ダーティペア OVA Episode 08
Dirty Pair OAV 08

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

The space cruise ship, White Swan, comes under attack by masked gunman who gas the passengers to death. One, Dr. Nea, races to his daughters quarters and takes her to a cold sleep escape pod along with her stuff animal dog (from which a microchip fell out of in her room as they escaped). A gunman arrives on the scene and gets unmasked by Dr. Nea, causing Tia to react with surprised recognition. Dr. Nea jettisons the escape pod before dying, where it is found 20-years later by Kei and Yuri on a small asteroid after receiving its signal.

Returning to 3WA HQ, Kei and Yuri are joined by Madam Beryl and briefed on the White Swan incident, which Madam Beryl had been assigned to in her active days and which case remained unsolved as to who attacked the ship. Kei and Yuri are assigned to the case now that the only surviving witness has been found and given the one clue from the scene — the number 42731 which Dr. Nea wrote before dying. Kei volunteers to sit with Tia and try to obtain information from her. She tries to win Tia over by doing different things, including head first. The young girl will not speak and Kei is frustrated when she leaves and joins Yuri. Yuri has been doing some research and discovered that Dr. Nea’s partner, Bill Jones, is still alive. He’d been investigated by Madam Beryl previously and found to have had an alibi.

Kei and Yuri take Tia to the J.C. Headquarters where Bill works. Bill is stunned to see Tia alive and when he introduces himself to Tia as “Bill-oniichan,” she has a negative reaction and hides behind Kei. Bill asks to be allowed to keep the girl, but Kei and Yuri refuse the offer considering the active case. They leave and Bill makes a call to have a hit made on the trio. As Yuri drives, Kei sits in the back with Tia. Yuri and Kei are discussing things when they are ambushed by another vehicle and nearly sent off the overpass as a result. The shooter gets away.

Realizing they are on to something, Kei and Yuri take Tia to the shipyard where the White Swan is parked. Wearing environmental suits equipped with jet packs (as the ship has no power and no gravity), the trio begin to explore when Tia takes off. Kei and Yuri follow Tia to her old bedroom, where she retrieves the microchip that had fallen from her stuffed dog. Inserting it into the toy, who opens up the nose and presses a code, which causes the dog to talk. Kei and Yuri suddenly know what 42731 is for and use that code on the toy. Sure enough, Dr. Nea’s voice is heard, where he reveals his suspicions that Bill is planning to kill him.

A ship arrives and attacks the White Swan and the trio barely make it out in time before the ship is completely destroyed. Kei and Yuri take Tia and the stuffed dog to confront Bill in his office. When they play the message, he angrily knocks the dog off his desk, leading Tia to rush to get it. Bill grabs Tia and now has a hostage with which to make an escape. Kei and Yuri give chase but are unable to nab Bill. Yuri gets stranded trying to make a leap and Kei ends up losing her weapon when she gets close and Bill threatens to kill Tia. Tia sees Kei signal her and uses Kei’s roll to escape from Bill on a bridge over a pool of circuit fluid. Kei disarms Bill, but not before the gun goes off, taking out the bridge and sending him into the pool to die. Yuri arrives just before the section containing Tia and Kei gives out and pulls them to safety.

The case solved, Tia is given over to Madam Beryl’s custody as guardian. Kei says goodbye to the still silent Tia, who responds by doing another head first roll to Kei. She then grabs her stuffed dog and leaves with Madam Beryl, leaving Yuri and Chief Gooley stunned at what just happened.

Thoughts/Review:

So, Yuri reads “Playgirl,” eh? I got a chuckle out of that and Mughi’s reactions for some reason.

Unfortunately, this episode had Yuri and Kei be a couple of world class non-thinkers after being cautious before. Seriously, why would you confront the chief suspect in your case while bringing the chief (child) witness who might be killed at worst or even hurt. Well, there wouldn’t have been a 2nd-half to the anime had the writers made Kei and Yuri play things smart. Oh well.

Not that Bill was that smart. First, he lets Dr. Nea write some numbers. Then he lets an escape pod actually escape. So I guess there’s enough brain farts to go around.