With hearts toward none II
1999:
Sumire looked from Woz to the girl in confusion, the question on her lips—'What's a singularity point?'—as the weight of Geiz collided with her, and the two of them were cast down before the advancing goat, steam pouring from its nostrils, the staff held high above its head.
"Idiot!" Geiz shouted pulling herself up, glancing back at Sumire as if their collision was somehow her fault.
Several shots from Tsukuyomi's blaster hit the pavement before the beast, burning it black, preventing its advance even as the man wearing the Geiz RX armour continued forward, the gun held out before him.
"She's a fixed point in time, a being around whom time flows regardless of how much the context changes."
Ahead, the goat howled in rage, the staff held up, the sound of police sirens in the distance, growing ever closer.
"And somehow she's connected to this monster," Geiz said, hefting up her ax once more, preparing to re-join the fight.
With a final effort, the woman broke free of Woz's grasp, pulling away from her, stumbling, falling to the ground, her face still full of fear and confusion, her mouth still open in a scream.
The staff came down, striking Geiz and Tsukuyomi away, the dark eyes of the creature focused on Sumire, the silver and purple of her armour, the weight of the Masked RideWatch's additions adorning her now familiar appearance.
She lifted up her sword, trembling as the cries of the woman behind her turned to sobs. This wasn't right, she told herself, something about this was wrong. She felt a gaze upon her, cruel eyes, and suddenly lifted her head, looking up towards the roof of the train station, seeing the Timejacker, Spade, hands deep in the pockets of his trowsers, his lips twisted in a cruel smile.
"Woz!" she cried out.
Behind her, the older woman jerked her head up, attention drawn away from the sobbing form of Shimazaki. Too late, the Timejacker was amongst them, his own blade drawn, striking each of the three armoured figures in turn, placing himself between them and the goat.
A spell formed on Woz's lips, yet she was unable to complete it.
"Way of Ble—"
The breath rushed out of her, she doubled over, No Rider suddenly before her, its breastplate shattered and concave, as if recently having incurred some wound. Yet whatever pain it felt did not prevent it from drawing back its fist and striking her again, knocking her sideways as it reached down and seized hold of the shuddering woman.
At the creature's touch, black spirit flames ignited, Akane's body consumed.
"You're always just one step behind, aren't you?" Spade crowed with glee, throwing his arms wide, the felled figures of the three friends before him. "Now witness the birth of a true singularity point, the dawn of a new era of misrule!"
1992:
The staff swung out, holding them back, the horned creature towering above them, the voices of the villagers now resounding from below, each of them trapped in their own dreams, their own nightmares.
"Pape Gorgom, pape Gorgom aleppe!"
"We can't fight like this," the other Den-o grunted, his fists held up before him, as despite his words, it was clear that his intent was to keep trying.
"Whether you chuse to fight or not, the end will be the same," a voice announced.
Hana felt a chill run down her spine. From behind the shape of the Imajin, a young man, older than her, dressed in a trailing brown cloak decorated with empty circles of silver stepped out of the shadow, his hands upon the shoulders of a girl no older than 17, her scrawny frame hidden beneath a shapeless white gown, her face expressionless, her eyes dull.
It was instantly clear that she moved only because the older boy directed her, that had he not guided her, she would have remained stoic and incapable of motion, hidden in the shadow of the black goat of the woods.
"Kyoko's friend!" the other figure called out in alarm, every word he said sounding overstated to Hana. "Akane! Pull yourself together!"
The other man looked upon them, his lips curling in a smirk, his fringe of bleached hair falling over one eye.
"Kamen Rider Black, Minami Kotaro," he announced, his voice full of mocking amusement.
The other figure—Kamen Rider Black—tightened his gloved fists in anger, the sound of the leather creaking, protesting.
"Gorgom! What have you done to Akane?"
Ignoring him, the other man turned to look at Hana.
"And Den-o, of course, I would have thought the scene might have attracted you." He paused, narrowing his eyes, his nostrils flaring, as if catching a scent. "Yet still in your grub form?"
