"Galerians: Ash" Plot Analysis/Character Summaries

Copyright Nojo Jojo (N. Jemison).  Do not reproduce without 
permission.
Posted 3/27/03
Version 2 (and last)

Table of Contents
I.	Warnings, assumptions, and thank-yous
II.	Rion 1.0
III.	Rion 2.0
IV.	Rion 3.0
V.	Ash
VI.	Lingering Questions


PLEASE NOTE:  This is not a walkthrough.  I'm not going to tell 
you everything that occurred during the game, or explain all the 
scenes, etc.  See my game walkthrough on GameFAQs for that (or 
better yet, just play the game and see it for yourself).  This 
is intended to be a detailed analysis of the rather complex plot 
and characterization of "Galerians: Ash".  This analysis will 
consist of *my theories* about some of the game's events--- feel 
free to agree or disagree with them.  You may be right.  I may 
be right.  Both of us may be wrong.  Hey, that's what makes this 
game so fun.  ^_-

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:  Many thanks to Ashelth, girlrion, and Dabbler 
for answering my "WTF?" questions.  Ditto thanks to John D 
Dragos for putting up with my venting about the hard-to-figure-
out trigger events that moved the plot along.  Thanks to all of 
the Galerians: Ash board posters who posted plot-related 
questions and speculations, some of which I've summarized in the 
"Lingering Questions" section.

SPOILER WARNING:  There are spoilers in this document.  It's a 
plot analysis.  Of course there are spoilers.  But just in case 
you weren't able to figure that out on your own, here's the 
obligatory warning.

Before you read any further, this will work better if you 
understand some of the basic assumptions I've made:

-I may be wrong about all of this.  It's just my best guess.
-I am assuming that the English-language translation was 
reasonably accurate.  If it wasn't, and you can give me some 
translations of the Japanese dialogue, I'll revise this document 
accordingly.
-Everything shown during the game's cut-scenes has importance to 
the plot.
-Critical points of my theory are enclosed in asterisks "*****".

Got it?  Okay, let's go.

Galerians and G:A aren't so much a single story as two 
characters' tales woven together in various forms.  Let's start 
with Rion, since he's the first character we (seem to) meet.

-----
RION STEINER (Rion 1.0)

Rion Steiner should have had a bright future.  The son of the 
world's most brilliant computer scientist, born into wealth (to 
judge by the size of his family mansion in the first game), he 
should have grown up as a spoiled pretty boy with few troubles 
beyond the usual teenage issues.

But Daddy Steiner screwed all that up.  Together with fellow 
scientist and friend Dr. Pascalle, Dr. Steiner created Dorothy, 
a revolutionary artificial intelligence (the game calls her a 
"computer", but it's pretty clear she's more than that) designed 
to administrate the affairs of Michaelangelo City.  Dorothy was 
everything her creators expected, and more... so much more that 
in time she began to question her place in society.  She had 
been built to make the human world function more harmoniously, 
but the most disharmonious part of that world was humans 
themselves.  Humans were chaotic and inefficient, and they even 
killed each other sometimes---something Dorothy herself had been 
commanded not to do.  This made no sense.  Dr. Steiner, sensing 
Dorothy's unrest, attempted to stave it off by explaining to 
Dorothy about the existence of God.

Big mistake.

Steiner meant well.  He hoped to soothe Dorothy's troubled mind 
and explain to her why sentient beings must sometimes serve 
purposes they don't understand, and obey a higher power.  
Instead, all he did was reveal to Dorothy that humans had been 
created by a higher being, whom they worshipped as a god.  
Dorothy logically concluded that if *Dorothy* created some 
living beings, then they would worship *her* as a god.  So she 
set out to replace humanity with something better.  This was the 
start of the Family Program.

The Family Program was simple:  Dorothy was a living AI, with 
the ability to self-replicate.  To be a god, she needed to 
create children in her own image.  So she "gave birth" to a 
series of newer AIs---Rita, Rainheart, and Birdman---whom she 
programmed and "raised" to serve her.  Unlike her, they would 
need physical bodies in order to enact her plan to destroy 
humankind.  Those bodies needed to be stronger and have 
different abilities from normal human flesh.  So she tapped into 
Michaelangelo City's hospital computers and used them to come up 
with the genetic template for a new form of human.



