White Gestalt prepare to execute their plan while danger looms in Alola.
This arc contains examples of:
- Armor-Piercing Question: After Project Solitaire's disastrous first field mission, Kisaragi tries to rein his troops in by snapping that "We are not going to murder [the Apex] like cowards." Malika asks in return, "So how will we murder them?" After all, you don't bring together fifty-two warriors and arm them with magic swords, bazookas, Molotov cocktails, and Humongous Mecha unless you intend to kill your targets.
- Big Damn Heroes: Thanks to Larkspur — through Lampetia — Kisaragi uses his portal sword to arrive in the Tape Car to fight alongside the Gestalt.
- Bittersweet Ending: Gladion's plan to stop the Apex has failed, meaning they will keep rampaging and hurting others until Chloe's arrival on the Train. He, Specter, and Tokio are faced to take an early exit because of this, leaving London behind. Alain is still stuck in the Fog Car and the Cage of Flauros will continue on as planned and the mind-wipe will remove the memories of the Tape Car incident for better or for worse. Lampetia was shattered and her heart is now in the hands of an Apex kid (albeit Lampetia states that this means she'll be safe since she's too "important" to throw away). However, while Gladion's initial quest has failed, White Gestalt has saved the Tape Car from destruction, Gladion did manage to reach out to others, Tokio will finally be able to return to his parents after almost two years and the creation of the Infinet means that there will be higher chances of future passengers to conenct with their loved ones. Not to mention that Gladion can start being the big brother Lillie needs.
- Blunt "Yes": When Light Easter asks Dark Easter if they're still pissed at what happened in the Fog Car, Dark Easter interrupts their light half with a "YES".
- Call-Back: Two of the passengers who are trapped in their memories are Robbie Jewell and Penelope Mouse.
- Call-Forward:
- Kisaragi notes that when Grace and Simon die, no one will ever mourn them. However, this is somewhat subverted, since Grace will mourn Simon's death and Hazel will mourn Grace's.
- Grace scoffs at the idea of someone using one of Randall's donut holers. Wait until Lady Destiny arrives.
- The memory Grace sees in her tape will become very important in Voyage of Wisteria.
- Tiffany being an ungrateful little bitch for someone rescuing her? Wait until the Fog Car...
- London tells Amelia not to intervene with their plan cause she'll make things worse. Chloe says this to The Cat when they meet in Le Chat Chalet Car.
- Dark Easter notes that the Apex are so apathetic and monstrous that tossing a dead child in their way is a cause of celebration. Sure enough, the first thought the Apex has about Chloe dying in the Fog Car is she deserved it.
- Gladion states that he couldn't separate the team leaders from the Apex due to only having one Dormouse to work with. Book 3 starts because Grace and Simon were cut off from their cult.
- Continuity Nod: One-One notes that he's giving White Gestalt the option to be kicked out of the Train early, which worked with the last paradox he dealt with. Said paradox was whether or not to let Lake leave the Train.
- Contrived Coincidence: Mallow decides to come clean about the Train just as something equally, if not more, important catches everyone's attention.
- Conservation of Ninjutsu: The Apex outnumber the White Gestalt but they are incapable of actually injuring any of them except Lampetia because of some loose shrapnel.
- Crime of Self-Defense: Played With. Yes, the Apex are certainly the aggressors in this Car, and the White Gestalt and Kiseragi are merely acting to defend themselves. However, the children of the Apex are incredulous that they are being treated as the undisputed monsters, when Kiseragi's group just shot missiles at them, and the White Gestalt subjected all of them to a Mind Rape. The fact that the Apex is seriously outgunned against either of these factions doesn't help, and Gladion acknowledges that there's no way they could talk the Apex down now that they've acted against them so openly.
- Drama-Preserving Handicap: Specter's Duel Disk lets him summon a myriad of monsters and his Sunvine Thrashers will tear the Apex apart. So Grace destroys it with a hammer to even the odds.
- Dramatic Thunder: Weaponized by Easter once both halves fuse once more. The Apex huddle in fear, unsure of what is to come, which gives Gladion the time to use Grace's Doormouse to hurl them into another car, combined with the Gale Boomerang to blow them away.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Seto Kaiba, Zack, and Ray are passengers affected by Gladion's plan; the three of them won't appear until Blossoming Trail with Kaiba (not named) having played chess with Chloe and the latter two becoming Chloe's mentors in fighting.
- Foregone Conclusion: Grace and Simon won't meet with Amelia until the final act of Blossoming Trail, so the two arrive in the Tape Car just moments after One-One and Amelia leave to another room.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Grace used a Doormouse to enter the Tape Car. Gladion uses the same thing to send the Apex packing.
- Hypocrite: Gladion chastizes Amelia for sitting around and letting the Apex continue without telling the truth like he did in regards to the Nihilego incident and his sister's trauma.
- Internal Reveal: With the worsening situation, the Ultra Recon Squad are forced to reveal their true identities to the Ultra Guardians.
- Irony:
- By the time Mallow finally wants to admit the truth about the Train, something else stops her from doing so.
- London tells Amelia not to interfere because she'll make things worse. She doesn't interfere yes, but she doesn't get an early exit like his other Gestalt partners.
- Kick the Dog: Tiffany snatches Lampetia's heart — just seconds after Lampetia got shattered risking her life to save this little girl's ass — just to spite Specter about her new battle trophy.
