When we come back, Ryu is inside the warehouse, still studying the trail of ants. As he starts to climb a stack of crates, two security guards on the other side see him and immediately jump him, knocking him down.





But Ryu sends them both flying with a sturdy kick from both legs. They hit the crates and then slump, unconscious.

“Hah. That tank over there looks mighty suspicious,” mutter Ryu, and he goes and climbs up its side to peer down at what it contains.

What it contains look just like sugare, so he jumps down inside the tank. (And I wonder if he thought about how he was going to get out again. Actually, I think the gun he carries but rarely uses has a cable feature akin to that of Joe’s –or it did in the Shutterkiller episode.)




A quick taste confirms it is indeed sugare. “What do you know?” he enthuses, “I finally got a clue I can use!”





But, shades of Ibukron yet again, he looks up to see a large disk descending towards him. “Bad news!” cries Ryu, unsuccessful in his effort to clamber out of the tank. Fortunately, the disk is a lid for the tank, not intended for compacting its contents. Nevertheless, as it seals atop the tank, Ryu is trapped inside.

Not far away, May watches all this.





She laughs quietly in triumph –yes, Jinpei, you were right to be suspicious of her!- and then walks away. But even as she was watching Ryu, it turns out that Jinpei is watching her.





With a “Hmmph!” Jinpei pauses and then tries to contact Ryu via his bracelet. He gets no response and is immediately concerned that something might have happened to him. So, instead of trying to solve the whole thing himself, he sensibly contacts Ken and apprises him of the situation. “It looks like Ryu fell into a trap –come quickly!” Ken confirms “We’re on our way!” to Location D and then Jinpei takes off running to catch up to and trail May.

Ducking between buildings to avoid being seen, Jinpei follows her and sees her boarding a boat docked at the waterfront. A man in yachting-like clothes is standing on its deck, but Jinpei rather cleverly throws a rock into the water such that it gets the man looking in the opposite direction as Jinpei sneaks aboard the boat by agilely running across a mooring rope.





On board, Jinpei immediately heads below deck and finds himself in what looks like a typical lounge-type room for a fancy yacht. But, there’s a circular hatch cover on the floor, indicating that there is still more below…

So Jinpei opens the hatch and then proceeds to climb down a ladder. He finds himself now in a much more industrial and mecha-like corridor with walls that are all metal and pipes. He’s about to walk around a corner, but hastily leaps back and flattens himself against the wall was he realizes that someone is coming from that direction.

It’s Captain Tiger Shark himself, approaching a Galactor goon. The goon tells him “The boss wants you.” “Again?” asks Captain Tiger Shark, sounding less than enthusiastic. Instructing the goon to “Prepare for departure,” he heads off to see the “boss.”

“Those guys were definitely Galactor, so this must be their sub!” whispers Jinpei now, peering out from his concealment once they’ve moved on. He starts walking down a corridor himself now, one that ends with a door that has a round window in it.

Peering in the window, he sees Captain Tiger Shark and the “boss” –none other than “dealer in death” Martin Gillman.





“How about it, Captain?” Gillman is saying, “I hear you’re also running a pirate operation with this submarine. Why don’t you come work for me at Gillman Concern?”

Interesting –it’s probably not too often that Galactor Captains get to field competing job offers from other non-Galactor villains.

Jinpei, listening and watching via the window, realizes that Gillman and Galactor are working together in the sugare scheme.

But suddenly someone presses a handgun into Jinpei’s back.

“You know it’s not polite to eavesdrop,” says a woman’s voice as a sweating Jinpei raises his hands.

“I want to know what you’ve done with my servant,” declares Jinpei now, turning slightly to look at May –of course it’s May- and affecting his English accent once again.

May tells him his servant is buried in sugare, and then orders him into the room where Gillman and the Captain are. Jinpei complies.

Gillman wants to know what’s going on and “How’d ya get the kid?”

So, May introduces her guest as the Prince of Tuba (I wonder if she really believes that’s who he is).



“


“Prince of Tuba?” asks Gillman, looking startled. “The Prince of that country that’s supposed to have developed sugare?” asks the Captain.

