive, and, most important, to renounce drugs. And Metz, who has been eavesdropping all along behind a corner, suddenly realizes the misery and the cruelty that those people have to endure, and that he cannot sell the drugs to those people anymore. He immediately heads off to report to Mione, but his boss isn’t in the office. Yet, in the back of the room, a half-opened door which leads to a dark stairway triggers Metz’s curiosity. And at the end of the stairway lies a room where the 908 soldier is sitting in front of a fireplace.

Back to Section III. Captain Hawks and Alice contemplate poor Oreld and Machs who are in a pretty worn-out condition, and in the same moment, Metz comes around to confess about the drug dealing affairs and how he was used by his boss. He also gives out precious information about the weekly transactions between Mione and the main dealer who supplies him with drugs. Since the next transaction already takes place in the evening, Alice promptly decides to interfere with Mione’s affairs and to finally arrest him. Captain Hunks agrees, but needs Oreld to stay at the army base to find more information about Section I since he apparently has a personal acquaintance there.

In a dark place, Mione and Hans are meeting a very mysterious figure. Mione says “We are all under the Silver Wheel.”
What is the “Silver Wheel”? Who is that shady person? Next episode, the Slayer!

Thinkbox mode: on

Whew. When I first heard what Hans said in episode 14, “burning people warms my heart a bit”, I directly thought of a friend’s quote, “Give a man a fire, he’ll be warm for a night. Set a man on fire, he’ll be warm for the rest of his life.” Well, scrap that. I enjoy central heating thank you very much. Now, what stunned me this time was Machs’ behavior. The more I watch him, the more he fails. In ep 13, he gets a loli’s kiss, that bastard. Now, he’s getting it on with Marielle??? Well, he did fail his attempt to impress the people though, unlike Oreld. Man, Oreld definitely is the way to go. That guy’s really got the guts it takes to be in Section III, hands down. Too bad he’s a womanizer, he mistreated cute Marielle nevertheless. I will not forgive him.

So, after all those 1-episode stories (which somehow have the aftertaste of filler eps), we now have a continuous plot that stretches across 3 episodes at least! And this time it turns out to be quite interesting. I never would have imagined Alice and the others chasing after drug dealers. More than that, out of a single case they were able to track back the origin of the drugs, and perhaps they will uncover a drug dealing network very soon. Although the proportions don’t match, it still reminds me of the big lines in the news: “over 9000 packs of cocaine found” “drug dealer network annihilated” etc. I find it quite interesting that an anime unrelated to that topic condemns the use of drugs, and shows the watchers in a simple manner that they really are not worth it. They might only make you as miserable as the poor people living down there in the sewage. And dealers will only end up in jail (if the police were as persistent as Alice…)

We found the moral of the side story, now, what is the relation between Hans and Mione? We know that Hans is part of “the Invisible 9”, but why is he following Mione’s orders? And Orland sure was surprised to see him. I wonder what he was thinking after hearing the details from Kauplan’s assistant. He might probably want to free the numb 908 soldier from his pain next time they meet… ah wait, he doesn’t feel anything. Only that it’s cold. But other than that, I hope there will be more of those “Invisible 9” appearing in future. Needs moar action. Last thought before going crazy after all this text, I really wonder what’s up with that “Silver Wheel” Mione is talking about in the end… My guess is that it’s a hidden organization doing more obscure crimes than only dealing with drugs. Wait, now that I think of it… Kauplan’s assistant has silver hair…… Could she be related to that?? And that man at the end of ep 15, looks like that one guy from the opening… You know, that one Baron, Alice’s fiancé. Masaka…?!? Oh lawds, the drama. Anything is possible.

Winamp is currently playing “She’s On Fire” by Amy Holland (yay for GTA 3 music). I guess that’s a good conclusion to today’s work. Keep genki, and remember what your mama always told you: Do never play with fire!