Keep the Home-fires Burning

Okay, okay. So it doesn't happen exactly like that but it's close enough to still be relevant. Fei comes back to Lahan to find it in FLAMES. So he does what any rational young man would do, he jumps into the convenient giant robot and blows everything up. I mean everything. Everybody in Lahan dies because of Fei. Timothy, Alice, Dan... 

Oh god-dammit Citan! Don't save Dan! Alice is standing right there and you rescue her horrible Troll of a brother!?

Anyway, you get your first taste of fighting in a gear here. It's pretty easy. In fact, the gear recognizes that you are a total noob and turns on "Easy Mode" so your stupid, dumb, surface-dwelling brain can handle it.

"Why did you save Dan?"

But it's all in vain I'm afraid. Because Fei freaks out and blows everything up. This is also the first time we see the suggestion that all is not well in the mind of our hero. Be prepared for more of this because the game is going to explain the shit out of this particular facet of Fei's character. There are several text walls later on which drill their Freudian psychology in like a sadistic dentist.

Long story short, (and spoiler alert) Fei has multiple personalities, one of which is extremely powerful and violent. They even named this fucker "Id". There are even more "personalities" in Fei's mind but we only know about the violent one right now, we'll see just how many times this dude can fragment later on. But don't go thinking Fei's the only character in XG with the old "multiple personality", there is no end to the messed up brains in this game.

Speaking of messed up brains, Dan gets real mad at Fei for exploding the village and everybody decides to kick him out forever. Great. Not like there was anything left here to do now anyway. So Fei heads out onto the World Map for the first time.

Ms. Plot Device

In the forest dungeon which comes next we meet Elly.

And after about 5 random encounters she's gone again.

This really could have been written better. Elly is a fantastic member of the team and can be really helpful in a fight but the times we get her in the active party are not profuse by any means. It seems like every time Elly comes into the party, one story chapter passes and she's taken right back out again. 

The thing is, Elly is massively important to the plot of Xenogears, but she is really never much more than a Macguffin. She drives the action forward without ever seeming to be herself of great consequence. She has to be rescued multiple times. She struggles with her dual nature just like Fei, but isn't allowed to come to terms with it. She is brainwashed a few times, sacrifices herself way too much, and is rather generally "The Woman".  I'm certain that if you've seen any Xenogears merchandise or promotional material you've seen young miss Van Houten's likeness sprawled on it with the "I'm a sexy member of the Armed Special Forces of my country" pose.

This is too bad because I can see the potential for a really great character in Elly. Her fighting is brutal and effective (except when it isn't), she's compassionate but tough (except when she isn't), and she's sexy (all the time, but not as much as Alice). Elly is a character who is great at the core but has gone slightly off in the storytelling. Like a cheese with a bit of green fuzz on the sides. You could scrape it off and eat the cheese anyway; it's probably still fine. But do you really want to? Do you really need that cheese? There's only a little bit left and there are other, much nicer, cheeses out there. You could cook it into a casserole or make a sauce, and that could be nice. But you really only wanted some cheese to go with the rest of your plate. And it's late so the shops are probably closed anyway.

Maybe I'll clarify that later. For now, Elly has gone back home and Citan is back in the party. We're headed for Dazil and the desert and that means we're entering Golden Time.