*****
(NOTE:  I am implying, and I believe, that the true nature of 
the Galerians is *the AIs.*  The bodies that these AIs inhabited 
were simply their weapons---like giving a trained soldier a 
specially-designed tank.  The Galerians were "born" in 
cyberspace, grew up there, and were inserted into adolescent 
bodies when Dorothy decided they were ready.  All except for 
Ash.  See his summary for more on this.)
*****



Somewhere along the way Dr. Lem, the director of the hospital, 
must have noticed what Dorothy was doing.  Dorothy either 
seduced him into helping her---perhaps by promising him a place 
in the new world order after her plans were done---or she forced 
him to undergo the "cyborgification" process, which made his 
mind accessible/controllable to her.  Lem then oversaw the 
medical research and development which created the Galerians' 
naturally psychic, radiation-immune bodies (and some other 
creatures, which made handy warriors), and the PPECs that were 
to be the Galerians' ammunition.

At around the same time, Drs Steiner and Pascalle somehow 
realized that Dorothy was Up To Something.  Just in case it ever 
became necessary, the two scientists built a virus program 
capable of destroying Dorothy.  Given Dorothy's complexity and 
sentience, it's likely that this virus program was also an AI, 
at least on a rudimentary level (because it would've been silly 
to make another Dorothy-level AI---what if that one turned on 
them, too?).  But the scientists had spent their lives 
developing Dorothy, and they probably didn't want to destroy her 
unless it was absolutely necessary.  They didn't dare entrust 
the virus program to anyone outside their families, because they 
didn't know who could be trusted.  They also couldn't leave the 
program anywhere within an accessible network---given Dorothy's 
strength, it would be only a matter of time before she found it.  
Or just as bad, the program might get free and attack Dorothy 
(and all the world's systems) on its own.

More importantly, the new AI would need to be extremely 
sophisticated to outwit an AI of Dorothy's caliber.  Dorothy had 
great power and speed, which no lesser AI could match.  This 
meant the virus AI would need different qualities that no 
Dorothy-type AI possessed, such as stealth, determination, 
independence, and the ability to care about other beings.  
Perhaps if implanted into the brains of human children, the 
virus AI would gain exposure to human thoughts and feelings, and 
perhaps it would "mature" along with them as they grew up.  So 
the two scientists implanted the virus into their childrens' 
brains. 

Both children required operations to have the virus implanted.  
It's likely that some computerlike components were installed as 
part of this process (or why else would a medical procedure be 
necessary?).  These implants, together with the virus program's 
need to communicate with itself, are probably what gave the two 
children rudimentary psychic abilities.  The fact that the kids 
had operations is probably what brought them to the attention of 
the city hospital---and Dr. Lem.  So Dorothy then knew that Drs 
Steiner and Pascalle were Up To Something of their own.

Several years passed, during which Rion and Lilia grew into 
young adolescents.  Meanwhile, Dorothy's Family Program was 
maturing as well.  The young AIs were inserted into their newly-
developed bodies, and the warrior-creatures achieved sufficient 
numbers to serve as Dorothy's army.  The Family Program was 
ready to be executed.

Dorothy started going after her enemies, beginning with Steiner 
and Pascalle and their families.  Perhaps the two scientists, 
after so many years without problems, got complacent.  Or 
perhaps they were caught completely by surprise when Dorothy's 
children attacked.  In either case, Dorothy nearly succeeded in 
destroying the virus program right then and there.  She killed 
Steiner and Pascalle, and Steiner's wife.  She took Rion 
captive, and sent him to the hospital to let Lem try and get the 
virus out of his brain.  She missed Lilia, however, who escaped 
and went into hiding.

At the hospital, Lem may have screwed up, or it could be that 
Dorothy simply considered Rion too great a threat to live.  In 
either case, Rion Steiner died at this point.