“That’s right, Tiger Shark,” says May, “And since we have him right here, why don’t we sell him to Galactor?”

Jinpei gasps in alarm at this suggestion.

Gillman likes it though, thinking they can also demand sugare from Tuba as ransom for him. “What a great idea,” he adds, leaning back and taking a puff on his pipe, “Just what I’d expect from my private secretary.”

While Gillman’s talking, Jinpei notices that his bracelet is chiming an incoming signal, but he can’t do anything, in full view of May and the others, to answer it.

“Stick the runt in the brig,” concludes Gillman.

But now we see that it’s Ryu, still trapped in the sugare tank, who’s trying to contact Jinpei. Sighly sadly at his lack of response, Ryu wonders what Jinpei’s doing out there. But then Ryu has something new to worry about, as the tank he’s in starts spinning fast, and then all the sugare in it begins pouring out from below in a spiral.

“I’m like food for an ant lion!” cries Ryu as he too starts to get sucked down.





He’s sucked out of the tank and, along with a rush of falling sugare, he lands inside a new compartment. Above, a round hatch just like the one Jinpei opened earlier on the ship/submarine closes now.

Captain Tiger Shark is looking through a periscope on the bridge and orders “Full speed ahead” to a nearby goon. We see the submarine’s engines firing up and it sails away from the waterfront of Location D, underwater, and leaving behind the yacht-like ship that was above it, acting as cover for it.

Meanwhile, the God Phoenix is flying through the sky. On its bridge, Jun is anxiously looking over Ken’s shoulder as he tries to contact Jinpei while a glowering Joe pilots the God Phoenix.

“Big Bro, this is Jinpei,” comes through Ken’s bracelet, “I’m in trouble!”

Ken gasps and wants to know what’s happened. Sadly, Jinpei admits that he and Ryu are both captives and are “being taken somewhere in a Galactor submarine.”





“So they laid a trap at Location D and were waiting for us,” realizes Ken, “I see…”

Jun’s priorities are a little different; she leans over Ken’s shoulder and demands of Jinpei “Why weren’t you more careful?!”

“I feel bad enough,” replies Jinpei a bit reproachfully but looking very remorseful, “Turns out Gillman was part of it after all,” he adds.

“You focused so much attention on the transport plane, you didn’t notice the submarine,” surmises Ken.

“Oh please,” huffs Joe derisively, “Those two are always so sloppy. Let’s find their location and go and rescue them, again.”

“You know what,” says Ken bluntly, “Let’s just let Galactor have them.”

“Huh?” says Joe, not expecting this.

“But Ken, that’s so cruel!” cries Jun.

“We can’t just throw our teammates to the lions,” adds Joe (though apparently, sneering at them is okay), “Come on.”

“Of course we can’t,” says Ken tersely, closing his eyes, “But they’re probably being taken to Galactor’s headquarters right now.”

The implications of this hit Jun and Joe –and not well!





“Once we find their headquarters, we can mount a rescue,” adds Ken, eyes still closed.

“But what if we’re too late?” asks Jun, distressed.

“I know," replies Ken, as we get a close up of his eyes, “But we have a chance here.” His brows draw together.

“No!” cries Jun, covering her face, “I don’t want to sacrifice them!”





“Try to understand, Jun,” says Ken, “We’ll only be up against Gillman, and he’s just an amateur.” Looking ahead grimly, Ken adds, “He won’t be as cautious as Katse –he’ll just lead us right to them.”

Jun is still sobbing as Ken adds, “We won’t get a chance like this again,” but then she gets a grip and seems to resign herself to Ken’s decision.





And now the narrator informs us that Ken, Joe and Jun have detected the submarine with their radar and have “followed it secretly so as not to be discovered.”





Captain Tiger Shark is looking through his periscope again. Underwater, a large door opens and the submarine sails inside… something –a base or a larger ship- and the door closes behind it.

When they surface, it does look like they’re inside a large base of some kind.





The God Phoenix is underwater now too, and speeding in the direction the sub went.

