ZEGAPAIN – 19

Summary:
Inside of Maihama server where a heavy rain is falling, Lu Sheng and Shizuno are dining together at a restaurant while being served by May-Yu and May-Yen. After studying the menu, Lu Sheng gets down to business and asks Shizuno where she went this morning. Shizuno feels that it’s too early for questioning and thinks that Lu Sheng brought her here to treat her to a meal. Lu Sheng responds by saying that she personally is going to decide the taste of this meal. In reality, this morning Shizuno had gone alone to the Maihama server building aboard the Zegatank. However, she tells Lu Sheng that she was watching Kyo in the pool. That actually isn’t a lie because Kyo had indeed been in the pool that morning. He had seen Kawaguchi and friends watching him swimming, and when he talked to them, they called him shameful. Kyo responded with a head-butt to Kawaguchi, but then greeted them as if they were still friends. He started talking to them about genuine humans and how he thought that Kawaguchi and friends would survive even in the ruined outside world. Kawaguchi still had no idea what Kyo was talking about, so he punched Kyo into the pool. As his ex-friends walk away, Kyo vowed to protect Maihama until the day of resurrection. At that time, Ryoko had been standing at the door to the pool building and Shizuno had been sitting on the diving board above the pool.
Shizuno starts going on about Kyo, but Lu Sheng turns the conversation back to her. May-Yu recites some facts about how at 10:17 local time, some unencrypted location information of the Maihama server was transmitted on the network by way of satellite. However, the caller is unknown and the transmission source is unknown. Looking straight at Shizuno, Lu Sheng wonders out loud who could have done this. Onboard the Oceanus, the crew seems to think that the location of the Maihama server has been exposed. Chris explains that to the Gards-orm, the server is a troublesome because it mass produces Celebrants. Concerned about Maihama, Kyo asks where Lu Sheng, Shizuno, May-Yu, and May-Yen are, but Dita reports that they are offline and cannot be contacted – in other words, they’ve gone missing. At this point, Shima enters the bridge and orders that they wait and see what happens. Just as Kyo is trying to appeal to Shima about the enemy aiming for their city, the Gards-orm show up. Inside the Anti-Zega, Abyss remarks to Shin that the server is a ruin, a relic of the past. He thinks that finally this one battle will be finished. Back on the Oceanus’ bridge, Kyo wants to go out on the Altair, but Shima simply takes an indifferent attitude. Kyo and Ryoko launch the Altair and go out to meet the Anti-Zega in battle.
As this is going on, May-Yen reports to Lu Sheng that the Altair and the Anti-Zega have made contact. Lu Sheng accuses Shizuno and Shima of sending an unidentified signal. When Shizuno asks him what he’s basing this on, Lu Sheng reveals that they found traces of erasure in the Oceanus’ personnel action data. He then directly asks her about going to the Maihama server this morning. Shizuno doesn’t answer his question and instead moves to end this dinner. However, Lu Sheng tells her to sit back down because he seems to have restricted her use of her Celebra-Icon. He says that the Maihama server won’t be so easily damaged. Its construction allows it to withstand a nuclear attack, and even the Anti-Zega won’t easily be able to intrude. And above all else, the suspicious person who leaked the location information of the server to the enemy is here with him. Meanwhile, the Altair and the Anti-Zega start fighting, but it’s clear that the Anti-Zega is more interested in going after the server than the Altair. With no one else helping, Kyo feels like everyone is abandoning the Maihama server. Despite Kyo’s best efforts, the Anti-Zega continues to head for the server building. On the Oceanus, Chris wants to go out alone without a wizard co-pilot, but Shima continues with his “wait and see” approach. Back inside the server, Lu Sheng declares that Maihama won’t fall. Shizuno reminds him that if the server disappears, then this city and he who is currently in this city will disappear too. Lu Sheng thinks that the answer will come out soon.