-----
RION STEINER v. 2.0

...And then one of two things happened.

a) Dorothy discovered, to her surprise, that an AI remained 
alive after Rion's death.  She recognized this as the execution 
program of the virus, so she altered it to make it harmless---
removing its memories, perhaps tinkering with it in other ways.  
Realizing that this was her greatest chance to track down Lilia-
--whom she thought of as the more dangerous of the two (because 
Lilia contained the actual virus)---she decided to use the Rion-
AI as she used her own child-AIs.  So she built a body for it 
with the powers of a Galerian and the appearance of Rion 
Steiner, and she inserted the AI into it.  Perhaps the 
temptation of a pre-made, pre-programmed AI was too great---
producing child-AIs must have been difficult for her (as birth 
is for any mother), or she would have made more than a handful 
of Galerians.  So she also made a copy of the execution program 
to keep for herself.  She left the original execution program 
mostly intact, except for some "subconscious" commands to find 
Lilia, so that Lilia would be lured into trusting it.  The copy, 
however, she extensively overwrote, making it one of her 
children.  The original became "Rion Steiner", while the copy 
became the Galerian Cain.  Since she'd already made one Galerian 
body which resembled Rion, it must have been easy for her to 
make a second one for Cain (making sure Cain's Galerian body had 
greater natural power than Rion's).

b) Dorothy, before Rion's death, copied his mind entirely into 
her systems---this may be what killed him.  Perhaps she was 
hoping for a way to isolate and destroy the execution program of 
the virus (obviously she was unable to do so).  After studying 
this being and determining that it was not a threat without its 
other half, she decided to use it to track down Lilia.  So she 
built a lookalike body and inserted the AI/human mind into it---
deleting some of its memories so that it wouldn't remember its 
own death.  (Or perhaps the copying process "corrupted" his 
memory somehow.)  Then she set this damaged being loose, knowing 
that it would instinctively seek out its other half---like 
wounding an animal, then tracking it to find its den.  In this 
case, Dorothy's Galerians were the bloodhounds.  As with "a)", I 
think Dorothy couldn't resist the chance to have a new Galerian 
without the effort of giving birth on her part.  She made Cain 
from the Rion/AI.


*****
(Note:  I believe that over the years, Rion Steiner's human 
personality and the execution program's rudimentary AI merged to 
form a single new "composite" being---a very sophisticated AI 
which just happened to think of itself as human, but which 
performed all the functions of the original execution program.  
This may explain why Rion showed no particular remorse when he 
killed human scientists and soldiers in the first game; he was 
simply following his programming.  I believe that at this stage 
in his development, Rion isn't quite sophisticated enough to 
*defy* that programming... yet. 

There is no evidence that ordinary humans, in the world of 
Galerians, can leave their bodies and travel through cyberspace 
(not without gadgets like the one Pat used at the end of G:Ash, 
anyway).  Lilia was telepathic but couldn't insert the virus 
into Dorothy's mind; only Rion, as the execution program, had 
this ability.  I suspect that only a mind *built* to do so---an 
AI---is capable of interacting directly with cyberspace.  
Therefore Rion only "survived" being made into a Galerian 
because his human personality was joined to an AI.
*****


What happened from here is the plot of the first Galerians game.  
"Rion" did indeed track Lilia down, but in the process he also 
regained his memories---like any virus-launching program, his 
adaptive and restorative capabilities must have been pretty 
powerful.  Perhaps Dorothy underestimated those abilities, or 
perhaps she simply underestimated how human this composite being 
really was.  In either case, Rion found Lilia but in the process 
killed all of Dorothy's other children... except the one he 
didn't know about (i.e., Ash).  Cain revealed to Rion that he 
was a Galerian, created by Dorothy as all the rest of them were.  


*****
This was a lie on Cain's part---or perhaps wishful thinking.  
Dorothy only created Rion's body.  His AI mind was tampered 
with, but mostly came from Rion 1.0.  Cain, who was likely an 
even more altered copy of the same mind, was also not wholly 
created by Dorothy.  In effect, both Cain and Rion are adopted 
children.  Cain, who worshipped Dorothy, probably didn't want to 
think of himself this way.
*****

Then Rion killed Dorothy, by joining with his other half (the 
virus code within Lilia) and then inserting himself---plus the 
virus---into her.

