86 -Eighty Six- Ep. 4: Real Name

From his cockpit, Theo yells at Lena. He claims those like her throw them out on the battlefield and she treats them like weapons while watching from a safe and warm place within the walls. If that’s not treating them like pigs, what is? She’s never even asked for their real names. Raiden interrupts and Theo says he doesn’t have to defend her. Theo calms down and Raiden tells Lena to kill the synchronization. The battle is over; she doesn’t need to monitor them. He went too far, but none of them are in the mood for a friendly chat with her. Lena says sorry and stops the sync. Shin thinks to Kaie saying she doesn’t want to die and a vision of a Legion unit destroying her Juggernaut appears in his head. Theo says sorry to Kaie, that he did the same thing as the white pigs and tainted her death. On June 16th the Spearhead squadron members play basketball outside while Shin sits on a bench reading. Theo has a hard time concentrating. Later in the recreation room he gets frustrated when the cat won’t stay still for a drawing he’s working on. Daiya and Haruto tell him his drawing looks more like a fox than a cat and that it’s scary rather than laughing, odd coming from one codenamed Laughing Fox. Kurena asks him if he’s bothered by what he said to Lena. Anju says she is and Lecca agrees. The three of them reach for Theo, knocking him out of his chair to grab a button from his shirt. Lecca taunts him for always only buttoning one button on his jacket. Daiya and Anju further comment on how what he said wasn’t like him. They talk about a former commander of Theo’s, the fox commander whom he admired, someone they don’t have. Theo heads to the hanger where Aldrecht is telling Shin to stay put until they get new parts shipped. He tells Theo not to let Shin do anything stupid as he leaves. Shin signals for Fido, which provides him a small part of Kaie’s Juggernaut, her name carved into it. Theo asks what the fox commander would have said to Lena. He wonders if he’d have gotten mad but then says it doesn’t matter. He calls her a white pig that considers herself a saint and thinks she’ll never use the Para-RAID again. Shin says Theo thinks his commander wouldn’t have said that. That night Lena reaches out to Shin via the Para-RAID as he sits alone in his room. Earlier, Lena stands in her room, saluting the flower vase by the window. Later, she talks to Annette in the research ward. Annette says she should accept things as they are but Lena says she could never forgive herself if she did so. Annette brings up that she’d have to go to District 86 and fight alongside them, but she can’t do that. What she should do now is spoil herself with some pudding dessert Annette has made for her. Lena says she isn’t in the mood. Annette asks her why it’s such a big deal that Lena didn’t ask their real names. She doesn’t need to know them and is never going to meet them. Lena says she knows Annette’s name. They’re friends and a name is who you are and she didn’t even think of that. It means she wasn’t treating them as humans. Annette tells her she’s over thinking things. She and the Eighty Six aren’t friends. Lena says they’re all humans. Annette says if she really thought that she’d have asked their names right away. This is a great time to stop trying to get any closer to them. Lena asks why she’s so set against them and Annette says it’s because there’s nothing she can do. Getting involved will only lead to regrets. There’s no way to go back to the way things were. She tells Lena she should quit being a handler and come to the lab. Lena gets up, saying she can’t quit and heads out. As she goes Annette tells her she should listen to her best friend’s advice. As Lena walks down the hall she thinks to her father saying they should go to the battlefield and see everything that’s happening. In a flashback, a much younger Lena is riding on a helicopter with her father, Vaclav. He tells her they are doing something worse than war and they have to bring this to an end as they pass over an Eighty Six encampment. Vaclav asks the pilot to take them a little past the frontline base. We cut to night time and see Vaclav holding Lena as the Legion attack. This shakes Lena back to the present.