“It looks like we made it here unnoticed, huh?” remarks Jun to Joe, as they see the underwater door the sub went through earlier looming ahead.

“Where exactly is ‘here,’ though?” replies Joe.

“It’s most likely a stopping point on their sugare transport route,” concludes Ken, perhaps thinking this place isn’t big enough to be the vast operation with hundreds of thousands of workers that Dr. Nambu envisaged.

But now the sugare is being unloaded from the sub –all in cute little bags that feature the Galactor logo. Who did all the bagging? Is there a captive engineer-staffed bagging conveyor belt somewhere inside that sub?





The bags are all going into a transport plane –probably very much like the one that crashed on Big Yellow Mountain. Yes, it seems Ken is right about this being a stopping point –especially as there’s no way that a submarine can go all the way to Karakoram…

Captain Tiger Shark is impatient for the whole transfer business to be done, but an alarm starts sounding and a goon in an upper level surveillance rooms barks that the underwater radar has detected the God Phoenix.

May looks very interested in this bit of news, demanding “What’s that?!” “What the hell?” demands Gillman likewise, spitting out his cigar.

“If the Science Ninja Team finds us,” says May, “Then the plan I’ve been working on using Gillman as a front will become completely meaningless.”

“Huh?” says Gillman, clearly perturbed to learn his secretary is using him as a front for her own schemes.





“Tiger Shark,” May instructs, taking charge of the situation, “Go put our prisoners to sleep immediately and take them in to Leader X right away."

Captain Tiger Shark salutes to her and departs, and now May turns and looks at the quite confused Gillman.

“You’re not May!” he yells, pointing an accusing finger as she begins to laugh at him, “You’re an imposter!”

“I’ve been fooling you all along!” declares Katse’s voice, “But I don’t need to anymore!”





And the green clothes are whipped off to reveal Berg Katse.





“Who the hell are you?” gasps Gillman.

Katse introduces himself.

“You’ve been playing me all along, haven’t you, you bastard?” says Gillman.

“Yeah, but I don’t need you anymore, so I’ll just be punching your ticket.”

Katse then elucidates this metaphor by pulling out a handgun and pointing it at Gillman.

Gillman starts pleading, offering to give Katse “sugare, missiles –anything!” but Katse shoots him anyway and he falls backwards over a railing.

Meanwhile, Captain Tiger Shark is entering a cell, where the air is cloudy with sleeping gas, but he’s wearing a gas mask.





He reaches for what looks like Jinpei sleeping on his stomach in his safari jacket and pith helmet, but upon grasping the clothes, he discovers to his alarm that the Science Ninja Team’s Swallow is concealed beneath them.

Jinpei (who must have been using breathing techniques to resist the sleeping gas) leaps up and sends his bolas flying around the Captain’s neck, and knocking his mask away from his face.





Jinpei runs from the cell.

Inside the sugare tank where Ryu was trapped, two goons, in gas masks and carrying guns, are looking for him. Suddenly, the Owl’s arm emerges from the sugare and grasps one goon’s leg, pulling him down. A leg emerges from the sugare next, kicking the other goon in the crotch.







Ouch!





Ryu now comes all the way out of the sugare and puts the goon out of his misery by clobbering him, and then he punches the other goon in the head to make sure he stays down too.

Ryu leaves through the ceiling hatch. In the corridor above, goons rush at him but he grabs them one by one and tosses them and then bashes two other goons' heads together before charging at a bunch of other goons and smashing them together.

He charges down the corridor now, head down, punching every goon he encounters.

Elsewhere, Jinpei is leaping and flipping off walls and pipes in a manner far more agile than Ryu and just as effective, as he takes down goons with sharp kicks.

However, they’re both startled when they back into each other and initially make to fight.







Of course, as soon as they recognize each other, they happily hug each other.

Meanwhile, Katse is standing on a little balcony atop the sub, snapping “Hurry up and finish transporting the cargo! The God Phoenix is coming!”

And just then it makes a grand (and destructive) entrance –I imagine Joe at least enjoyed the opportunity to bash it through the wall of a Galactor base!