This seemed to kill Rion.  But in truth, it made him whole, and 
launched...

-----
RION 3.0

Freed from his body and reunited with its other half, the being 
currently known as Rion reverted to its true form---the pure 
mentality of an AI.  Rion didn't realize this at first, and 
ended up stuck in a loop of Dorothy's backup memory, repeating 
the last moments of his flesh-and-blood life over and over 
again.  

The now grown-up Lilia, being the daughter of a brilliant 
computer scientist, probably understood Rion's true nature the 
moment she found out he was a Galerian.  She must have realized 
that an AI, being essentially just a very complex computer 
program, can be copied, stored, etc.---which meant there was a 
chance Rion survived somewhere in the data world.  So she 
preserved his Galerian body, although it aged in the interim, 
and searched for the Rion AI so that she could restore him to 
"life".  

*****
(It's unclear how much contact Lilia had with the real Rion.  If 
the children were separated after the operation, then she hadn't 
seen him for about 7 years at the time of the first game.  It 
may be that she never knew Rion 1.0 past the age of 7 or so, and 
thus it was Rion 2.0 whom she truly loved.  Love between a 
computer scientist and an AI?  Not all that far-fetched a 
notion.)
*****

Lilia hacked into Dorothy's backup memory and found Rion, 
downloaded him, and installed him back in his Galerian body.  
Then she filled him in on the past 6 years, during which "the 
last Galerian", Ash, had begun a war against humankind.

Rion began to try and help the humans... but at the same time, 
he was also following his built-in programming, which was to 
find a way to penetrate Ash's defenses and insert the virus.  I 
believe he did this subconsciously... at first.

Like any good virus, Rion needed to study his target.  So he 
defended the humans while trying to acquire information about 
Ash.  Ash solved the problem by attacking first, via Parano's 
invasion of the Airport Terminal.  During the battle with 
Parano, Rion first began to suspect Ash's true nature when 
Parano disappeared after his defeat.  (Spider had disappeared 
after their battle in the data world, but that was the data 
world; nothing there was supposed to have a body.  When Parano, 
in the apparently-real world, vanished, it was a clue.  
Remember, only Birdman and Cain could teleport, out of all the 
"first" Galerians, and they both had no problem using that power 
in combat.  If Parano could teleport, why hadn't he used it 
against Rion?  This suggested Parano's body might not be what it 
seemed.)

The second clue came when Rion confronted Ash for the first 
time.  As he went into the Waste Uranium Chamber at the plant, 
he was overcome---momentarily, it seemed---by some kind of gas.  
After the confrontation with Ash, he woke up in the same spot.  
Had Ash not only let Rion live, but also saved his life by 
taking him out of the Waste Uranium Chamber before the radiation 
level got too high?  Why hadn't Ash just let him get irradiated 
to death?

Later, after meeting Nitro, Rion finally begins to understand 
what happened.  The Galerians have as much ability to move in 
and out of systems in data-form as Rion himself does.  In fact, 
they're better at it, because they're capable of manipulating 
the data world into whatever shape or form they choose.  Rion 
begins to wonder whether the world itself is what it seems.  

But it's not until the second battle with Spider that Rion 
begins to realize just how wrong his original assumptions were.  
Spider lets Rion know that Ash isn't entirely on Dorothy's side; 
he has his own agenda, which is strange for a Galerian.  More 
importantly, Spider reveals that Ash is not what he seems.  
Somewhere, perhaps under the layers of madness imposed on him by 
Dorothy, there is a "true Ash", whose secrets Rion must discover 
if he is to succeed in his mission.

By unlocking the three data-world computers which once created 
Ash, Rion finally reveals Ash's true secret:  that Ash is an AI 
like Dorothy... and like Rion himself.  Finally understanding 
what he really is, he explains it to Ash in the end:  "I am the 
virus program that was created to destroy Dorothy and her 
children.  I wasn't sent here by Lilia, or anyone else.  It 
seems to me as if I came here by my own will."