He turned the girl before him, angling her so she remained his shield, standing alongside the goatish Imajin.
"Not Nogami, not the girl child either." His eyes widened with understanding. "Ah, yes, the other singularity point, the other little girl, Kohana or some such."
"Hana," she said firmly, unfamiliar with the other names used. "My name is Hana."
A horrifying sensation of dismay settled in her stomach as it dawned on her that this man was from the future, that whatever his plan was, he had already enacted it. He was a time traveller, she realised with unsettled awe—another time traveller, independent of the Owner, independent of the Den Liner.
His smile widened, as if he sensed her thoughts.
"Exactly," he purred, "and as such, you should know that the contract has already been made, that summoner and summoned are already bound together, and there is nothing that either you nor Tokiwa Sumire can do about it."
Tokiwa Sumire. The name echoed in her thoughts, carrying with it a sense of dread.
Swiftly, Black darted forward, lashing out above the girl's head, the boy with the blonde hair leaning to the side, avoiding the punch, swiftly bringing his hand up and snapping his fingers together.
Hana felt a fearful weight descend upon her, a sense of heaviness that held her in place, prevented her from moving. Frozen in his tracks, Minami Kotaro stood silent, one arm extended, the girl in the white robe so close to him that, if inclined, she might have thrown her arms about his waist.
"No," smiled the young man, his eyes glinting with cruelty and mischief. "No, I don't think so, Kamen Rider Black."
Before them, independent of the arrested time, he reached out and placed a hand on the back of the girl's head, and her body opened up like the blossoming of a flower.
1988:
"What do I want out of life?"
She turned and looked at him with surprise, as if the question had never occurred to her, her eyes blinking slowly as she took in the details of him, older than her by five years, his shoulders already so broad, his stature already so imposing. They said that you grew a lot in these formative years of youth, and that you got smaller as you got old, but to witness her brother and father standing next to each other nowadays, it was startling to see how much taller Takashi was than their father now.
Akane sighed and wondered if she would ever be that tall.
"Yeah," Takashi said, and then repeated his question, "What do you want out of life?
He stood with his back to her, his hands in the sink as he washed the dishes after dinner, and she idly sat at the kitchen table, awaiting his inevitable reminder that it was her turn to dry.
She shrugged nonchalantly and laughed, kicking her legs out underneath the table in a lazy rhythm. It was early summer, and despite the unusual rain of the morning, the afternoon sunlight was warm and bright as it poured in through the kitchen window.
"I don't know, I'm only 13-years-old," she protested, indignant that such a question had been asked of her.
He nodded, but did not immediately reply, and she thought the situation dropped, which suited her just fine.
"You should think about it," he said at last, breaking his silence, turning slowly from the sink to look at her. "You're capable of great things, Akane. Time passes so quickly, and there's so much that people will expect from you, that they will want from you. You need to decide quickly what it is that you want."
She looked at him with confusion, blinking slowly as she tried to take in what he said.
"Okayyy," she said at last, drawing out the single word, "I will."
His expression became stern, and for a moment, she was worried that she had upset him, had made him angry somehow, though she wasn't certain how.
"Good," he said, and turned away.
Outside, the light of the sun seemed to obscure the details of his form, making him seem dark, ominous, bestial even.
1999:
'Scissors!' the belt announced as Geiz jammed a second RideWatch into the open slot. 'Armour time! Cruel Gladiator! Scissors!'
With shimmering claws of wicked steel, Geiz snapped through the staff of the goat creature, shearing it in two. Growling with disgust, the creature tossed it away, bowing its head and ramming her with its curled horns and hardened head.
Shimazaki continued to cry out, whilst before her, Spade stood with smug satisfaction, pulling free his own Faizphone and shooting wildly, holding Geiz and Tsukuyomi at bay, the light of the energy blasts playing across their near-identical armour.
Decision, Sumire, she told herself. Time to make a decision.
'You know, there's a rumour that at the end of the world, a Demon King will rise up and take over the world.'
