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Theories > Sky Rider Theory
Rewritten By Geoffrey Duke, August 2003
 
Panzer Dragoon Zwei was a prequel to Panzer Dragoon and shed some much needed light on our friendly dragon's origins and motivations. To avoid any ambiguity, Lagi was the first name given to the dragon of all three Panzer Dragoon games by his very first human rider, Lundi. We've yet to discover the truth, but I believe the unidentified dragon rider we caught a glimpse of in Panzer Dragoon's introduction was Lundi, only older. The unknown rider has inherited the name Sky Rider due to his current anonymity, but is best remembered as the armoured guy who passed his reins to Kyle after being shot through the chest by the Dark Dragon rider and before dying from that wound. When the Sky Rider falls to the ground dead, Lagi raises his head skyward and unleashes a shrill cry of grief. This expresses the close bond they shared. Personally, I loved how the Sky Rider selflessly sacrificed his life for the sake of the world's continued existence. Even in death, he clung to his one and only true purpose in life. If the following points aren't enough to convince you, then think about *why* a prequel to Panzer Dragoon was made if not to provide more insight into the original and mysterious rider seen in the PD1 introduction sequence.
The Seekers in Panzer Dragoon Saga loved to wear ancient armour or armour composed out of ancient relics. The Sky Rider's general appearance, helmed-visage and armour can be explained when a comparison is made between him and the style of armour the self-same Seekers wore to distinguish themselves from everyone else when they weren't trying to blend in with the rest of humanity. The rider's armour is fashioned as if improvised; the way his left shoulder pad is fitted into place in a manner out of proportion lacks any kind of symmetry. Very human if you ask me. The armour lends the rider an air of experience, or look that defines it. His exposed facial skin (around his eyes) is the colour of human flesh, failing to conform to the pale skinned trend Azel herself set. He does not have glowing eyes like his Dark Dragon counterpart does if he were a drone, which either makes him a very advanced drone, or just human. Also, the Sky Rider was far too emotional to be a drone; he practically begs Kyle to stop the Dark Dragon from reaching the Tower. Indeed, he struggles to speak due to his wound, yet manages to do so with the utmost fervour.
 
One argument that emerges time and time again from the boiling depths of the heated debate living on in the wake of the Sky Rider's death is how no human could communicate via vivid telepathy as he did. Kyle touches his outstretched arm during the final moments leading up to his death whose visual senses then enter a tunnel of gaseous blue colours representing Kyle's mind journeying into another. Once on the other side of the tunnel Kyle finds himself floating in mid-air inside a vision -- an imaginary world his senses perceive as if real. The voice of the Sky Rider asks Kyle to stop the Dark Dragon from reaching a Tower he sees the dragon approaching before his very eyes. By now Lundi and Lagi had become one, both sharing each other's thoughts and senses. The idea of Lundi speaking through Lagi with more comprehensible words as opposed to ambiguous images the dragon typically uses is not an impossibility. The true significance of the blue tunnel will become apparent further into the theory.
Another point of argument is the green light particles spiralling out of the Sky Rider's chest wound at the point of his death. Some believe that the green light was the Divine Visitor itself escaping from a dying corpse to find another host, but that would necessarily be admitting that the Divine Visitor wasn't the player. Instead of coiling into nothingness the Divine Visitor would have naturally wrapped itself around Kyle... if it was the player. One can argue that it didn't enter Kyle because Kyle couldn't enter Sestren like the Sky Rider perhaps could; it left until another opportunity presented itself. The green energy being the lifeforce of a bio-engineered creature better stands up to criticism. The colour scheme of that green energy and the colour of the green light glowing on the neck of baby Lagi are an exact match. Somehow the light they share connects them. It also seems akin to the sprinkling green energy particles Lagi emits when healing himself in Panzer Dragoon Saga. The truth is we don't know how the bonding process effected Lundi. If a drone happens to emit green particles upon death in a future Panzer Dragoon title, we'll know the truth of the matter then and there.