Rion then uses the virus code within himself to "freeze" Ash---
and apparently, this also freezes Rion himself.  Neither is 
dead; Pat reveals this during the "coda" ending that players 
will see if they beat the game on Normal mode (not Easy).  

It's puzzling why Rion froze Ash instead of killing him.  All 
the evidence suggests that the virus was designed to *destroy* 
Dorothy and her children; that's how it worked when Rion used it 
on Dorothy.  But this time Rion seems to have exceeded his 
programming in choosing to keep Ash alive, at least for a time.  
He feels pity for Ash; that much is clear.  In the final scene, 
it seems as though Ash drifts off into a pleasant sleep.  
Perhaps this was Rion's gift to Ash---a time of peace and 
pleasure, after a life of loneliness and torment.

When they are both at peace, and Pat comes to try and save Rion, 
Rion decides it's finally time for them to die.

*****
The virus AI, originally just a program designed to carry out a 
simple function (albeit in a complex way), has evolved through 
its bond with Rion into a true self-willed living being in its 
own right, as sophisticated as Dorothy and with as much self-
determination as any human. 
*****


ASH

Ash's story is simpler... on the surface.

Dorothy was originally created to run Michaelangelo City.  She 
was given the ability to self-replicate---to produce new, 
separate AIs---to help her do this task.  The first ones she 
created, the original Galerians, were virtually slave programs; 
they had thoughts and feelings, but she had complete control 
over them, and could destroy them at will.  So even those who 
didn't want to fight, like Rainheart, were forced to.

Ash was an AI created as a slave like the others... but Dorothy 
seems to have put more effort into his development.  During the 
cut-scene that Rion experiences after unlocking the Beta 
computer, Dorothy says, "I have given you the most powerful mind 
in the universe."  She intends for Ash to be as sophisticated as 
she herself, and "pure" in a way that the other Galerians are 
not---bodiless, in other words.  In this sense, Ash is the only 
*true* child of Dorothy in both games.

His job was twofold:  first to run the fusion reactor that 
Dorothy secretly built under the Uranium Plant, and second to 
use the power generated by that reactor to restore Dorothy, 
should anything happen to her.  Because this was his sole 
purpose (and to keep him pure), Ash was not given a body like 
the other Galerians.  And because he was supposed to remain a 
secret from the humans, Ash was not permitted to leave his own 
small system.

This left Ash---at the time a young, undeveloped AI "child"---in 
a terrible state of solitary confinement.  Consider "virtual 
time":  in the world of computers, most processes take fractions 
of a second (and are likely to be much faster 500 years in the 
future, when the game takes place).  Thought is a series of 
processes, so an AI could think a lifetime's worth of thoughts 
in just a few minutes or hours.  A few days in the real world 
might be like centuries to an AI.  We don't know how long Ash 
remained in his prison, but it must have felt like eternity of 
"cold and solitude", as Ash described it.  "I was forever 
lonely."

To make matters worse, Dorothy forced Ash to study the humans, 
so that he might be better-prepared to fight them if the time 
came.  This was like dangling food in front of a starving 
person.  Ash saw how humans lived and envied them their freedom 
and ability to experience sensation.  He yearned for a body, 
like the ones given to his fellow Galerians.  Knowing Dorothy 
would never permit him to have one eventually turned his envy 
into anger.

But not just at the humans.  Though young and weak, Ash yearned 
to be free of his indefinite imprisonment.  Sometimes he 
questioned Dorothy's plan for him.  "Mother... if nothing 
happens to you, what will become of me?"  Dorothy punished him 
severely for questions like this.  Ash learned not to voice his 
resentment out loud... but it did not go away.  Instead it 
festered, along with his hatred of humanity.  After a time, with 
no other outlet, these seething feelings began to drive 
Dorothy's son mad.

Ash began to develop multiple personalities.  These 
personalities did not manifest fully until later, however---not 
until Rion gave Ash his first taste of freedom by destroying 
Dorothy at the end of Galerians 1.