The words echoed in her mind as she twisted, bringing her blade up, deliberately missing the Timejacker yet forcing him to leap back from its edge nonetheless. Whatever Woz told her, whatever rumours there was that Akane might have heard, she believed in her ability to decide her own fate, to become a powerful and just ruler, not whatever corrupt and tyrannical figure ruled over the future that Geiz and Tsukuyomi hailed from.
On the ground before her, Akane sobbed, her form consumed with tongues of black fire. Behind her she heard the ruined staff of the goat clatter to the ground. Geiz's scissor-claws driving the monster back. Even for the Imajin, time was supposed to progress in a linear fashion, their arrival from the future into the past unlocking points earlier in the timeline, moments they could take advantage of, yet whatever it was Spade had done, whatever damage he had wrought to the timeline had changed the rules—and because of this it was Akane who suffered.
She turned again, and the edge of the Zikan Girade clashed against the steel of Spade's cruel wakizashi, the boy's face close to hers as he pushed back. In alarm, she noticed the misshape of his nose, the swollen lavender bruising, the suggestion of events she had no knowledge of, no understanding of.
"You can't stop it," he continued, indifferent of any compassion she might have been inclined to show him, "all of this has already taken place. You've failed, just as you failed before in 1984, just as you will fail again, and again, and again."
A chill ran down Sumire's back, and before her, Spade smirked with cruel intent. She felt tears in her eyes, that stubborn compassion she felt refusing to go away. What made someone commit to such actions as he had, she asked herself; what
"All along you thought Badan was your foe, and instead you ignored the awakening of Gorgom!"
With all his strength, he pushed with his short sword, throwing Sumire backwards.
"Don't listen, your majesty!" cried Woz in alarm. "Even as a boy, Spade was prone to overstating his victories. In the future, you are an unrivalled power, a ruler to whom none before might compare, your understanding of the battlefield second to none!"
That, thought Sumire sadly, was exactly what she did not want.
She heard the goat-beast cry out in alarm, the sound of it echoing amongst the chaos of their surroundings, and though she did not witness the Imajin's defeat, it was enough to hear it fall, to know that whatever she might have feared, Geiz and Tsukuyomi had stood soundly at her back.
That left—
A pained, inhuman cry escaped Akane's lips, her body yanked upwards to her feet like a puppet on strings, eyes wild with pain, lips pulled back to reveal the gums and white teeth of her mouth, her body burning within the black flame, No Rider still holding onto her despite the burning.
Desperately, Sumire threw herself forward, and again her blade crashed against Spade's short sword.
"I told you before! You can't stop it!"
From Woz's sleeve, a length of tightened knotted material unfurled, winding itself about Akane, arresting her struggle.
"Your majesty!" Woz cried in warning, backhanding the shambling shape of No Rider out of the way, her fist slamming hard into its face, sending it staggering away.
The shadow-fire burnt through it almost instantly, and Shimazaki Akane howled with rage and pain—and then fell abruptly silent.
The light of the fire dimmed, and where Akane had been now was the twisted caricature of her former self, dressed in a uniform of white hemmed with purple, her body warped and misshapen, bound in seeping cables and wires, some mechanical, others disturbing organic. Steam rose from the shape of her, curling about her as she stood alone, her face expressionless, her eyes dull, lacking all of the characteristic emotion they had held previously.
"Akane!" Sumire cried in alarm. "Akane!"
From behind her came the howl of the wind, sand and dust stirring up, the goat Imajin taking form once more.
Sumire turned from Akane's dull expression to Spade, his face full of glee and cruelty.
"Behold," he said, gesturing towards Akane with a flourish of his hands, "Lilith, mother of monsters."
Abruptly, she came to life, emotion surfacing within her, anger and pain rich in her dark eyes. She threw out her hand, and the goat let slip its staff, the shaft of silver soaring throw the air and into her hands.
Twisting her lips, she turned to look upon Sumire. The other girl felt her heart stutter in her chest, a sudden wave of pain to see the woman who had so readily agreed to help them now transformed by Spade's cruel machinations.