Entering the server building, Kyo fires blindly down the shaft. After Ryoko reports that the enemy has reached the deepest parts, the Altair has to avoid a giant flame that comes up through the shaft. Determined to let everyone become genuine humans, Kyo vows again to defend their Maihama. Inside the server, Shizuno wants Lu Sheng to let her go because that she truly wants to tell Kyo something. On the subject of Kyo, Lu Sheng asks her if she wants again to sit in the rear seat behind Kyo. He knows that she used to go out with him. Shizuno laughs a little and admits that she still likes Kyo now. Lu Sheng wonders if she’s motivated by jealousy, but Shizuno reveals that she was saved by Kyo. Lu Sheng then asks that if that’s the case, then what is her objective? It’s at this point that the window bursts open and the wind blows dramatically into the room. Lu Sheng asks her to stop deceiving Kyo because Kyo has been through enough pain. It will be harsh to inform him about her participation in this act of betrayal. After May-Yu and May-Yen close the window, Shizuno emits a sigh and wonders if it’ll soon be time for the main dish. Meanwhile, the Anti-Zega has reached the Maihama server room. Abyss calls it a birdhouse and thinks that this is where the eggs are born. Ready to destroy it, the Anti-Zega reaches out to touch the server.
On the Oceanus, everyone can only watch as the Anti-Zega’s arm gets to mere inches away from the server. For some reason, Shima seems to actually want the enemy to touch it. However, Abyss stops and notes that this is too easy. He then hears the Altair arriving behind them and turns the Anti-Zega around. While the two mecha are struggling against each other, Shima contacts Kyo and tells him that it’s enough. He finally reveals that by touching the server, the enemy’s information will be laid bare. Ryoko realizes that by using the large scale quantum computer here, data collection from the Anti-Zega is possible. Kyo, however, cannot believe that they would sacrifice the people in the server (including his friends) for this. Back inside Maihama server, Shizuno tells Lu Sheng that leaking the information was part of a trap to lure in the Anti-Zega. Lu Sheng, however, asks that even if they were deceiving their allies, what was the basis on which they were confident that the Gards-orm would fall for the trap? He now knows that she and Shima must be connected to the Gards-orm in some way.
Kyo meanwhile is refusing Shima’s orders because he doesn’t want everyone to disappear. Shima yells for Kyo not to miss this chance, but Kyo still can’t do it. Fortunately for him, Ryoko finds another way to get the Anti-Zega’s information by using the Altair’s fist and the quantum computer’s transceiver unit. It can accomplish the same objective and the server won’t need to be touched. Kyo tries to hit the Anti-Zega, but he misses his first punch. After knocking the Altair back, the Anti-Zega uses its head-mounted beam weapon, but Kyo and Ryoko are ready with the shield. Kyo then immediately counters with an uppercut punch right into the Anti-Zega’s torso. With the enemy’s information’s protective wall destroyed, the Oceanus starts receiving the data. In this situation, Abyss suddenly notices that there’s a large cable above them. The Anti-Zega proceeds to rip that cable out, attach it to the Anti-Zega, and blow up the entire place, including the server. Kyo wanted to protect everyone, but in the end, the Altair was transported out. After a gigantic explosion, Kyo and Ryoko are back in the Oceanus’ hanger, both crying and mourning the loss of their Maihama
However, the inside of the server seems to be still intact, as Shizuno, Lu Sheng, May-Yu, and May-Yen are still in the restaurant and everything appear to be perfectly fine. Lu Sheng thinks that the Maihama server was destroyed, but, like Shizuno says, it clearly hasn’t been. She doesn’t say why it hasn’t been and instead suggests that they move on to dessert. Then with a smile on her face, she kisses a rose petal.

Preview:

Man this show really likes to mess with us. That was a pretty big roller coaster ride this week – one second we’re led to think that Shima and Shizuno are betraying everyone else, and then we learn that it’s a trap. After that, there was the question of whether the server was still around. It really looked like it was gone after that explosion, but it’s clearly not because of that final scene.
I guess the server still being around has something to do with Shizuno visiting the server location alone earlier on the Zegatank. She probably moved the contents or backed it up somehow. Still, I don’t think they should have been so hush-hush about their actions until they were pulling it off. Telling the crew everything beforehand might have made things a lot easier and saved Kyo & Ryoko a lot of angst. But it does make for better drama this way, so I can’t really complain.
It kind of felt like Lu Sheng’s interrogation of Shizuno was fairly useless, at least to us as the audience. Everything that was said we either already knew (Shizuno and Kyo used to go out, she still likes him) or already suspected (Shizuno and Shima are connected to the Gards-orm) or found out in this episode (the trap). What it did accomplish is make Shizuno seem even more mysterious, and I’m hoping that some of that mystery will be gone after next episode, which looks like it’ll be about her and whatever secrets she has.