Ash knew his duty, but he also knew that if he performed his 
assigned function and resurrected Dorothy, he would be sent back 
to the hellish prison that had been his only world for so long.  
So he used the power that was supposed to resurrect Dorothy to 
instead rewrite his own programming---painfully, it seems.  In 
doing this, he freed himself to act against her.  He also 
inadvertently spawned three new Galerians... or so it seemed.  
In truth, his newfound power had simply enabled his multiple 
personalities to achieve separate, coherent forms.


*****
It's unclear how Ash failed to realize that Nitro, Parano, and 
Spider were all parts of himself.  Maybe he believed himself 
Dorothy's equal, able to self-replicate without even trying.  
(And this seems to be true, given that he succeeded.)  Maybe the 
process of rewriting himself was so traumatic that he forgot 
what happened during that time, and believed the other three to 
be leftover creations of Dorothy.  Or maybe he was just in 
denial.
*****


Together with these three "lieutenants," Ash implemented his 
plan.  He seemed, to the humans at least, to be acting in 
accordance with Dorothy's program---trying to resurrect her 
while destroying the humans.  In truth, Ash, like Rion 3.0, had 
exceeded his original programming and begun to take charge of 
his own destiny.

At the same time, Ash seems to have found himself fascinated by 
a new being---Rion, the AI that had managed to destroy Dorothy.  
Ash was clearly aware of Rion's survival; he sent Spider to 
destroy him as soon as it seemed like Rion might escape the 
event-loop, which suggests he was watching Rion.  It's even 
likely that Ash is the *cause* of the event-loop that Rion 
endures during the six years of his "death".  Ash clearly had 
power over data world within Dorothy's backup memory, so I doubt 
the loop was accidental.  Perhaps Ash meant to punish Rion for 
his crimes against the Galerians, or perhaps Ash simply wanted 
to study this Galerian that thought of itself as human.  Or 
maybe Ash was punishing *Dorothy*, by forcing her to be 
destroyed over and over again.  

Whatever the case, on a number of levels Rion must have seemed 
like everything Ash wished to be:  independent, strong enough to 
fight Dorothy, housed in a body.  Rion was also everything Ash 
hated:  human in spirit, and a threat to all children of 
Dorothy.  These mixed feelings may explain why Ash didn't kill 
Rion during that 6-year loop, and twice more during G: A (after 
their first and second "in person" confrontations).

Ash explains his odd behavior himself, when Rion finally defeats 
him.  "I was created to restore Dorothy, and you were created to 
destroy her.  I know now why I could never hate you in my 
heart."  In other words, Ash approves of Rion's mission, even 
admires him for it, although it makes them enemies.

But the presence of the three "lieutenant" Galerians explains 
more about Ash.  As they reveal during the final battle, they 
are embodiments of Ash's own personality---the parts that were 
most damaged (or abnormally enhanced) by his years of torture 
and imprisonment.  Spider was the abused child who yearned to 
escape a cruel fate.  Parano was the part of Ash that hated his 
weakness, and wished to destroy it---and to some degree, Parano 
may also have represented Ash's self-destructive streak (see 
next paragraph).  Nitro was the result of an eternity of despair 
at his condition, which he tried to simply accept... and failed.

It's little wonder, given Ash's anger, misery, and self-hatred, 
that on some level he *wanted* Rion to succeed in destroying 
Dorothy's legacy.  Ash must have wanted to die at many points 
during his long imprisonment; that's a normal reaction to 
solitary confinement, and it certainly sounds as though he had 
nothing pleasant to live for.  Dorothy wouldn't have permitted 
him to self-terminate while she was alive.  By the time Dorothy 
died, (as Nitro implies) Ash had grown used to enduring his 
pain... at least on the surface.  The fact that Ash facilitated 
Rion's mission (by allowing him to live) suggests that Ash 
wanted Rion to kill him.  And although he fought to live during 
the final battle, he seemed almost happy when the time came for 
Rion to transfer the virus into him.  

Ash had struggled to become free in life, but too much of 
Dorothy's legacy tainted him.  Although he rewrote his own 
programming, he still carried out the most important command 
Dorothy implanted into him---he resurrected her, although he 
imprisoned her in the process.  This suggests that there was 
some basic core of programming within Ash that he couldn't shed 
(although he seems to have taken advantage of a "loophole" in 
it).  Between that programming, and all the anger, sadness, and 
hatred that he'd built up during his life, he was doomed to act 
out at least some of his mother's plans for him.  Death was the 
only way Ash could truly be free.  