"Now," she said, her voice low, her fury barely under control, the words rising from within her into the sound of a deafening command, "make my monster grow!"
With force, she drove the staff down into the ground.
1992:
For the longest moment, she stood there, a hole open within her, the depths of an impossible world glimpsed inside her. There was an old story, she remembered, a story from long before she had ever laid eyes upon the sea of eternity and the sands of time, a demon that had possessed the means of lifting a person out of their skin and holding them in the sky so that they might see all the world around them; within the open body of Shimazaki Akane, Hana now thought she glimpsed the suggestion of such a gift, the terrible expanse of a dimension beyond which human minds could not conceive.
The door within her closed, the flesh sealing up, and Hana felt her stomach churn, a tremble of fear running through her. When the Imajin had escaped after her timeline had collapsed, they had gone into the sands of the time and drifted out from there into the history of the world, dispersed amongst the years and moments. She brought her fists up to defend herself, the wicked short sword of her opponent striking against the amour of her forearms, sparks flying, the reverberation of the impact rattling her bones.
She fell back as the other—Kamen Rider Black—pushed forward and took her place, and she felt something close to resentment. She knew that the Den-o armour was not really hers, she knew that, despite being a singularity point, she was not strong enough to employ the armour as it was meant to be used, that the whole reason Owner had picked her was that he thought she had possessed this potential, and though he never said it, she took it as a sign of his disappointment that upon realising the limit of her skill, he continued to search for one who might use it as intended.
The anger and resentment welled up, the recollection of the lost pass that had brought her to 1992. Was this what Shimazaki Akane had felt too as she had given birth to the Imajin?
With a rising cry of frustration, she rushed forward, pulling back her fist, unsettling her companion as he barely had time to step out of the way, and she drove her hand forward, the crack of her armour-plated knuckles and the summoner's face, his head thrown back, a spurt of blood erupting from his nose as the cartilage broke.
"Look out!" came the sound of Black's voice at her side.
She felt something whisk past her, the thrill of excitement as she realised she had narrowly avoided something, and then there was Black, the coloured stripes of his armour glowing with intensity as he pushed back against another assailant, a creature that, again, was not unlike the Den-o armour, and yet was weirdly alien, organic even, as if ruinous flesh had grown up over the armour inherited by whatever lay beneath.
Hastily, Hana reached for the pass, her heart trembling as the creature bore down upon Black, saliva pouring from its open jaws.
'Hammer Form,' the belt called out as the pass moved across its surface.
There were a finite number of upgrades that could be employed with the Den-o armour, she had discovered. Refusing to commit to a definite answer when questioned, Owner had turned his attention away from her, focusing on the plate of rice before him, the tiny flag on the cocktail stick, the fork in his hand, as he simply said that if there was a way in which a singularity point could summon companions to their aid, then the applications of the armour might extend far beyond what it was capable of now. Hana, however, did not have companions, and as such, she was limited to what little armoury came as standard; the free package, she thought sourly, without all the downloadable content.
Still, there was Hammer Form, a chain coalescing from light about her wrist, a massive stone hammer held in her grasp, the breastplate of the armour turning from silver to lavender—the lavender of bruises, she thought sadly.
Now it was her time to deliver a warning.
"Move!" she shouted, and without questioning her, Black leapt back.
Good boy, she thought, swinging the hammer, the chain growing taut. The monster looked up, and the weight of it smashed into its chest, shattering the armour, throwing it back into the dirt, an animal yelp escaping its open maw. She yanked back on the chain, pulling the hammer again to her grasp, turning towards the young man with the broken nose.
With displeasure, blood running into his mouth, the summoner regarded the two of them unhappily. His lips parted, a further threat, a further warning forming—and suddenly there was a rush of movement, a blur of silver steel, and with a gasp, Hana turned, and inexplicably found herself spirited away.