- Lack of Empathy:
- One-One and Amelia's apathy towards everything that happened with the Apex rubs White Gestalt the wrong way.
- The Apex don't care about Specter's feelings about Tiffany snatching Lampetia's heart as they consider it a battle trophy.
- Metaphorically True: Grace tells White Gestalt that they'll meet again. Technically she does see London again, when she's reincarnated as Warbler.
- Missed Him by That Much: One-One and Amelia leave the main room of the Tapes Car to check out the damage that was caused by Gladion's antics...just seconds before the Apex comes barging in to kill them.
- Moral Myopia: Specter is pissed that the Apex should be more concerned over Tiffany's well-being than they had ever shown any Denizen on the train, especially the one that just saved Tiffany.
- Morton's Fork:
- Gladion lays it out to One-One that nothing they do will convince the Apex to just stop their ways: if they fight against them and lose, then they'll die, but even if they win, they'll just take it as justification for their Darwinist ideals. And of course, talking things out is out of the question. Therefore, the use of the Tape Car may be their last chance to convince them. Unfortunately, this is a prequel. It's also partially Deconstructed, because since the heroes were convinced from the start that the Apex were both remorseless sociopaths and a deadly threat to them they never so much as tried to talk things out or defeat and contain the brats as One-One had asked them to do. By working off of a biased set of assumptions of what their options were, the White Gestalt arguably caused as much mental trauma in one day as the Apex had caused in a decade.
Gladion: They beat us, we’re good as dead. We beat them, they just think it’s more validation for their worldview. The strongest should be in charge...and the second we try to tell them they’re wrong, they’ll think it's a weakness or hypocrisy and try to replace us. So we fight and fight and fight and get nowhere. We need a better solution, something that makes them face the truth.- The Ultra Guardians face a similar dilemma with Necrozma...if they leave it be, they could lose Solgaleo with no guarantee that it will be enough to sate Necrozma's hunger. But defeating Necrozma brings the risk of leaving Poipole's world to die...and Nagnadel confirms that they were desperate enough to consider invading Alola. Either way, unless they Take a Third Option, things are grim no matter what.
- Mr. Exposition: As in canon, Nagnadel fills the Ultra Guardians in on Necrozma's backstory.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The White Gestalt's plan cripples every passenger's train journey and simply pisses off the Apex more. And while the 'hero' part is debatable, Kisaragi notes that all Solitaire has accomplished was radicalizing them even more.
- Nothing Is Scarier: We never get to see the minds of the White Gestalt after Gladion's suggestions through the memory tapes hits a snag. All we know is that all of them are reacting in pure agony.
- Oh, Crap!: Light Easter acts like this when they see the White Gestalt all frozen in place due to Gladion's plan backfiring, and their darker self struggling to speak through London.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
- Kukui wearing a shirt is a sign that things are wrong in the Alola region.
- Specter loses his shit when an Apex girl (Tiffany) snatches Lampetia's heart and is ready to kill the little grunt and the other Apex kids. It's so bad that Easter has to tell him to stop before he does something he regrets.
- One-One having neither friendliness nor depression because he's too angry is a terrifying sight.
- Rage Breaking Point: Specter reaches this when Tiffany snatches Lampetia's heart and it takes Easter to stop him.
- Seen It All: Ash isn't particularly freaked out by Nagnadel's holograms, and advises the group not to move and risk falling off the cliff.
- Stating the Simple Solution: Specter finally decides to tell Tokio what he should've done that could've avoided his train trip. Instead of rewinding time, why not take a phone and call him? London quickly tells him to shush it; last thing Tokio needs to do is feel like an idiot and wasting two years of his life on the Train.
- Tempting Fate: Grace questions who would ever weaponize one of Randall's donut holers. A certain princess of the Vermillion would.
- Twitchy Eye: London's eye ends up like this when One-One reveals the ability to kick passengers out early, especially in light of the bowling ball still allowing the Apex running free.
- Ungrateful Bastard: Lampetia saves Tiffany from fallen rubble. She responds by snatching her heart when the kore is killed and gloats about it being a great trophy in front of Specter. The other Apex kids are more concerned about Tiffany and not the fact that Specter is angry at his partner dying again.
- We Will Meet Again: Grace states that she and White Gestalt will cross paths once more.
- Wham Episode: Part 2 has Gladion enact his plan to stop the Apex. Good news? The Apex are stuck in their tapes? Bad news. So are they and every other passenger.
- What Does This Button Do?: Again, Light Easter's fascination with buttons comes into play, although Amelia tells them not to touch it.
- What the Hell, Hero?:
- White Gestalt are justifiably pissed that neither the Conductor of the Train and the False Conductor herself aren't doing anything to stop the Apex nor were they even aware of their atrocities for years.
- One-One and Amelia are not pleased with the Gestalt after their plan backfires.
- What Would X Do?: Larkspur gets to Kisaragi by questioning if Utahoshi would approve of his methods.
- Why Don't You Just Shoot Them?:
- Apparently, the Train can make people leave earlier than usual which it does with White Gestalt. London questions why not use it on the real monsters, the Apex, to which One-One replies that it only works if he has explicit permission to do so and the passengers in question have learned their lesson.
- Gladion uses a Doormouse to kick the Apex out of the Tape Car. When asked why he didn't separate the leaders from the cult itself, Gladion said he only had one Dormouse to work with.
- Would Hit a Girl: Specter will gladly give Grace a bloody nose before chasing after Tiffany for how she stole Lampetia's heart.