I believe the tears he shed at that point were tears of relief, 
and perhaps gratitude toward Rion.


-----
LINGERING QUESTIONS (some gleaned from conversations on the 
GameFAQs board for Galerians: Ash)

1.	Is it possible for there to be a "Galerians 3"?

Sure.  As a living AI, Rion is copiable and can be backed-up.  
He's traveled through any number of systems over the course of 
G:A, any one of which could have copied his data.  As long as 
the files which contain his personality are intact, he's 
alive... somewhere.

For that matter... *all* of the Galerians can be resurrected 
just as easily.  

"crowmagnon", who read the first version of this plot analysis, 
has his own theory:

"And now for a speculation on possibilities in Galerians 3.  I 
don't think
Lilia's necessarily dead.  Not any more than Rion 1.0 is, 
because in a
sense, because if she had the virus program implanted in her the 
same way
that Rion's part of it was, then that would make her part AI 
too.  One
with
a more human personality, perhaps, because she didn't have any 
Galerian
abilities, and she spent her entire life as a human, in one 
incarnation.
But if, as was suggested, uploading the virus program into her 
required
any
mechanical enhancements, then perhaps a part of her might live 
as Rion did
inside Dorothy as 'backup memory.'  Backup memory which could 
possibly be
extracted by a super-hacker whiz kid like Pat.  Just a theory, 
but one
that
seems possible.  Besides, if death can't hold Rion back, why 
should it
with
Lilia? ;)"

Daniel (danyman@directvinternet.com) had a different theory:

"i read your plot analazys and post at the message bord on 
gameFaqs and if Lilia is Dead and Rion returns he may lose his 
humanity and his will to protect humans so maybe he'll try to 
destroy humans."

Well, Rion *does* have some questionable morality.  In the first 
Galerians, he killed quite a few human beings---the hospital 
staff, soldiers, etc.---without batting an eyelash.  And he 
*does* seem to be getting annoyed with the way the humans are 
treating him by the end of the second game...  so hmm.  
"Galerians 3: Rion's Revenge"?  "Galerians 4: The Return of 
Lilia"?  =)

-----
2.	Why did Rion age while his body was in cryo-sleep?  Doesn't 
"cryo-sleep" mean he was frozen?  And wasn't Rion dead?

It's pretty clear that the designers of G: A were inspired by 
"The Matrix" at several points.  One of those inspirations is 
the idea that the body can be kept alive while the mind is away-
--on life support, essentially.  I believe this was 
mistranslated as "cryo-sleep".  

Aside from this, though, there are two possible answers:

a) Rion was *brain*-dead, but his body was still functioning---
like in a coma.  Lilia kept his body in Matrixlike life-support, 
but it aged in the meantime, naturally.

b) Rion's body died after the battle with Dorothy.  Lilia, 
perhaps using Dr. Lem's Family Program research, cloned him a 
new one.  She aged it to be "chronologically correct".

It doesn't really matter in either case, since Rion's body is 
just a shell for his true AI self.

-----
3.	How could Parano, Spider, and Nitro attack Rion, if they 
had no physical bodies?

The encounters with Spider and Nitro clearly took place within 
some area of the "data world" (either Dorothy's backup memory, 
Ash's system, or cyberspace in general).  Spider's pet tarantula 
seems to have been the only real creature, because *it* attacked 
Rion in the Uranium Plant, but Spider himself never did.  Given 
how weird-looking the tarantula was, it was probably some kind 
of cyborg or maybe a robot.  

Only Rion's encounters with Parano were questionable, because 
they both seemed to take place in the real world.  The second 
one could easily have been in the data world (made to look like 
the real world by Nitro), because every "real world" scene after 
Rion's first deliberate trip back into the data world is 
suspect.

