In life, all you really need is a clean pair of underwear to face the day. Everything else will sort itself out.
Since resuming his nomadic life to help the Kougami Foundation with its research into the Core Medals, Eiji had added a few more things to his list: his cell phone and charger, to help him keep in touch with his friends; his OOO driver and case of Medals, in case he ran into trouble; and Ankh's broken Medal, as a promise that he would one day bring him back.
And so his journey brought him to Thuringia, Germany, where eight-hundred years before, the Core Medals, the Greeed, and the original OOO had been born. While the archeology teams there believed they'd unearthed most of the big artifacts there were to be found, Eiji still wanted to learn everything he possibly could. He mostly just let the professionals handle the digging and handling of everything while he wandered around and wrote down notes, but the ruins of the castle made him stop in his tracks.
It must have been majestic in its past, but it had crumbled and decayed, and what stones that weren't being overgrown with plants were blackened from age. It was easy to miss, which was what had made this dig so hard for the Kougami Foundation for ages, but it was the castle the King had ruled from.
"Careful," warned a woman as she came through. "We're still collecting artifacts here."
"Uh, sorry," Eiji apologized, reflexively in his poor German before realizing the woman spoke Japanese. "Wait, you're from the Japanese branch?"
"Yes," she answered, not looking up. And now that he was looking, he could see her light-colored hair had been dyed, and beneath her glasses, the familiar facial features of someone from his home country.
...Somehow, a little too familiar.
"What a relief," he admitted. "I've been struggling with the language this whole trip. I can get Arabic and English just fine, but something about German is harder."
She nodded politely, but kept her head down otherwise. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and turned to look at the remains of a stained glass window, long since shattered.
"This must have been the chapel where the original OOO sealed the Greeed," he said after a pause. "It's hard to believe no one found it for centuries." He looked back at her, but she was still cataloguing. "Or do you think there was another reason looters didn't take everything?"
"Superstition," she said, still not looking up. "Fear of more Greeed existing, eventually things being forgotten."
Eiji nodded himself this time, then turned back to the window. Reaching for his bag, he pulled out a candroid and started to open it...
A bullet knocked the can right out of his hand. He whirled around and saw the archeologist, holding a gun on him. All at once, Trash Yummies appeared from the forest.
"I thought you looked familiar," he said. "Foundation X—you worked for Kannagi, didn't you?"
"I did," she answered, keeping her gun trained on him. "The Foundation's crumbled since then—no thanks to the Riders."
"Didn't think they'd want you back," he admitted.
"You could say I'm on probation," she said. "It was easy enough to convince them that we defectors only wanted stronger leadership and a more proactive stance against the Riders, only to learn too late how crazed Kannagi really was. After all, I was only an enforcer; I didn't directly participate in the coup. "
"What do you want?" he asked.
"Right now, your Medals," she demanded.
Carefully, Eiji reached for his case and tossed it to the ground. The agent motioned for one of her Yummies to bring it to her, and she glanced at the contents.
"It's complete," Eiji said, his voice flat but tense. It wasn't the first time he'd been held hostage, and old memories were weighing on him. "The rest of the Medals were destroyed by PuToTyra."
The agent judged him carefully before allowing the Yummies to grab him. "If you're lying, it'll be harder on you later."
"You're going to kill me anyway," he argued. "What's the point of cooperating?"
The Yummies pulled him forward, and the agent kept up her pace by him, keeping him in sight at all times and never too far away in front or back.
"I'm not Kannagi, who boasted about his plans before they were complete," she said. "Suffice to say, my mission is to bring you back alive."
Eiji kept a look out around him, watching every tree and shadow. Seeing this, the agent said, "If you're looking for an escape route, you're out of luck. My men have already taken out the archeology team and its security detail. They're everywhere"
"I already figured that part," he said, with a hint of a confident smile. "You wouldn't be good kidnappers if you hadn't. So I'm glad I called for backup."