1999:
She looked up at the shape above her, the Imajin swelling, blossoming, flesh erupting upwards in a spewing tower of coarse fur and tremulous muscle, a colossal black goat, its head thrown back, a bleating cry echoing like thunder amidst the clouds, and then with hesitation, turned towards Spade, his face distorted in a cruel smile, No Rider crouching at his feet, saliva leaking from its jaws, and Akane, her body trembling, her hands grasped about the staff with its cruel serpents. No, Sumire thought, this can't be Akane's destiny, this can't be who Akane was meant to be.
She felt Geiz's hands upon her, pulling her away, manhandling her.
"Zi-o!" the other girl snapped. "Zi-o! We have to fight that thing!"
No Rider let out a growl, its legs tense as it prepared to pounce, and swiftly Woz stepped forward, her trailing silk scarf unfurling, striking out with sudden force against the broken armour of the beast's chest, exciting a cry of pain from its trembling throat.
"Go," the older woman said, glancing at Tsukuyomi, the blaster still in his hand. "We shall keep our friends occupied."
"Don't hurt Akane," Sumire protested as Geiz pulled her back. "We can still save her!"
Woz pointedly turned away and Sumire knew that the other woman did it deliberately so that her expression could not be read. There was a flash of moment, and wounded as it was, No Rider danced forward, Tsukuyomi intercepting the creature, placing himself between it and Woz, and all the while, Sumire, felt herself pulled back and away.
Geiz brought two fingers to the side of her helm.
"Computer! Time Mazine activate!" she called out.
Unheard, Sumire could imagine the HumaGear voice relaying its response. From behind them came the sudden roar of imagination engines, the shift of mechanisms, gears grinding, cogs turning—an elaborate mechanism, like the innards of a clock, she thought, and the idea filled her with a sense of sadness and frustration.
A shadow fell over them, the Time Mazine transforming. Sumire allowed herself to be pulled bodily up into the cockpit.
Ahead, the goat creature threw back its head and howled once more.
∞:
The hammer slammed down hard into the floor of the dining carriage, the woman behind the counter—Naomi, she reminded herself of the girl's name—jumping slightly in surprise, and Hana reached up, tearing the helmet from her armour free and tossing it across the car.
"Why did you pull me away?" she cried out in anger.
Before her, the Owner did not look up, fork in one hand, his attention seemingly held once more by the plate of rice prepared for him, the tiny flag slanted at an angle, ready to fall at any moment.
"Why did you pull me away?" she shouted again.
Around her, the armour dissipated, her costume once more revealed, white jeans and whiter Nikes, a black leather jacket.
"You were wasting time," the Owner said, his voice soft, patronising, infuriating.
You live in a time machine, she wanted to scream. Instead, she simply stamped her foot, the fracture in the ground before her shaking free shards of broken tile. All of these people who rode this train, all of these people so comfortable outside of the flow of time, so blasé about travel through the fourth dimension, and the Owner and his handful of staff running the show—in that moment, she hated them all; she, who no longer had a world to go home to, hated everyone who had more than she did.
"There was a singularity point there, I wasn't wasting time!"
"What good is a singularity point without the true pass that you lost?" he remarked.
She chafed at his words, frustration welling up within her, and she found herself suddenly with tears in her eyes.
"You may wish to get changed," he said, still refusing to look her in the eye. "Our next stop will be 2007, once again. Perhaps you will have better luck finding the pass there."
She said nothing in reply, feeling the fury rising and failing to let it go. Trembling with anger, she said nothing, she turned away and headed towards the door, to her cramped quarters in the staff car. At her back, the Owner gently slid his fork into the pile of rice to no avail. Slowly, finally, the flag fell upon its side.
1999:
The massive Time Mazine's hands grappled with the hooves of the beast, wrestling it back, the streets resounding with the effort of their struggle, buildings trembling, glass shattering, car alarms exploding into radiant discord.
Grasping the control yoke, Geiz drove the machine on, pulling back giant steel fists, lashing out at the goat with blows that hammered home with the weight of oncoming trains.
"Sumire!" she cried out, glancing over her shoulder.
The other girl nodded.