The balcony on which Katse was standing breaks apart from the impact and he falls to the floor below.





“Wow, this is convenient!” says Jinpei as he and Ryu now emerge from a hatch in the sub to see the God Phoenix in front of them. They quickly leap to its dome and get inside. I guess the God Phoenix is now sort of sitting on top of the sub and the transport plane, inside the base’s docking bay.





“Forget about the sugare! Just take us up!” yells Katse, and the transport plane fires up its engines and starts moving, dislodging the God Phoenix from its position atop it. Inside the God Phoenix’s bridge, Joe gasps and grabs the controls for balance while Ken falls back in his seat.

However, no sooner are Ryu and Jinpei on the bridge, Joe immediately vacates the pilot’s seat for Ryu and the God Phoenix now follows the transport plane.





They exit what looks like a small, rocky island through an opening in a cliff overlooking the sea, in pursuit of the plane.

But now the Ninjas are all staring in alarm at the view screen, as it appears that the transport plane is about to fire on them.

“Away with the missiles,” says Katse, on the plane’s bridge. Two missiles are fired at the God Phoenix, but fortunately Ryu is able to evade them and the missiles instead strike the opening in the island through which the God Phoenix and the plane had just departed.

This has the convenient effect of blowing up the base! “Serves them right, I say,” remarks Ryu.

“Check it out, that mecha’s kind of tipsy,” says Ken, and we see that the transport plane indeed appears to be unstable in the air.

Katse is angry, demanding to know why they aren’t shooting down the God Phoenix, but a goon, staring at a wildly fluctuating gauge needle, informs him that “the fuel isn’t flowing smoothly.”

“How could it break down at a time like this?” mutters Katse despairingly, “If we don’t lighten the load, we’re going to crash.”

“All right,” snarls Katse, “Dump the sugare!”

So they do just that. So much for the children of all those captive engineer-workers at headquarters and their cravings for sweets!





“What a total waste!” declares Jinpei indignantly when he sees what’s happening.

“Hey, what did you do to them anyway?” says Joe curiously, now approaching Ryu.

“Little ole me?” says Ryu, smiling, “Well, nothing too technical, really. I just did a little tweak and it made it so that the sugare flows into the fuel pipes.”

Ryu is looking smug as he says this –but he deserves to- and Joe is looking at him with genuine admiration on his face –and that’s not something Ryu gets to enjoy very often!

But Ken now shouts “There’s no time to lose! Fire the super bird missiles, Joe!”

“Roger!” replies Joe, heading for the shiny red button and shooting two missiles at the transport plane.





Inside it, explosions and flames rip through it, sending goons flying and screaming, but naturally Katse slips through a door that seals behind him, even as terrified goons then bang their hands on it and futilely try to follow him.





The God Phoenix veers away as the transport plane begins to blow up completely and its debris sinks to the seafloor below. But something that is not debris is there too –Katse’s escape ship.





Inside it, Katse is kneeling at the console, his head in his hands, cursing the Science Ninjas and no doubt despairing at what Leader X is going to say or do to him.

On the bridge of the God Phoenix now, Ryu plants his hands on the console, hanging his head. “This is tearing me up, Ken,” he says, clearly upset, “I heard from Joe and Jun that all because I ran away without thinking, we weren’t able to locate Galactor’s secret headquarters this time.”





Hmm, he does have a point, though I don’t think he should blame himself too much for that.

But Ken looks kindly at him and says “No biggy.” (In the subs he says “Ryu…”)

Jun is smiling happily at Jinpei –I think she preferred Ryu’s plan over Ken’s! Joe has his arms folded and eyes closed but he’s looking like he might be thinking that if he were a prisoner of Galactor, he’d take any chance to escape and fight his captors rather than sit tight quietly.





“The Owl apologized to the Eagle in front of the whole flock,” says the narrator, “But in truth, thanks to his actions, the Team was able to foil Galactor’s plans for transporting sugare to their headquarters and despite the fact that so much of it was cast into the sea, this victory had a special sweetness.”

The final scene is the tranquil surface of the blue sea.

The end.