To her credit, the agent didn't stop—immediately dropping as the blast from a Birth Buster hit the tree behind her before leaping for the shooter. But it was enough confusion for Eiji to rip his arm free from one of the Yummies and jump up and kick the other one back.
With him free, a contingent of Kougami Foundation security officers burst out of hiding, shooting at the Yummies and the agent with their Birth Busters. The agent had just a moment to give Eiji a shocked look, to which he grinned, holding up his phone.
"Candroids aren't the only way to call for help," he said. "We already knew Foundation X was in the area, so we were ready. Those archeologists you thought you killed were all security agents, and the security team were the elite unit. They were all ready for you." The agent glared at him, her face beginning to transform—a Mutamit, one of Foundation X's augmented human projects.
The security detail was still firing on her as Eiji pulled out the OOO Driver and his second ace-in-the-hole—the Super TaToBa Medals he'd received from a Rider from the future, Minato Miharu. The agent shifted into a golden jaguar creature and dashed toward him, but he transformed and quickly knocked her aside, getting the case out of her hands. He raced toward it, faster than the Mutamit could perceive, and paused only to start drawing Medals.
"Probably want LaToraTah," he muttered. "This form's a little overkill."
But with him in one place for a moment, the Mutamit was able to attack, striking him with a wooden-looking rod embedded with black blades; Eiji had no doubt that those were specially designed just for him. He didn't have the luxury of changing combos now; overkill would have to do. A security officer tossed him a case. Without missing a beat, he sliced it open with his claws, revealing the Medajalibur. The Mutamit came at him again, and he met her sword, but she produced a small black knife and slashed at him beneath his guard, forcing him to back away. It looked like stone, like obsidian maybe, but it was sharp enough to leave a scratch in his armor.
He was going to have to end this now, and he started to load Cell Medals into the Medajalibur, but the Mutamit knocked the case out of his hand with her knife. He kicked her back to keep her from grabbing them, but it meant he was going to have to improvise. He removed the Core Medals from the Driver and inserted them, just as the Mutamit charged him again. He scanned the Medals and slashed at her, just as her sword met his.
A wave of energy tore reality in two. The backlash engulfed them, and for a moment, everything was white. But the rift healed itself quickly, and they both collapsed to the ground, reverting forms. Eiji tried to catch his breath and immediately caught a whiff of something awful. There was an open latrine nearby—he'd dealt with the persistent stench before in some of his travels, and he knew to try to calm his breathing. The Foundation X agent wasn't so lucky, and he could hear her gagging and retching. This made for the perfect time to escape.
Eiji stood up and realized all of a sudden that he was no longer in the forest, standing before the ruins of a medieval castle. Instead, he was in a village of some kind, with a majestic castle standing not far in the distance. He quickly grabbed his notebook and compared it against what he'd written and drawn—there was no way to prove it for sure, but it looked like the same one.
A voice called out to him in what sounded like German. His difficulties with the language made it impossible to understand what was being said, but it was the voice that made him turn—a voice he heard every time he scanned a Medal. And impossibly, surrounded by a small army of knights, was OOO.
It took him a moment to put it together—alternate worlds and Riders were possible, but the intact castle and the language still sounding like German were proof of a far more devastating realization: they'd traveled back in time. The Medals that had transcended time had taken them back to the days of the first OOO, when the original Medals they'd been patterned off of had been created. But in the time it took for him to realize this—and realize just how serious the consequences were—the King ordered his knights to seize Eiji and the agent, and the single most suspicious item in their possession.
In retrospect, trying to argue, in broken German, mind you, "We're not your enemy!" when you have a sword lying on the ground next to you is not a helpful defense. The fact the agent was his enemy didn't help things either.
The knights seized them and started to march them toward the castle. The agent was trying to get free, but Eiji didn't bother. Resisting now was only going to be a waste of energy—energy he'd need later. As it stood, he didn't have much in the way of options.