Team Andromeda promised that Panzer Dragoon Zwei would provide shocking revelations about the first game's storyline. What could be more shocking than learning the life of a character you grew to understand and watched grow was brought to an unforeseen end in a brave attempt to save the world? The truth, as far as I can decipher, resides in the ending cinematics:
 
Panzer Dragoon Zwei has five different cinematic endings for each of the five possible dragon shapes the dragon can assume by the end of the game. Epilogue a, b, c, and e are considered the game's primary endings because they essentially tell the same tale with the only difference being a different dragon in each. In other words, all the endings are the same in spite of differing appearances with the exception of the ending cinematic for the Type 01 dragon, which is the most difficult dragon morph to acquire in the game itself.
At the beginning of all the primary endings not long before beams of raw energy burst out of Shelcoof, Lagi levitates Lundi away from him in a green man-sized bubble and roars with sadness the moment he departs. Lundi's gun slips through his grasp in the midst of his confusion and falls to the ground below. On close inspection, his gun bears a shape resembling the gun the Sky Rider wields 18 years later I consider to be more than a mere coincidence. The Sky Rider's gun has an extra handle attached to the back, and the front is slightly more curved. The gun itself may have been upgraded.
 
Still trapped in the bubble, bright light washes over Lundi, whose senses are pulled into a tunnel of black and white colours whizzing forth at speeds too fast for the eyes to readily comprehend. His mind struggles to absorb the gravity and meaning of the surreal images shooting into it in sudden to lasting flashes.
The tunnel proves that Lagi was the one behind the telepathy in the Sky Rider/Kyle encounter. We know that drones can interface with ancient machines and link up their minds with bio-weapons, but we don't know if they can communicate on the same telepathic level with a human being. Unless Smilebit state that the Sky Rider was in fact a drone, we only know what we know about drones from Azel and Abadd. Neither have communicated with a person the way the Sky Rider did with Kyle.
  Lundi catches brief glimpses of the future including a second long flash of Kyle trapped in a bubble like he was, and an even quicker flash of the Sky Rider. What is Lundi really seeing? Can Lagi peer into the future? He could be seeing a future version of himself as well as future events. Is Lundi seeing this or are we?
Here we see a dragon in a shape that isn't familiar to us until the events of Panzer Dragoon Saga. The dragon seen here looks like the Arm Wing which goes to show how far Team Andromeda planned ahead.
 Now Lundi *is* seeing the future, either that or Lagi is giving his intents and purposes imagistic form. We see a dragon fly towards the leaning black Tower of Uru, a ruin integral to the plot of the next game. However, we didn't know what it was at the time, much less its name. The only way Lagi could know what shape he'd morph into that far into the future is if he could see it.
During all the endings Lundi will witness a link between the ancient skyship he destroyed and the Tower outside of the Imperial capital that was destroyed in Panzer Dragoon by the blending of their images as they explode with blinding rays of white energy. Lundi sees the Tower of Uru still standing after the destruction of the first two ancient weapons suggesting the mission the destroy them was incomplete. The Heresy dragon imparts the truth of the Towers to Lundi, though we only see parts. Giving Lundi all this knowledge would be a waste of time if the man didn't put it to good use. Why bother at all if his role as a rider was coming to a permanent end?
The primary endings essentially reveal Lagi's true identity. Images of Lagi crying as a baby, seen in Panzer Dragoon Zwei's first story FMV sequence, are overlapped with images of the fully grown adult dragon crying out in bereavement over his rider's death seen in Panzer Dragoon's story introduction sequence in a slow explicit fashion to leave no doubt in our minds that they are indeed the same entity at different stages of their life-span.
