Mouth Wide Shut

Mouth Wide Shut (Japanese: マウス・ワイド・シャット) is the eighth episode of the Wild Arms Twilight Venom anime. It involves Sheyenne and company waking up in a strange town and having to deal with a family feud.

Full Synopsis[]

Sheyenne Rainstorm, Dr. Kiel Aronnax, and Issac are resting on the desert sand in the shade. Sheyenne complains that they can't hide in the dark properly because of The Midnight Sun while Issac appreciates the beauty of the scene. Then Issac comments that either humans are greedy or just bad at cooperation skills. Not too far away, Loretta Oratorio is looking for them with binoculars while Mirabelle Graceland and Jerusha are relaxing. Jerusha comments on how humans can be friends one day and enemies the next. Back in the shade Sheyenne is looking at half of a key which is supposed to be to the treasure in the valley of the Midnight Sun hoping that the treasure is his long lost body. Kiel quietly remembers how they got the half of the key; they were in a saloon when a hysterical woman collapsed on their table and gave them the key half. She said the treasure was lost three years ago and could "turn the world upside down."

Back on the girl's side Loretta is holding onto the other side of the key and fuming that Sheyenne has the other half. A flashback scene reveals that Loretta purchased her key-half for a large sum of money from a man in the same saloon that Sheyenne got his half of the key in. Jerusha asks Loretta why she doesn't just ask Sheyenne to borrow the other half but Loretta says she bows to no one -- just before she gets drop-kicked by a shadowed figure. Kiel asks Sheyenne a similar question about sharing the key but he refuses saying the he doesn't beg to women -- women beg to him. Then he, too, becomes the victim of a flying drop-kick.

Sheyenne, Kiel, and Issac wake up in a red colored room; a doctor exits saying they'll be fine. A woman named Rosa explains that she found them lying in the desert and rescued. She starts running for an embrace and Sheyenne opens his arms but Rosa runs past him and glomps onto Kiel. The Sherriff enters and welcomes them to Honest Town. He goes onto explain that the town is split into two factions -- the Rodon Family, which he is a part of, and the Ascensa Family. The town is literally split in two as all of the buildings are in two rows parallel to each other, one half painted red (Rodon's Family), one half painted white (Ascensa Family). Elsewhere Loretta, Mirabelle, and Jerusha wake up in a light blue colored room to find they are in the company of a man, Mr. Leereum, and his maid. He says that only members of the Rodon Family would attack a group of beautiful women. Loretta gets drunk off of the compliment and giggles hysterically for awhile until the maid interrupts and tells Mr. Leereum it's time.

Outside the buildings Rosa and Mr. Leereum are standing on opposite sides of the town, each with a gun in their hands, getting prepared for an old fashioned duel. Before the duel can start Mr. Leereum has a coughing fit, which concerns Loretta, so she jumps out to protect him -- and at the same time, Sheyenne jumps out to protect Rosa. Sheyenne and Loretta both state their angry and simplistic goals at the same time, causing both to think the other is imitating them. The scene shifts to a Rodon Family building where Rosa is hanging onto Kiel while Sheyenne watches on with envy. Rosa explains that the Rodon's first settled the town but then the Ascensa Family moved in and started causing trouble. She asks Kiel to be her body guard -- even though Sheyenne points out he's the one who rescued her. Sheyenne tells Kiel to decline, since they're after the treasure and Rosa says the treasure is supposed to be south of town.

In the next scene Sheyenne is moping around outside about how all the girls used to want to have fun with him when he had his old body. He's surprised to hear a female voice ask to have fun with him but when he turns around it's just a little girl. He ends up eating a meal with the little girl and her stuffed animal when they're gunfire breaks out and Sheyenne reacts swiftly, firing a shot from the Batour that slices through a town arch and a rock on the outskirts of town. The Sheriff comes along and says it must have been the Ascensa Family. Elsewhere Mr. Leeruem apologizes to Loretta because he didn't want her to see him sick, and he coughs again, saying the sickness comes from living in the desert too long. He claims that he finally moved into Honest Town but the Radon Family wanted to kick him and his friends out for being outsiders. Later that night there is an earthquake that rocks the town although no one is injured.