There was a chance that the energy flux from the Medals could send them back to their own time spontaneously. Or a portal from the future could open, like the ones Miharu had used to travel to his time a few years before. Or with the very real possibility he could set history off-track with a wrong breath, Nogami Kotaro or Momotaros might have arrive with DenLiner. But each possibility seemed as unlikely as the next.
"They think we're assassins," the agent muttered.
"Well, we didn't exactly look innocent," he admitted.
"Are you just going to let them take us?" she challenged. "Or do you have something else to get us out of this?"
"I've got nothing," he said, trying his best not to sulk. OOO had seized everything in his pockets, the bracelet from his wrist, and the shawl he'd worn in place of a jacket. "They even took my underwear for tomorrow."
She stared at him with an eyebrow raised. He shrugged. He wasn't about to talk to an evil, kidnapping, merchant of death about his grandfather. Growling under her breath, she started to produce her knife as Eiji stared in horror.
"When I say so, get down," she whispered.
"You can't!" he whispered back.
But before she could attack, electricity hit a tree near them. The agent didn't wait to pull him down, and he hit the ground hard. OOO turned and growled, "Uva."
"What?" Eiji asked, but the agent pulled him back down.
OOO turned to his knights. "Get the prisoners to the castle. I'll handle this."
A young woman in blue ran up, crying, "Your Majesty! Your Majesty, please!"
OOO looked at her, and his voice was harsh. "Gerhild."
She stopped and curtseyed nervously. "I know, I was banished from your sight. But please—there are two of those Yummies attacking."
"Two?" OOO repeated.
"The second is from the bird Greeed," she insisted. "I only just managed to escape—it's taken the children hostage!"
OOO turned to another few knights. "You, search for the bird Yummy. I'll take care of the one in the village and the Greeed." To the woman, he insisted, "I'll deal with you later."
But as he was about to order the remaining knights to the castle with Eiji and the agent, he noticed them suddenly missing from the area.
"Where are the prisoners?" he demanded.
In fact, the agent had grabbed Eiji by the wrist and dragged him toward the forest the moment the King's attention was on the young woman.
"Where are you going?" Eiji insisted.
"Away from here," she answered.
"But the Yummy..." he protested.
"Not our time, not our battle!"
He started twisting his wrist, trying to get free, but she tightened her grip and pulled him to the ground, pulling his arm behind his back.
"I've done my research on you," she insisted. "I know how you think. After high school, you went on a worldwide tour on your father's money to provide relief to other countries. Your travels ended when you landed yourself in the middle of a civil war in the hottest region in Africa at the time and refused to leave before it was too late. Your father paid ransom to get you out, then had his men retrieve you from the international aid hospital when you hadn't even seen a doctor yet. Because he was afraid any news of you receiving psychiatric treatment would affect his career, he never let a therapist near you, and it's amazing you're even still functional because of it. Probable posttraumatic stress disorder, definite martyr complex. No desire for yourself, only for others."
He shouted as she pushed down on him again. He could feel his shoulder being stretched past his limit. But there were more important things to worry about, and he cried out, "There are people out there, dying!"
"They're already dead!" she shouted back. "They died eight-hundred years ago, and I don't have any intention of doing the same!"
He stared off into the forest. Somewhere out there were Yummies and Greeed attacking people. There was no portal waiting to take him home, no time train ready to stop his interference—only the screams of people as they fled the attack.
An idea hit him as she twisted his arm again. "The...the sword."
She loosened her grip only slightly, just so he could talk without screaming. "What about it?"
"The Super Medals," he said. "They're still with the sword. That's the only way we'll make it back—their power is time, so they went back to when the originals were created. It should work the other way too. OOO still has them."
She let go, and Eiji moved his arm back with a groan. As he sat up, she asked, "Did they get your Driver?"
"I don't know," he admitted, rubbing his shoulder. "I wasn't wearing it when the knights grabbed us—I don't know if it's back there, or if the King has it, or..."
"We can't go back where we were right now," she argued. "Any other plans?"
No. No plan, no rescue from future Riders, no time-traveling train, no phone, no charger, no notebook, no Medals, no Driver, no sword, no underwear.
