Xam’d: Lost Memories ep 2: “Blackout on Sentan Island”

It’s time for the episode 2 of Xam’d, which brings us epicness with the BONES seal of quality. Akiyuki shows his skills at taming Pokemaws, we have more Nakiami Moeness and someone is Falcon Punched in the gonads. Really, nutsack boxing…I squirm each time I see it.

The Birth of Xam’d

We start with a small recap of the last scenes of episode one: Akiyuki tries to save the albino girl but gets transformed into a humanoid creature called Xam’d. Oh, and a soldier nearby makes target practice with his head in front of a shocked Haru.

The Northern Government (let’s shorten it to NG) ships start their bombardment but their payload isn’t typical bombs. Instead, they drop huge organical…er….hmmm…well, they are huge organical pods, so to speak, dropped all around town. And they start to steam out, spewing vapour by several hatches in the pod’s walls.

The tea is ready.

Meanwhile, Akiyuki/Xam’d regenerates his bullet wounds and recovers in an instant. The soldier tries to shoot him again but he’s intercepted by a 2-hit backhand/jumping kick combo from Haru. Really, what’s her issue with males? She really likes to kick the crap out of guys….Anyway, she’s not even sure why she did or why she’s not afraid of that phallic looking white monster. Meanwhile, another soldier and Furiuchi appears inside the schoolbus.

Someone is going to get his ass kicked.

No matter how many times you rewind the scene, you won’t see her panties.

Destructive Power

The pods stop steaming and and spew out a giant two-legged version of Metagross. called a Humanform Weapon. They seem to be incredibly sturdy, since they regenerate easily even from shot wounds caused by artilhery rounds from a nearby Infantry Fighting Vehicle. Interesting detail, the wound revealed a kind of armour under the Humanform Weapon similar to the green cocoons from episode one. The HFW (short for Humanform Weapon). Another thing is the orbital green ball they use to discharge a kind of beam attack with also has the added effect of creating vacuum explosions for increased damage. But why the hell HFW’s only use one orbital ball? Technically they seem to have 4 orbital balls but we only see them use one at a time. Energy constraints?

Push! Push! I can already see the head!

While the HFW who’ve landed nearest the school is wreaking havoc, Furiuchi and Haru try to run for safety, but Xam’d (let’s use this name for Akiyuki’s phallic-man form) grabs Haru’s arm softly. But they are split apart by one of the HFW’s energy beams. That HFW then proceeds to tackle Xam’d, dragging them both outside the shool’s area. While recovering from the events, Furiuchi says one interrestig thing: “The war started again”. Does it means they were in the middle of war before? I think Sentan Island’s villagers were mostly refugees from areas where the NG and the SC had conflitcs (SC as short for Southern Continent). But when Furiuchi mentions Akiyuki, Haru decides to go after Xam’d and the HFW

Go, Humanform Weapon, use HYPER BEAM attack! What? What do you mean you only know SPLASH?

Both Xam’d and the HFW get to a nearby flood canal and the HFW shoots a energy beam onto Xam’d. This is where Xam’s reveals one of his skills; he morphs his arm into a shield, deflecting the energy beam. They keep fighting down the canal, and when they were tackilng each other, Xam’d morphs his arm this time into a giant blade. Haru finally reaches them and shouts: “Hurry, getu out of there, Akiyuki!”. Haru suddenly realizes the thing that she knew already subconscienly, which was that Xam’d is Akiyuki. The water pipe where she was standing breaks apart, dropping her into the canal but Xam’d grabs her with his free arm, preventing any injuries.

I’m getting wet, if you know what I mean…

End of the Fight

Nakiami notices Xam’d and Haru with her binoculars and rushes to them. Meanwhile, Xam’d cuts the HWF legs and proceeds to finish him, pummeling it’s “head”. From it’s dead body, a sort of purple crystal starts to grow (although the characters later refers to it as a stone). Nakiami parks her Cloud Rider in a nearby tower, shoots a rope from it into the canal, which fixates into it with some kind of liquid metal, then she proceeds to descend using a small foot platform attached to the rope. Then she stabs Xam’d’s arm with her cane, detaches the cane’s head and asks why a complete Xam’d doing there. She also asks Haru if the original form of the Xam’d is human (which implies that Xam’d can be formed from other animals), which Haru says yes. Haru looses herself a bit then, crying that Akiyuki can’t be dead. Xam’d is getting devoured by the same purple stone that the HFW was, but this time is Nakiami which is controlling it, with her cane. She makes Xam’d a proposition: stay there and die comsumed by the stone or come with her and live. Xam’d says “I want to live” (Xam’d’s voice seem to be heard only by Nakiami and Haru so far). Nakiami accepts and destroy the rock and touches the crystal in Xam’d’s forehead, making him slowly transform back into human again.