That same night Rosa runs crying up to Kiel and shows him a letter she received from the Ascensa Family, challenging them to a duel, saying they have three representatives fighting for them. Mr. Leereum hands Loretta a similar letter from the Radon Family also claiming to have three representatives. Sheyenne agrees to fight for Rosa's side and Loretta agrees to fight for Leereum's side. The next morning Sheyenne walks into the town talking to himself about how if he wins the duel Rosa might actually notice him, but then pauses, looking out at the arch and the rock he shot -- neither have holes in them. Mirabelle is also out early that morning and notices Mr. Leereum inside the largest white building in town. She wonders what he's doing so she turns into her bat form and flies up there. She opens up a door and gasps at what she finds.

In the next scene Sheyenne and Loretta are standing apart from each other with Mr. Leereum in the middle explaining the custom of the duel. He has a coin that he will toss and when the coin hits the ground the duel begins. Both parties say they're ready. The coin is tossed into the air and when it lands Loretta sends out two fire spell cards at the exact moment Sheyenne shoots with his Batour ARM -- the two groups of projectiles meet up and cause a huge explosion. When the dust settles Rosa and Mr. Leereum see that all six of the adventurers have collapsed and are passed out. They start laughing to each other, calling each other darling and saying that they've "did it again". They run to the Batour lying on the ground and are excited at how much a rare gun like that must be worth. Their glee is interrupted by Sheyenne, who tells them to keep their hands off his gun.

Mr. Leereum and Rosa turn around to see all six of the adventurers on their feet and looking stern. Mirabelle says that they figured out their trick. She goes on to explain that in the large white building she found an array of costumes -- the costumes of everyone they had met in town so far -- and realized that there were only two people in this town playing multiple parts. Loretta is angry at being used and Sheyenne wants to see who they really are. Both of them throw off their costumes and reveal themselves to be the man and the woman from the saloon who gave away the half-keys to the main party. Sheyenne says that their big trick was to have people come into Honest Town looking for the treasure and then have them kill each other so they don't ever have to get their own hands dirty and they also get to swipe the belongings of the fallen parties.

The two cons start to grovel, saying they'll never do this trick again if they let them go. Loertta interrupts and asks if the treasure of the Valley of the Midnight Sun is real, to which they say it is. They've never bothered to go out looking for it because they've had so much success getting treasures to come to them. Loretta proposes to Sheyenne that they have a race to find the treasure and whoever finds it first gets to the other party's key. Sheyenne agrees to these terms and everybody starts running south from town. The con artists get up and laugh that they've actually tricked the group into going North so they'll all get lost in the desert. They stop laughing when they realize the gang hadn't run off too far and were in earshot. Kiel says that if the first part of their plan fails then the con artist's second trick is to get people lost in the desert. Sheyenne explains that he noticed that the arch and the rock he shot were on the south side of town yesterday but were on the north side of town today.

He shoots the Batour into the ground, hitting hidden machinery, causing the entire town to rotate. Sheyenne says this was the truth about the earthquake they experienced. The six adventurers leave the town without hurting the con artists -- but the machinery has been disturbed and the town continues to rotate, causing some of the buildings to fall down as they were of shoddy quality. In the desert inside a crevice Sheyenne and Loretta butt heads and both put their halves of the key into a treasure chest at the same time opening it to reveal a teddy bear in a sweater with the letter "J". After a stop at saloon Sheyenne notices the girl who had wanted to play with him. He looks at the teddy bear they found in the treasure chest and decides to give it to her which makes her over-joyed. She runs to show her grandfather the teddy bear but reacts in surprised, exclaiming that the eyes of the teddy bear are actually the Gelumatron Precious Stones. Unbeknownst to the main party they had actually found a real treasure this time -- and one they could have split evenly between the two parties!