"I never have a plan," he admitted, and though she scoffed, he stood up, holding a hand out to her. "The only way we're going to get the sword and Medals back is if we follow the King. We're going to have to earn his trust."
"He'd be a fool to, " she argued, but she still took his hand and stood up. "But it's the best we've got."
"Then we need to get to the village," he said. "The King will be there."
"And how exactly are we going to earn his trust, then?" she challenged.
He grinned. "By saving as many people as we can. Come on!"
He ran toward the village, and she sighed as she took chase. "You're lucky Foundation X needs you alive."
Contrary to her expectations, Eiji actually was extremely methodical about his actions during a battle. The moment he ran in, he took note of the fires, the injured civilians, and the collapsing houses. Mental triaging took place rapidly—the civilians had to be ushered away from the fires and buildings first, so he rushed over, urging in limited modern German, "This way, this way!"
"Over here!" insisted the woman from before.
Eiji looked at her and nodded before pointing people over her way. The agent, also running evacuations, saw her and looked his way.
"Her again," she noticed.
He nodded. The woman was moving people toward the edge of the forest, and now more people were recovering from their shock and following her.
"The King doesn't like her," she pointed out.
"Well, right now, I do," he insisted. Looking to the nearest house, he insisted, "Come on!"
It was as if the wood had completely rotted away. A man was trying to hold up his burning thatch roof while his wife tried to get their sheep and pigs out. Eiji immediately ran over to help the man hold up the thatch bundles while the agent produced her knife and cut a safer exit route.
"Through here!" she insisted in German. "Hurry!"
The husband looked at Eiji, who nodded before they both let go of the roof and ran. The man's wife grabbed him in a grateful hug while Eiji rubbed at his shoulder—the strain was getting worse.
"Hino," the agent warned.
"Another one," he insisted, making his way toward another house.
This one wasn't on fire, but it was in roughly the same straits—portions of the roof had collapsed on a woman inside. Eiji grabbed her hand and pulled as the agent cut her free from the bundles of thatch, then helped her out of the house altogether. He took one look at a rotted support beam and looked at her.
"It's the Yummy."
She nodded. "Guess someone was tired of fixing houses. Or wanted more to fix."
"Guess so," he answered, trying to stretch his arm.
"You're going to kill yourself at this rate," she pointed out.
"Then I won't be any use to you, right?" he challenged.
She sighed in exasperation. "You win. You want to help someone? Let's find those children."
He smiled slightly out of relief. "Thanks, Agent..."
"Solaris," she answered simply.
"Solaris," he agreed. "Let's see if anyone else knows where they went."
But the woman from before made her way over to them. In limited Japanese, she asked, "Children?"
Both Eiji and Solaris stared at her in shock. They were in Germany in the 1200s. While Japan hadn't yet instituted its isolationism policies, it was hard to believe that a young woman from an obscure kingdom in Thuringia would speak any Japanese.
"You speak our language?" Eiji asked.
She looked at them helplessly, not understanding a word. Picking up on it, Solaris asked in German, "A little bit, right? How?"
"I used to live in the castle," she explained. "Until a few months ago."
"The King?" she guessed, while Eiji watched the conversation hopelessly.
She nodded. "I was his lover. When I repeatedly failed to bear him a child, he sent me away."
"What's going on?" Eiji asked, completely lost.
"She was banished," Solaris translated. "For failing to provide the King with an heir."
His expression darkened somewhat as he nodded. In the little German he could manage, he put his hand to his chest and said, "I am Eiji." Then, to his newfound time-traveling partner, he added, "Solaris."
"Gerhild," the woman replied, placing a hand on her own chest. Looking to Solaris, she begged, "Please. I know where the children are. You have to help!"
Some things didn't need translating. Eiji looked directly at Gerhild and insisted, "We'll help."
The relief on her face was plain as day, and in Japanese, she said, "This way!"