In order for the player to unlock epilogue d Lagi must've morphed into his ultimate form, the Type 01 dragon, before the confrontation with the final boss. Any fan of the first Panzer Dragoon will recognise the armoured blue dragon for what it is from the very first moment they lay eyes on it. Again, Lagi bringing the events Panzer Dragoon Zwei to a close in this form and remaining so for the events of Panzer Dragoon is more than merely coincidental if the events to follow weren't closely linked in time. Lundi ends Panzer Dragoon Zwei on the back of the armoured blue dragon, only for the Sky Rider to ride it into the next game in the timeline. What a remarkable coincidence indeed. You can only gain access to the cinematic sequence by maintaining perfect scores in and throughout the game, and therefore makes it toughest ending to unlock. Unlike the primary endings, much of which were told from a third person perspective, the whole of epilogue d is seen from a first person perspective. Firstly, we see Lagi in his Type 01 form flying overhead, obscuring whomever may be riding him. Secondly, clips of Lundi's vision involving the skyship and the Towers are blended and blurred to convey a commonality. Thirdly, we see Lundi in his current boyish state, slowly overlapped with an image of the hardened Sky Rider who died at the very beginning of Panzer Dragoon. Then we see the Sky Rider being shot through the stomach by a laser blast, and thus killed. The rest we know: Kyle continues his mission. The FMV moments after the vision seem to occur in the correct post-Panzer Zwei timeframe. We never actually see Lagi leave Lundi like we do in the primary endings, only the death of the Sky Rider. Why is he such a prominent figure in what is supposed to be an ending cinematic dedicated to the outcome of Panzer Dragoon Zwei? Because we are seeing what happens next to Lundi, that's why.
 
I suppose the direct overlapping of Lundi's image with the frontal image of the Sky Rider could mean they simply share the same destiny, as riders. But the fact that images of Lagi as a child and adult are overlapped to disclose the dragon's identity, suggests the similar overlapping of Lundi and the Sky Rider is a method of identification. Who am I to deny logic? What is interesting to note is how baby Lagi and adult Lagi cry out in the company of Lundi and the Sky Rider, respectively, at the same time. The combined moving images could denote both of them crying out over the same person.
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Sestren's memory orbs:
Before Edge fights Sestren incarnate, Sestren displays the events of the previous Panzer Dragoon games in the correct chronological order through a sequence of memory orbs orbiting its pulsating body. Sestren has also been keeping an eye on important events, literally, as we watch these memories through a huge oval eye. The events they replay hold more significance than anyone is prepared to understand at first glance. They are intriguing records of how Sestren perceived the outside world. If the Sky Rider was someone other than Lundi, then his story was untold because he never had a story to tell. Any activities undertaken by the Sky Rider after Panzer Dragoon Zwei and before his eventual demise -- any possible untold story of a different rider -- would've been of minimal relevance to Sestren and the Tower network, otherwise it would've been well aware of it.
In Sestren's fourth memory orb when we see Lundi riding the Type 01 dragon whilst battling the guardian dragon of Shellcoof, his gun seems nearly identical to the Sky Rider's gun seen shortly after. I believe Lundi upgraded his gun a little along his flightpath towards the inevitable final conflict.
Compare its current shape to that which we saw earlier: the front was square-shaped and the handle was placed at the centre of the horizontal shaft, whereas now the front of vertical lower half is diagonally structured and the handle is at the back. How many more upgrades would it take to tweak the gun to seem like that of the Sky Rider?
After Sestren displays the images of Lundi and Lagi killing the guardian dragon of Shelcoof, we see the mysterious Sky Rider, whom happens to be riding the same Type 01 and carrying a similar gun, killed himself. Each event depicted by Sestren occurs shortly after one another sewing the impression that Lundi and the Sky Rider are the same person.
Sestren's memory orbs *prove* that none of Panzer Dragoon Zwei's primary endings (4/5) occurred. At least, not in the way PD2 portrays them. Lagi morphed into the Type 01 dragon by the end of Panzer Dragoon Zwei, as shown to us by Sestren itself, meaning Lundi never lost his gun. If the Sky Rider was someone else, wouldn't Sestren have shown us who, or better yet, what he was?
 
Near the end of the fifth memory orb we watch Kyle's encounter with the dying Sky Rider again, only this time when Kyle extends his arm up to reach the Sky Rider, his image is swapped with a very similar image of Edge doing the very same thing. The first dragon rider hands the mission he began to Kyle, and then Edge, in a more symbolic fashion. We see all three riders in one single moment and their relationship to one another. Kyle and Edge were both hunters who kept the aim of the first rider in their sights. The pursuit of the same goal never ended.
