Part 29: The Crooked Man

New Music: King of Closing Time



I've been trapped in the ring of time.



The Twisted come from the future and I destroy them. And eventually I fall. When I do…





But that my friend… is about to end.



Cutscene Aya couldn’t manage to afford the 300 BP surcharge to repair her outfit for the end game of The 3rd Birthday. So, she’ll be cut and bleeding with shredded clothes for the duration of the conflict against Hyde Bohr here. I think they were going for Aya having been through a lot and meaning business. But that would mean she actually had any character development in the time since she’s last seen Hyde and uhh… no. No that did not occur, T3B.



I didn’t authorize the use of Overdive for this operation.



It was no one.
What a brave soul you are. Heh.
Well, other than the part where you didn’t actually come here yourself. I’m a bit disappointed to be meeting your proxy… hmm… Balthasar Grosheim, is it…?
I just want to know one thing. Why did you... put me up against the High Ones?



Door?
*motions head upwards* Admittedly, it is more of a portal. But, the term Portal of Time doesn’t have the same sort of ominous ring to it as Door of Time. Don’t you agree?



Every time one of us dies, the time-space power structure is consequently redesigned and the Babel grows in strength. Heh.





Our species become the foundation of the Grand Babel.



We were successful, as we unlocked the doors to Zero.
What about all of your friends? And the people that are important to me.
Also… I guess that girl from the concert. But… she counts too. Did you know her? Was she someone else you threw away?
…No. We weren’t acquainted. But the rest?





By the way, Hyde can teleport now. I guess that’s just a general High One power, since Madigan liked to warp into scenes too.





Hyde delivers a series of pimp hands to Aya. The first she skillfully dodges from behind. The other? Not so much.



You scared, Aya?
I could never really tell your emotional state, to be honest. Did everyone ever tell you that you have this terrible nervous tick where you start sort of whimpering… and breathing heavily when even the least bit excited?



Or are you in fact enjoying this?
Again, I could never get a read on you. The way you used to wander around the CTI building with a blank stare and constantly sighing? I thought it rude to ever mention how irritating it was every time you started doing that. But… we’re clearly past the point of pleasantries.





Aya, the warning shot might have been appropriate for Madigan. But Hyde is clearly the last boss. It’d be better if you shot him in the chest or head. Just a thought.



Then come.




New Music: Terminus Zero (Recommended Listening)



Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha!
L-Look at that…
What is that?!
Private Grosheim, what the HELL is going on in here?!



Time for the boss of Episode 5 of The 3rd Birthday: Slenderman Hyde Bohr. I actually love this boss. He’s delightfully stupid as all hell. I’m just going to jump ahead in the battle so we can get a good look at Hyde’s High One form before we begin proper. He… umm… isn’t fond of staying still.



Yep. It’s just Hyde having traded out his white suit coat for some back tentacles and having stretched his torso and limbs to 3x their original length. He’s an incredibly silly boss and I’m completely disappointed Madigan, Gabrielle, Cray and Emily Jefferson turned into Final Fantasy dungeon bosses and not absurd stretchy doofuses.





Hyde is an incredibly fast boy and he doesn’t even need to resort to teleporting most of the time. Though he totally can just teleport across the room. Mostly only to recover from being stunned. Despite his clown on stilts build, Hyde can book it at twice the speed of Aya’s dash. And he does so while rapid firing homing lasers in Aya and support troops’ direction. Unlike the Reaper earlier, Hyde has absolutely no compulsion against gunning Aya’s allies down before resuming his assault on Aya’s new host.







And I do quite literally mean gunning them down. For you see, Hyde has summoned a pair of (laser blast firing) assault rifles and is duel wielding them while running around like a lunatic or stretching his body out to fan the entire room with laser gun fire. Hyde’s gunfire blasts are mildly homing so while being in cover is ideal, it’s not always possible given how fast he is flipping around the arena. So if Aya is caught out in the open, she does have the ability to quickly dodge roll out of the way and avoid the shots.