She led them through the forest, and Eiji tried to sort everything out in his mind. She spoke very limited Japanese. The Core Medals all had names either in Japanese or English. Since both were connected to the King, it was possible that he spoke both languages, in addition to the local German. And Gara had spoken flawless Japanese, even if a bit antiquated. There was a connection somewhere, and it could explain how the Tokugawa clan had came to possess the orange Core Medals.
The sounds of crying suddenly came into earshot, and they stopped before a circle of stones in a clearing, surrounding a pit. Eiji chanced a look inside and saw dozens of children—several older children, a few younger children, and many, many babies.
"How many of them are there?" he asked in shock.
Gerhild only had to watch Eiji's body language to figure out what he was saying, and she explained to Solaris, "There were a lot of babies born this year."
Eiji reached down into the nest to try to grab a child's hand. He was almost there when something barreled in, striking him directly in the ribs. He skidded down the side of the nest and rolled, clutching his side when he finally stopped. He looked up and saw the Yummy responsible—a giant penguin. He would have laughed at the absurdity if he could breathe right.
"Hino!" Solaris shouted, shifting directly to her Mutamit form.
"I'm fine!" he insisted, despite all evidence to the contrary. "We need to get the kids out of there!"
Solaris brought her sword down on the Yummy, but it blocked with a flipper. "Move!"
Nodding, Eiji got up and sprinted for the edge of the nest. Gerhild had run over to the edge to try to help the children, but when she saw him and saw what Solaris had transformed into, she picked up stones and started throwing them at him.
"No, we're..." Eiji stammered, trying to shield himself while struggling with the translation. "We're here to help!"
But she continued throwing rocks, forcing him back. As he backed up, he couldn't help but notice Gerhild hadn't left the edge. She was protecting the children, the same way a bird Yummy would protect its parent.
The realization hit him harder than the stones. Gerhild couldn't have children. They hadn't yet seen this Yummy's parent.
He ran toward her, ignoring the rocks continuing to hit him. The Yummy broke away from Solaris and made a dash toward Gerhild, but Eiji intercepted in time, pushing her out of the way and taking the bone-cracking hit that sent him rolling down into the nest. He dug in his hands and feet to slow himself down so he wouldn't land on anyone, and by the time he reached the bottom, his hands were raw.
He looked up. The younger children and the babies were all crying. The older ones were forming a barrier in front of them, watching him suspiciously.
"Ah, it's okay," he insisted, trying for his best German. "It's okay."
They didn't seem to believe a word he was saying. This wasn't uncommon for him, between fighting as OOO and his own travels around the world. But usually, he was able to offer something to help them out. He had nothing this time—just the laces on his boots, and his belt.
"I can maybe make a rope," he said to himself, unlacing his shoes and tying them together. They weren't strong enough on their own, but secured to his belt and twisted together, that was something else. But when he tried to reach his makeshift rope toward the edge of the nest, it didn't reach.
"So much for that idea," he sighed. "Solaris?"
Above, she was again locked in battle against the Penguin Yummy. She managed to get her knife in underneath its defenses, but it slapped her back with a flipper in rage.
"In the middle of something!" she yelled.
Gerhild was still watching the battle with apprehension, but Eiji's actions to save her from the Yummy had confused her. How could someone allied with a monster do something like that? She looked over the edge of the nest and saw him trying his best to reason with the children, crouching down to ask them to climb on his shoulders to safety. But they were all too frightened to trust him.
"It's all right," she called down to them. "We'll get you out of there!"
Eiji gave her a grateful look as the first child hesitantly climbed onto his shoulders. He stood up and walked over toward Gerhild, hefting the kid up. She reached down and managed to grab hold, getting him out.
The success emboldened the other children, and they started running up. But Eiji looked back at the youngest and held up his hands, trying to explain, "No, the babies first!"
As they stopped, he took off his shirt, tying it into a sling. He tied his rope around it, then gestured at the tallest child to bring him one of the babies. A baby went into the sling, and Eiji hefted the child onto his shoulders, where he sat carefully, while Eiji handed up the sling. The boy reached the sling up to Gerhild, who retrieved the baby before sending it back down again.