Lagi chose Edge to be his rider in Panzer Dragoon Saga, but that alone doesn't mean he sought out separate riders every time he sprung into action. In Panzer Dragoon Zwei, Lundi was the one who chose to become Lagi's guardian as soon as he saved Lagi's life. Not the other way around. While Lagi probably chose to be born in Elpis because of the rare coolia farm residing there, he couldn't have planned for the village's code to kill all mutants. Lundi kept Lagi out of compassion, and their union was totally by chance. The beauty of Panzer Dragoon Zwei was that a dragon and its rider were born out of serendipity, and more importantly, human compassion. Lundi and the dragon he saved from the cruel clutches of death, grew up together and formed a lasting friendship. Lagi imparted unique knowledge to Lundi concerning the true purpose of the Towers, which reflected the deep trust they shared. Why would Lagi, then, choose a new rider before the beginning of Panzer Dragoon if an understanding one was already available? Kyle inadvertently witnessed the premature death of the Sky Rider. Lagi never intended Kyle to be or become his rider; Lagi chose Kyle because it was convenient for him to do so at the time, nothing more. Making sure the Sky Rider's death was not in vain, Kyle finished what he started. The pairing was, again, the product of serendipity.
At the end of all Panzer Dragoon Zwei's endings, Lundi says: "And after all this, he is still with me". Could this statement be more unambiguous? No, actually. According to Lundi's journal in Panzer Dragoon Saga, he felt that Lagi was still with him spiritually as long as he acted on the information he was entrusted. However, he could've meant what he said literally, in the context of the true ending. None of Lundi's journal entries preclude the possibility of him finding Lagi at a later date, nor do they suggest anything that could've prevented him from becoming Lagi's rider once again. Panzer Dragoon took place 18 years after Panzer Dragoon Zwei; there was plenty of time for Lundi to become a Seeker and join up with Lagi again.
Note that Gash, Lundi's protege, didn't tell Edge how exactly Lundi died. I mean, we never found out how exactly Lundi died *if* he wasn't killed during the Panzer Dragoon introduction sequence. The developers could've ended the Sky Rider suspense instead of letting it grow out of control by telling us how Lundi was killed, but didn't. Why? Perhaps because Lundi was the Sky Rider, and was killed during that introduction sequence? Gash was a very knowledgeable Seeker in Panzer Dragoon Saga, so what hasn't he told us? Lundi could've possibly rejoined Lagi, but never returned from his mission. This might explain Gash not knowing Lundi's fate, if that is the case.
![Orta is the newest addition to the Panzer Drago[o]n rider posse.](images/sky_rider_theory_19.jpg)
Notice how that in this wallpaper devoted to all the Panzer Dragoon dragon riders (though I have no idea why Azel is included) the Sky Rider is missing. His absence is conspicuous and highly questionable. I believe he's absent because he's already present. Lundi is depicted as a boy between the age of 15 to 20. Add another 18 years to that, put some armour that flaunts experience on him, and the question is answered.
To sum things up: The original dragon rider was Lundi, since Panzer Dragoon Zwei was a prequel. Then Kyle (the hunter), and finally Edge. Whoever the Sky Rider was, Lagi expressed great grief over his tragic and untimely death. This person was obviously important to him. I believe the Sky Rider was always meant to be Lundi, and that Panzer Dragoon Zwei was the story of the unknown rider. If the series had ended with Panzer Dragoon Zwei, no one would give this a second thought because everything would tie together.
Back to Page 1 of the Theories Section
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Destroy the mutant stealing habits; it is the village's code. The Will of the Ancients is an unofficial fansite that is in no way supported or associated with SEGA or Smilebit. Panzer Dragoon, Panzer Dragoon II Zwei, Panzer Dragoon Saga, Panzer Dragoon Orta and all other official Panzer Dragoon content is © SEGA, 1995-2003. Everything else on this website was made or written by Solo Wing Dragon unless otherwise noted. Please ask me first before using any content on this website for fan or commercial purposes.
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