Episode 9

Act.09 - Siblings: In "Bastard", Alex receives a rapturous applause for her singing. Events from earlier, when he was still captured by Ivan Glaziev, play back in the mind of an anxious Twilight in the audience. Loretta commends Alex for her début and she thanks her. Loretta then says she remembers when Alex was a prostitute and says she was lucky she was still alive commenting that the Benriya and Chad were good people. Loretta then goes on to say that one of the prostitutes at "Bastard" had quit and hints that Alex could fill in, disheartening her, but then deadpans that she was joking mentioning that her mother had also been a prostitute. Loretta explains that her mother was the first songstress in "Bastard" but died after giving birth to her, noting that she couldn't face the after-effects of the Tb pills like Alex had.

One of Loretta's underlings then calls her away as Ivan arrives to meet with Loretta. The fidgety Twilight from earlier stares at them as Ivan hands Loretta a case full of money to pay off loans. Loretta smells blood on him and Ivan apologetically explains he had just been doing corpse disposal prior to coming. Outside, the Benriya confirm they had finished their anti-Twilight repelling duties, with Worick saying they should go and chill at "Bastard". While Nic declines the offer, saying things went on forever when Worick drank, in "Bastard" Ivan subtly shows the anxious Twilight a dismembered ear as a signal. Nic then notices something and heads off, with Worick calling after him. Back at "Bastard", Alex looks on as the anxious Twilight kills people within the establishment. When one of the guards tries to apprehend him, the Twilight attacks and kills him before then going after Loretta. Loretta barely looks at the attacking Twilight before Galahad effortlessly intercepts him, snaps his dagger and sends him hurtling away with a strong punch. Ivan looks on disappointedly as more Twilights suddenly swarm on Galahad, but Marco breezes in and easily dispatches them.

As Ivan thinks on how useless the Twilights were, Loretta angrily berates the first Twilight for needlessly killing innocent Twilights and threatens him to confess who the ringleader was. The Twilight fearfully attempts to flee and is subsequently killed by a unnervingly happy Mikhail, shocking Loretta. As Galahad and Marco wonder where he came from, the Twilights in "Bastard" run for their lives in fear. Loretta fruitlessly tries to calm down the scared Twilights and one of them knocks her over in the ensuing chaos, but fortunately Alex dives to save her before she gets hurt. As the Twilights chaotically flee from "Bastard" Ivan also leaves the building and tells Erica to kill them.

As Worick heads back to "Bastard", he sees people fleeing and is told that the place was under attack from a little kid who was killing Twilights. Worick looks up at Nic and tells him to go and buy them some time, but to be careful due to who the assailant might be.

Back inside "Bastard", Mikhail and Galahad trade blows with the latter aggressively attacking the child until he lands what he thinks is the finishing blow. However Mikhail grins up at Galahad, having completely stopped the punch with his hand, and prepares to strike him from point-blank range but Marco intercepts the attack, forcefully throwing the child away with his wrist wires whilst simultaneously retrieving the tags the child had stolen. Mikhail tells Marco to give him his tags back but Marco refuses, prompting the former to call him mean.

As Nic is racing towards "Bastard" he notes the disgusting smell of flesh, Twilight blood and "him" with a devious grin. Meanwhile, outside of "Bastard", Erica finishes off a group of Twilights. Inside "Bastard", Loretta gives Alex a loaded gun for self-protection. Noting that the observers were gone and seeing the corpses outside, Loretta tells Alex to escape before she hurries away but Alex, reminded of her little brother as she watches Loretta run off, follows Loretta anyway.

As Marco and Galahad seriously pressure Mikhail in their fight, Galahad notes that the child had no tags and wonders if he was a Hunter. Mikhail then complains childishly for them to give him the tags back but Galahad says they were theirs to begin with. Mikhail then grins sinisterly and says he would take their tags instead. He then attacks but Galahad and Marco work together to pin Mikhail down. As the Cristiano duo are about to deal with Mikhail, Erica arrives much to the child's delight. Mikhail tells on them to her and she agrees to help him, launching in to attack Marco.

Whilst Marco and Galahad duel Erica and Mikhail, Worick runs up to the top of a building and fires off a flare into the sky after determining the direction the wind was blowing. As the flare goes off in the sky, different important residents of Ergastulum react to the flare that was sent up. Inside "Bastard", Mikhail picks up the ring, noticing it wasn't a tag and then realising that Marco wasn't a Twilight but actually a normal. An injured Marco angrily swipes the ring from Mikhail's fingers, cutting them in the process, causing the child to go psycho. However before Mikhail can strike Marco, he is swiped out of the way by Erica, who also deflects a series of bullets fired by Loretta. Erica immediately goes to cut Loretta down but Alex instinctively shoots at her before standing in front of the Cristiano Family leader to protect her. Erica prepares to kill Alex but, just then, Nic makes a dynamic entrance and knocks Erica back, readying to stab her, but stops when he realises that he recognises her. At the Monroe's, Delico looks out of the window. Erica coolly throws a vicious palm thrust, which Nic avoids, and then frees herself whilst Nic notes everything he remembered about her from the past and confirms it is the same Erica as before. As the two fight, Galahad tells Nic to stop as she is too strong for him, calling him a "faker". However when Galahad sees his face, he understands Nic's intentions. Loretta then says to leave it to Nic and she, Galahad, Alex and Marco move to exit the battle area. Mikhail leaps over to prevent them from doing so but they escape just in time, with Mikhail's strike severely denting the specially-made door. With the door closed, Nic draws Mikhail's attention and beckons for him to fight.

Outside of "Bastard" Worick finally arrives and sees the corpses of many Twilights. He then sees Nic's empty bottle of Celebrer, noting that Nic had overdosed again, before suddenly seeing someone fighting Nic, shocking him. At first he thinks it is Delico but soon realizes it is Erica.

As Alex and Loretta patch up Galahad and Marco respectively, Alex asks Galahad what he meant when he called Nic a "faker". While Nic duels with both Mikhail and Erica, Galahad explains how Twilights are ranked and then reveals that Nic was different; Nic earned his rank due to drugs affecting his full strength allowing him to defeat Twilights ranked higher than him. As Galahad finishes explaining, Nic is dealt an incapacitating strike from Erica, much to Mikhail's happiness. When Erica proceeds to land the finishing blow, Ginger abruptly appears and violently pins Erica down, holding a gun to her head, while Doug stops Mikhail's movements with his throwing knives. When Ginger recognizes Erica's face, Erica tries to retaliate but Ginger ruthlessly knocks her away with a rapid kick to the head. Mikhail asks what they should do as Erica gets to her feet. Outside the police mobilise but Erica and Mikhail burst out unexpectedly and escape down an alleyway, leaving Chad in a stupor when he sees her face.

The Twilight corpses are cleaned up and Loretta asks if she was wrong, but Marco reassures her. She then hears the crying of a Twilight baby and rushes over to soothe its crying. Meanwhile, Chad asks Worick what was going on and Worick replies that first he needs to speak to Delico.

Ivan relays the results of their mission to Uranos while Mikhail plays with his stolen tags. Elsewhere, Uranos is told by a shadowed figure that he knew they couldn't do it, before telling the Corsica head that "they" always had the Corsica's back. Another person then asks if "he" had arrived yet and he appears, telling Uranos that he hadn't found his sister. Uranos welcomes Emilio Benedetto to Ergastulum and the "".