By On February 11, 2149, Shin participates in combat practice at the Special Officer’s School. Eugene is his co-pilot in a Vanagandr unit. The unit of one of their colleagues, Marcel, slips down a hill but Shin pilots his unit to jump backwards over it. Later the commanding officer chews out both Marcel for that maneuver as well as Shin for having the unit jump. He gives them both zeros for this exercise, even though he admits Shin is correct when he brings up that he did that to avoid damaging the unit. An angry Marcel tells Shin he’s not going to thank him and drags Eugene away with him when Shin meets up with Grethe. Marcel and his co-pilot tell Eugene to distance himself from Shin. The new Vanagandr units they’re working on don’t factor in the pilots’ safety and 12 test pilots have already died. Shin attends a shooting range then visits his colleagues. Grethe asks if they’re ready for a trip. The setting moves ahead to April 1st. Grethe brings Shin and the others to a field that was formerly under Legion control but has been retaken. A glassed off area contains several defeated Juggernauts. Grethe claims to have found the mementos of Shin’s former colleagues and talks about how in the Federacy they engrave names on a national memorial, revealing one that she has had specially made here. Now that Shin and the others have graduated from Officer’s School, they’re officially part of the military and will be joining the Nordlicht Squadron under her command. Frederica cries out at a nearby covered Scavenger unit telling the others it’s a surprise and not to look. The covering falls off the Scavenger unit, revealing it to be Fido. Frederica claims it’s a rebuilt Fido using the original’s core unit. She claims it’s several times stronger but only activated upon hearing Shin’s name. Shin walks up to Fido and in a brief flashback he says its proof they made it here. Shin asks Fido if it’s still alive and if it wants to go home, causing it to roll down a hill. As they walk back, Theo asks Frederica why she’s here. She claims to be their mascot and says it’s a Giad tradition to have young girls like her assigned to a military unit. They eat and sleep with them, making the unit a found family who will risk their lives for their beloved “daughter” or “sister.” Theo finds this sickening. Frederica tells Shin she has another surprise and hands him his old pistol. On July 28th, a battle rages on Giad’s western front line. Several Vanagandrs take on nearby Legion units then head through a trench where they are attacked. They come across a Dinosauria Legion unit which is about to fire until it is struck. Shin’s Vanagandr makes its way through several Legion units using its blade to slice through them. A surprised Eugene calls it the new Reginleif. Another pilot calls the Eighty Six the monsters of the Republic.
Later, Shin gets out of his unit and is chewed out by a technician about using his high frequency blade again, something they don’t have a spare for. He claims the Legion will withdraw and she backs down. Shin gets into a jeep, accompanied by fellow unit member Bernholdt and Frederica. Shin tells her to not follow them onto the battlefield as she’s just a mascot. She criticizes him for going into enemy territory as a commanding officer. Upon asking if he’s listening, he pulls her hat down her face, and she has to ask Bernholdt to pull it off her. The next day at the Forward Operating Base 15, various soldiers in the dining hall talk about the Nordlicht unit and its creepy pilot, the headless skeleton reaper. Eugene gets his meal and joins Shin’s table, ignoring Marcel’s plea for him not to. He tells Shin he got here a month ago and it’s good to see him again. Frederica is distressed about eating mushrooms and Shin takes all but one of them. Eugene thanks Shin for saving him to which Shin apologizes as he hadn’t noticed it was him. Recognizing each other from the library, Eugene and Frederica shake hands and agree to be friends. They tease Shin about not looking up from his book when someone talks to him. Frederica asks Shin to take a photo which he appears hesitant to do. She gets up, saying she doesn’t want to interrupt a meeting between old friends and leaves. The two of them talk about how someone her age shouldn’t have a reason to fight. Eugene tells Shin his sister is staying with their aunt and talks about where he thinks he’ll take her the next time he’s on leave. Shin asks if he really should have joined the military as the war’s not going to end well. An alarm goes off, stopping their conversation. Later, in a wooded area, Eugene’s hand holds a locket with his sister’s photo in it. Frederica contacts Shin, telling him its bad news. Shin departs his unit and tells her to close her eyes. He walks up to a mortally wounded Eugene and hands him the locket from his severed hand. He pulls out his pistol and Eugene thanks him before he fires. Marcel runs up to Shin afterwards and Shin says he has good timing and to make the casualty report. Marcel yells at him, asking him why he didn’t save Eugene. Marcel claims he was too busy fighting hunks of steel and is a battle mad Eighty Six. Marcel is told by one of his colleagues to stop and thanks Shin for what he did. It’s not too late for Shin to leave the army and be happy. Shin tells him the Legion are coming and to meet up with allies while he can. Shin asks Frederica about the situation. She says it is not good and that there’s new orders. She asks him if he’s alright and he says yes after looking at Eugene’s body and closing his eyes.
In just one episode, eight months pass; a significant amount of time. Shin and the others have made their way through the Officer’s School and find themselves back on the battlefield. The battlefield is as tough as ever and even the Federacy seems to be struggling against the Legion. It was quite a touching moment to see the monument that Grethe was able to put together based on the mementos of Shin’s former colleagues. It reminds me of a similar moment in Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans. Alas, the childish Frederica spoils the moment by appearing and acting like a little kid. We see that Fido has been restored, which somewhat disappoints me as the sequence showing the end of its “life” in the prior cour gets blunted with it coming back, better than ever a few episodes into this one. The concept of Frederica being a mascot and imposing a found family on the troops seems to be just an excuse to shoehorn an annoying kid into a part of the storyline where there’s no place for her. The episode provides a lot of time with Shin’s friend Eugene, whom he has to mercy kill at the end of the episode. It goes to show that as powerful as Shin is on the battlefield, he can’t save everybody. Unfortunately, Eugene’s role in the storyline comes off as too rushed for me to have as much of an impact as it could have. I’d have much more preferred if he stuck around a lot longer and died at a later point. If our core five characters are going to be protected from at least an immediate demise, Eugene’s short entrance and exit from the storyline come off as if he filled a quota to be an emotional death.
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