With a system in place, the children began loading one infant at a time into the sling so Eiji could send them up. His arms burned and his back ached, but he kept up pace, passing up the sling so Gerhild could rescue the babies first. He was on the last one when he heard Solaris shout in pain. He almost jumped, but he kept his hold on the sling and on the child on his shoulders.
"Solaris!" he cried.
Gerhild turned. Solaris had fallen, reverting to human form as she lost consciousness. The Yummy turned toward Gerhild and spotted the babies and child at her side. It tilted its head for a moment before squawking and moving toward her.
"Stay back!" she yelled, scooping up more rocks and throwing them.
The attacks only made the Yummy angrier. It started to slide toward her, and she immediately put herself in front of the children. But a sudden attack from behind threw the Yummy into the nest.
Gerhild looked over in surprise to see OOO. "Your Majesty..."
He glanced only momentarily at the children behind her. Then, with a scan of his Medals, he prepared his final attack.
The second the Yummy fell into the nest, the remaining children crowded around Eiji for protection. Still holding the baby, he helped the boy off his arms and looked around for any options. There was nothing he could attack with, nothing he could shield the children with other than his own body.
"Get down!" he shouted, gesturing for them to stay low.
The Yummy attacked, striking him hard on his back as he crouched over them, refusing to let go of the baby. But before another attack could hit, a burst of heat hit his back, throwing him onto the children before he could do anything to correct his stance. Hot Cell Medals fell down onto him, and he managed to turn his head to see OOO standing in the remaining flames. Their eyes met, and OOO clearly took in the children Eiji was shielding and the sling in his arms.
Eiji tried to stand up, but the pain all over his body was too much. He collapsed, and OOO ran forward, catching him before he could land on the children again. But he could feel his consciousness slipping, and before he could drop the sling, he tried to hold up the baby to OOO. OOO realized what he was doing and scooped up the baby in one hand, and Eiji was able to smile in relief before everything went dark.
Kamen Rider OOO is the property of Toei and Ishimori Productions. Solaris's Mutamit form is based off of Jaguar Van, one of the Neo-Shocker monsters who appeared in Eight Riders vs. Galaxy King, which Megamax was a massive tribute to. Quite a bit of this is based off of Wonderful: The Shogun and the 21 Core Medals, and it also includes references to the various other movies Eiji has appeared in. Namely that I'm not going to overlook that he has time-traveling friends on DenLiner.
Overall, this fic ignores the OOO novel by Nobuhiro Mori, the summary of which can be found online. While some details are interesting, it doesn't seem to mesh well with what we see in canon, so I've elected to ignore it and write my own crazy story.
I have to own up and admit that a lot of the writing style is inspired by my friend Shaun Garin/drunkpandaren, with whom I've collaborated for many years, so our styles tend to bleed over. Speaking of bleedover, there's influence from Book 4 of The Legend of Korra, which I watched at the time of this writing and was dealing with something that looked very similar to PTSD; the events that happened to Korra in the finale of Book 3 also influenced how I handle what's coming toward the end of the fic.
I've done quite a bit of research into life in the 1200s and Thuringia and Germany in roughly that era, so forgive me if I've gotten anything wrong. Alchemy is even harder to work with because OOO kind of runs on magic. And the title comes from a line in Elton John's "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?" which proves I'm a massive dork; I have been wanting to use this for an OOO fic for a while now. The chapter title is a loose translation of a line from "Time Judged All."
As a warning, while this is not a Stockholm syndrome fic...I'm not going to deny that I've done the research on that, as well as on PTSD, and that Eiji is in a position where he has to depend on Solaris. So I'm trying to cover this carefully, without relying too much on Stockholm syndrome or on its absolutely terrible portrayals in some media.
Any quotes from the series come from TV-Nihon's subtitles.
Originally posted 11/1/14 at Archive of Our Own.