Nakiami says that the HFW’s soul will be transfered to him and that was the purpose of Xam’d. She also talks to Haru, noticing the fact that Haru heard Xam’d’s voice and gives to her the spiritl Haru saved.I need some confirmation, but she says “Nakiami” to Haru, which can mean her own name or “No more tears”. Then she proceeds to Vulcan Nerve Pinch Haru, leaving her half-uncounscious time enough to see Nakiami take Akiyuki with her. Haru is later woken up by Furiuchi, who was looking for her.

Meanwhile, the courier ship is docked and the crew is ressupplying or idling around. The Captain is waiting for Nakiami (mainly to beat the shit out of her for not following orders.) The 2 kids from the crew find a Nekotama and ask the Captain if they can have it, which she denies. The kids then argue with her, since she let’s Nakiami do similar things, then they point to Nakiami, which was arriving and argue she can’t have that too (”that” refering to the uncounscious Akiyuki). The Captain makes a lovely “Pissed OFF” smile…..

Insert random joke about Asians here.

The ship finally leaves. In her room, Nakiami treats Akiyuki’s arm, sealing it with the help of a Fsking giant needle (ouch!”), which helps control Akiyuki’s transformation. After it’s done, one of the crew members rushes in (let’s refer to him as Dreadlocks), worried about Nakiami. But she seems to have things under control and says the Hiruko is under control. What is Hiruko? She refers to Akiyuki or to the thing inside Akiyuki’s arm?

Stab time.

One of the best scenes on this episode happens now: while Dreadlocks leaves the room, he gets bitten by Roppa, the new Nekotama pet the kids have. A bit pissed off, he teases the kids a bit, but they didn’t liked it, so they punch Dreadlocks in the balls…..One hit K.O.

NOM!

“OUCH!”

FALCON PUUUUUUNNNCCH!

“*CRY*”

The episode gets back to Nakiami’s room, which wonders why Xam’d says he wants to live, even when nobody celebrated his birth. The camera focus on a wall of the room where we can see claw marks on it, hinting that Akiyuki’s isn’t the first Xam’d to be in that ship.

Recovery

Sentan Island is recovering from the attack, which seemed aimed at the military structures. Even so, there was a lot of casualties. Haru and Furiuchi are in a shelter, wondering about Akiyuki’s fate. The same thing happens in Akiyuki’s father office, where his mother tells his father that he’s missing and argue about what to do next.

Serious moment.

Remember the pods which spew out the HFWs ? The camera focus into the inside of one of them, revealing that a human is inside, with a helmet connecting him to the pod. He blabbers about getting closer to Hiruko, takes a pill and proceeds to kill himself, using a bio-organic version of the explosive pack used by the albino girl of episode one. Are the HFW controlled by humans? And what’s this Hiruko than they seem to worship? Don’t forget Hiruko was referenced when Nakiami was treating Akiyuki.

STICK

BOOM…wait, Deja Vu?

Now we focus into the metro of a unknown town, where a lady officer reads a report to some commander called Kakisu. She says all 11 pods and HumanForm Users were killed and a unknown white haired girl was among the casualties. It also seems Commander Kakisu is walking to a place on the subway where was a accident 10 days ago.

Cool.

There he meets Dr. Kanba, a old man in a wheel chair with similar facial marks to the old lady from episode 1. They argue about several things, like the transfer of the research facility to Sentan Island and one huge monster in front of them, which they call Xam’d. They also refer to it as Tessik’s God. This Xam’d looks more as the HFW than Akiyuki’s Xam’d. Another thing they comment is that if the research fails, the one who will be blamed is Kakisu.

The other Xam’d.

This Episode’s Comments

There seems to exist several factions around: The Northen Government, the Southern Continent, the old lady’s faction, the Hiruken HFW users, Dr Kanda research faction and the courier ship crew. They seem to have several degrees of relationship between them.

Another main thing is Hiruko, which is referenced several times. I bet this will be main factor of conflict around, considering one of the factions is based around it.

About the crew: Argh, this is really inspired on Gekkostate, they have counterparts of all of the characters, even the old man. Next ep is focused on the crew, so I can reveal more about them in my next post.

Commander Kakisu is another character which was copy-pasted from Eureka Seven. Who doesn’t remember our psycho Colonel Dewey Novak? Well, Kakisu seems a bit more sane. But he sure does look as a main villian.

I wonder what Haru will do now, now that Akiyuki is away from her. Will this lead into a romantical development? Another side note, her sister’s name is referenced as Midore, for those who’ve missed it.

Dr Kanba seems know a lot about Xam’d, but is his role as a neutral or will he have a more dynamic presence on the events? And what’s his connection with the old lady….