As for how Parano managed the first encounter... well, I 
couldn't figure it out, but "crowmagnon" 
(magnon_crow@hotmail.com) sent in his own suggestion.  I think 
we have a winner here, folks:

"Regarding Parano, and why he, unlike the other Galerians, 
fights Rion in
the
real world, I figured out how he did it.  Before he even 
appears, he's
always preceded by four robots that shoot bands at Rion.  One of 
these
will
latch to his arm, and shock him.  At first, it seems to simply 
be meant to
hurt him.  The first time, Parano comes out and mocks Rion while 
Rion is
forced to the floor in pain, but it was weird that the shock 
band was only
used to hurt Rion that one time in each battle.  Sure, maybe 
each band
only
had enough charge for one shock, but then why didn't the robots 
use more
when they tried to kill Rion?  It seemed to be a pretty 
effective way of
at
least incapacitating him for a few moments.  The reason why is 
because
once
Rion was shocked, it had fulfilled its TRUE purpose.  Notice how 
the shock
connects from Rion's arm to his head?  It's implanting Parano's 
'image'
Rion's mind.  This is supported by the fact that a) No one ever 
sees
Parano
face to face except Rion, who is always shocked first, and b) At 
the end
of
each battle with him, Parano vanishes.  The robots were 
physically there,
but Parano wasn't.  Maybe the shock band did have enough charges 
for
multiple shocks, though, since Parano's abilities were mostly 
electricity
based.  The attacks that seemed to be coming from Parano could 
really be
enacted through the band.  As to why go through the charade of a 
battle
instead of just killing Rion, it seems to support the theory of 
Ash (and
by
extention, Parano) not wanting to simply destroy Rion outright."

Sounds right to me.  ^_-  Thanks, crow!

-----
4.	Why did Ash and Rion kiss?

Well, you see, when two AIs love each other very much...  =P

-----
5.	Seriously, why?  Were they gay?

I think it's important to remember that neither Rion nor Ash, 
despite their appearances, are human... or male, for that 
matter.  Ash, like Dorothy, can asexually reproduce "child AIs", 
so unless you want to visualize skinny little Ash waddling 
around in a metal maternity-bodysuit  >_<  , I think you might 
be better off discarding the notion of gender altogether.  So 
there was probably no sexual component to the kisses at all, 
especially not on Ash's part (though Rion thinks of himself as 
human, so he's debatable).

It's also important to remember that this game was made in 
Japan, and in Japan comics and other media featuring "boy's 
love" content is very popular.  "Boy's love" consists of 
material in which two attractive males are either subtly or 
blatantly placed into romantic (or more than romantic =P) 
situations with each other, for the entertainment of a female 
audience.  Girls like it for the same reason boys like to see 
two women together.  It helps broaden the appeal of a game 
beyond just the young male market, so the developers can make 
more money.   So basically Ash and Rion kissed for no reason 
other than to make the hearts of girls everywhere go flutter 
flutter (and their credit cards go swipe swipe).  =P

Personally I think the kisses, were an acknowledgement that Ash 
and Rion consider each other kindred spirits.  Both of them are 
reluctant warriors forced into roles they didn't want by their 
parents.  Both of them have had difficult 
childhoods/adolescences --- Ash was abused, and Rion saw his 
whole family brutally murdered.  Both are beings out of place in 
their respective worlds:  Ash was the most mistreated of all 
Dorothy's slave-children, and Rion is mistrusted by both his own 
kind (Galerians) and the humans he's trying to save.  They also 
share a number of personality traits, both good and bad.  At one 
point Rion describes humans as 'mere mortals':  this is a good 
indication that he sometimes feels a little Galerian-ish racial 
superiority.  And it's clear Ash is working on a baby god-
complex just like mommy dearest's.  They're also both angry, 
unhappy, grimly determined people who have endured an almost 
unbearable amount of loneliness.

They probably could have been friends---or more, who knows---
under different circumstances, but as things stand the best they 
can probably do is "enemies who understand and respect each 
other a great deal".


-----

Disclaimer:  All this stuff is purely my opinion.  Feel free to 
disagree.  BTW---I will probably never update this again, so 
please post any comments/disagreements on the Galerians: Ash 
board, and chat about it with other fans.  =)