Speaking of dodging, akimbo gunfire dashing and teleportation isn’t our old boss’ only method of transportation. Hyde can also flop onto the ground and utilize his back tentacles to slither around/do the worm to quickly close the distance between himself and Aya. It looks so fucking dumb. I love it! High One Hyde is great!



Once he reaches Aya, Bendy Bohr will perform a spinning lariat to smack off a good quarter of Aya’s HP if she doesn’t haul ass dodging in the opposite direction. Wayan Thackery could not have seen his day ending like this…

The slithering and pimp slap attempts are when Hyde is most vulnerable to Aya’s counterattack, since he is rather wide open both while crawling about and recovering from his entire body turning into a slapping corkscrew. BUT! Hyde isn’t quite out of tricks.







If the CTI chief finds himself pinned down by gunfire or getting owned by Aya herself, he can start bending his body, bouncing around like a deflated balloon. I mean… it’s really hard to hit him when he does this… technique, let’s call it. Mostly because I personally found myself laughing to hard at his dumb ass. In reality, just rolling in the opposite direction a few times negates any ground he covers while doing his Slinky impression.



When it comes to actually fighting him, he’s pretty easy. Especially compared to the bullshit that was the Reaper just before this fight. He doesn’t have any armor. He has no phases where he’s invulnerable. Explosives stun the hell out of him. Really, all he has going is he put all of his points into Agility.





But, in the end he goes down like all the rest and in order to finish the fight, Aya must perform an Overdive Kill while Hyde Bohr is down and out.



Music Ends…



Since we’ve defeated another High One, it is of course time for another flashback to that fateful Christmas Day at Kyle Madigan and Aya Brea’s wedding. Ugh. Aya Madigan…? That’s not a great protagonist name.



And as before, we’ve seen the whole part where this poor priest gets lit up for the twentieth time. Count your blessings you just died and weren’t dragged into a pan-dimensional time travel loop or whatever the hell is going on here.





And of course, Aya and Kyle getting shot as well.













And then we have confirmation that Aya did, in fact, put a bullet in her weird clone younger sister. For some reason! Kind of a dick move there, Aya Brea!





*chokes back tears* I did it?

Aya falls to her knees…



*reaches to the portal* Yes. To stop the awakening of Eve, the Mother.
Eve is... Eve is the Mother?
What like… your mother? You’re not her time traveling future son, are you?
…What? No. That’s stupid! Be silent and let me explain.
We High Ones, we were there the moment Eve Brea awakened.
*taps head* …And the memories from her body were inherited by us fortunate ones.



BARF!



Eve!



So yeah, hey. Turns out Hyde, Cray, Gabby, and Emily were all attending Aya Brea’s wedding. They were just all in the bathroom freshening up when the SWAT Team rolled in and gunned down everyone. And they were wearing the same clothes since that day. And I guess they all knew Eve as well and either forgot. Or maybe they all agreed never to mention any of this to the amnesiac Aya after the fact because… Uhh… Err…

…

Let’s just continue!



I know that I can fix my mistake. If I dive -





You used to be cool, Aya. But now… Now you’re just a gigantic bummer is what you are. A bummer. Also…
The ability to Overdive is not yours alone, but also shared by others.





It sure is! It’s time to go to Eve Brea the High One’s Mother. Or… Well… maybe it’s more complicated than that.



But, that concludes Operation Scarlet Snow in Episode 5 – The Counterattack. Only one episode remains of The 3rd Birthday. There is a gaping maw of bad storytelling stretching out before us. Prepare yourselves... as we enter the final act.






Video: Hyde Boss Battle and Episode 5 Ending (You should watch this. Mostly because Hyde’s boss form is a silly, ridiculous spectacle.)





Hyde Bohr Concept – The trifecta of white hair, slicked back, mullet. It’s like bulletin points on anime men not to trust.