Lena’s uncle Jerome walks by and asks her what’s wrong. Later in his office, Lena tells him she still can’t forget it. The last place her father took her was a battlefield in District 86. She’s sad about what happened to him but is glad she could see things with her own eyes and learn the truth. She was able to hold to the ideals the Republic threw away. Jerome tells her Vaclav was a kind man who wanted to make the Republic a better place. He was a good father and husband and that’s why he wanted to show her what he did. He thinks it’s a terrible shame that an enemy attack took a man with such a strong sense of justice. However he claims there’s something Vaclav didn’t realize. Just like the rest of the Republic, he wasn’t doing any more than watching. No matter how much he talked about equality he wasn’t the one fighting. He felt subconsciously that only the Eighty Six die on the battlefield and that’s why he was able to take her there. The fact that he did something so reckless for his ideals proves his ignorance and stupidity. Jerome tells Lena he doesn’t want her to be like her father. What she’s doing is enough. He accepts some responsibility, saying he assigned her to the unit and wanted her to feel for herself the reality of the nation. She doesn’t have to do it if it’s too much to handle. Lena says she wants to continue to act in her role. Jerome asks her what the Republic flag stands for and she states freedom, equality, brotherhood, justice and nobility. He tells her she should look at the real world; such things are nowhere to be found in the Republic. She’s too focused on seeking ideals from herself and others. They are ideals because they are unattainable. Seeking them when she knows that is foolish and cowardly. Later, Lena waits on the side of the street as the news broadcasts propaganda about there being no casualties. Thinking of what Theo said to her, Lena can’t take it anymore and runs off. She activates her Para-RAID, asking for Undertaker. By the time Shin responds, she is at a war casualties cemetery. Lena apologizes for yesterday and the day before. She tells him her full name and says she should have asked his sooner, doing so now. Shin tells her there’s no need to worry about what Laughing Fox said and they don’t all think that way. She isn’t responsible for creating this situation, nor does she have the ability to fix it herself. Lena says it was rude to not ask their names and he says there was no need to ask. He asks her why she thinks it’s required to use codenames via Para-RAID despite the enemy being unable to intercept it. She says it’s so the handlers don’t think of the processors as human. He says most processors die within a year and they probably assumed all that death would be too much for a handler to handle. Lena claims that’s cowardly and she was being that way. She says she was going to run away, but doesn’t want to be a coward forever. She again asks Shin to tell her everyone’s real names. He provides her the real names for Kaie, Raiden, Theo, Anju, Kurena, Daiya and others. Lena writes them down in her diary as he says them. After he’s finished she tells him to call her Lena. She tells him she’s a Major and he says he’ll call her Major Milize from now on. Lena asks him what he’s doing now and he says he’s leaving Kaie’s name behind. Eighty Six don’t get graves so in his first unit when someone died a comrade would carve their name in a piece of their Juggernaut to bring along with them. As such the last survivor would take the others to their final destination. He’s that last survivor. He’s always been. So he considers that his job in this unit as well. Over the past 5 years he’s experienced 561 die. He says he remembers them because he takes them with him. Lena says that’s why he’s called Undertaker and he says that’s part of it. Lena says she never faced the people she let die and feels bad about it, being truly sorry. She says she’d like to apologize to everyone. Shin asks her if he should connect now and does so, to her surprise. We cut to the Spearhead squadron gathering in the recreation room as Lena apologizes to them for the way she’s behaved until now. She wasn’t treating them as humans and failed to realize it, so of course they’d reject her. She tells them her full name and asks if they would still answer her to tell them their own. Theo claims it’s a pain as Shin already told her his name. She says he did, but she wants to hear it from them directly. Theo says the mark on his Juggernaut is Laughing Fox, but he got it from someone else, the commander of his first unit. The commander was an Alba, and was cheerful and chipper. He claimed it wasn’t right to make the Eighty Six fight alone and as such came to the battlefield himself. Theo says they hated those Alba that came to the battlefield, but they never left. They stayed behind in the rear guard, defending the processors. He’s not asking Lena to do the same, but tells her as long as she’s inside the walls she’s not their equal and they won’t accept her as one. Lena asks if this commander was the good person Kaie was talking about. Theo says she was referring to everyone who fought as hard as they could. He says he’s done talking and tells Lena his name. She apologies and he says enough, and to get it over already. Raiden tells Lena his name and says her nightly calls made them think of her as a wannabee saint and hypocrite. They laughed at how stupid she was. He apologizes for this. He agrees with Theo that they don’t view her as an equal though. They’ll be okay continuing to talk to kill time, but he wouldn’t recommend it, saying she’s not cut out to be a handler. Lena says if it will help pass the time she’ll keep calling. He jokingly calls her a moron and tells her to send them the map. She says she’ll send it immediately. Daiya, Haruto, Anju, Kurena, Lecca, Chise and Kino tell her their name. Lena thanks everyone. Later that night Shin walks alone down the hall and Lena reaches out to him, apologizing for doing so. She says she hasn’t heard his name and asks if he didn’t want to say it. He says he’d just forgotten. His name is Shinei Nouzen. She is surprised and asks if he knew a Shourei Nouzen. His personal name was Dullahan and his mark was a headless knight. Shin flashes back to times in the past with his brother, with his face crossed out. He tells Lena that Shourei is his brother.