"I'm ready!" she called back, trying not to think of the similar battle in the streets below, of Woz and Tsukuyomi, of Spade and No Rider—of the transformed Akane.
"Let's go!" Geiz shouted, almost as if she was having fun, as if such conflict excited her.
Sumire pulled free a RideWatch from her armour, slamming into the console of the massive machine, exciting a further transformation, the likeness of its appearance shimmering and darkening.
'Masked!' announced the HumaGear voice from the deck. 'Armour time! Royal Edenoi! Masked!'
Black plates slid into place across the surface of the Time Mazine, strengthened steel and taut limbs, a black veneer decorated with stripes of yellow and red, the lens of the helm turning blood red.
Geiz pulled back on the yoke once more.
"Power stripes!" she cried.
'Engaged,' the machine answered placidly.
About the armour, light coursed across its surface, burning brightly around the wrists and ankles. The goat struggled to break free from the machine as it took hold with one massive steel hand and brought the other down again and again in successive blows.
"We need to finish this quickly," Sumire said, anxiety in her voice as she thought again of the confrontation in the streets below them.
"Already on it!" Geiz growled.
With one hand, the Time Mazine hefted up the howling goat-beast, pulling it from the ground, tossing it up into the air. The machine's mechanical muscles tensed, the legs bent, and Geiz cried out in excitement
"Rider—"
'—Uppercut!' completed the voice from the control deck.
The Time Mazine launched into the air, twisting at the waist, the fist rising, connecting, slamming into the Imajin, shattering the jaw, breaking its neck as the head was thrown back, the entire corpus of its unholy frame exploding into sand that fell heavily, like hail against the streets below in its wake.
The Time Mazine's feet crashed down onto the ground once more, and Sumire was already at the cockpit, opening the chest panel of the great robot before Geiz could stop her. Her eyes scanned the streets below, searching for signs of the battle, and a gasp of sorrow and fear escaped her, her eyes falling upon the sight of Tsukuyomi and Woz, sprawled out and bruised, unconscious below.
Of Spade and No Rider, of Akane, there was no sign whatsoever.
Behind him, his cloak trailed, his arms folded across his chest as he looked down from his vantage point at the unfolding scene, the unfolding of the robot's chest, the rush of its pilots towards the fallen.
Beneath his black mask, beneath the bulbous red eyes of his helm, beneath the stripes of yellow receding back from them, curving about the skull, he remained expressionless, unfeeling, unthinking. Dimly, however, there was the strong echo of memory, the confrontation between these travellers and the thing he had fought to a standstill all those years ago in Asahi Village, the woman in the armour so like his own at his side. He had never seen her again, not even on the arduous spirit journeys when he cast his mind out into the void, touching upon the realm of the demon, Choronzon, recoiling in fear as he had witness the unfolding of the void; the fourth dimension, the sands of time.
On that day, with his friends standing at his back as they had been on some many occasions before, the television programme they all worked upon increasingly becoming an excuse for them to travel in his company as he sought out the monsters of Gorgom, he had found himself confronted with madness, tested to his limits, and then, one by one, the opponents against which he had struggled, the ally who had aided him, all had vanished into the air, subsumed within the essence of sleeping girls, spirited away by flowing walls of silver, making good their escape in a robot not dissimilar to the thing crouching in the streets, its slender frame dowsed with falling sand.
He had not understood what had happened that day. He had known that Gorgom had to be defeated, had known that the evil that had taken his dear step-brother, Nobuhiko away—that had stolen away Kyoko's older brother, Katsumi's boyfriend—had to be stopped, and in the end… in the end, what had he become in order to achieve this?
He unfolded his arms, looking down at the palm of his right hand, black plate armour, pulsing, seething flesh beneath.
"A Demon King," he whispered in disgust, answering his own unspoken question.
Gorgom no longer existed, he told himself, yet evil persisted, and against that threat—demon or not—the man who had been Minami Kohtaro, the man who had once been called Kamen Rider Black—would stand forever, even if he had to become a monster himself.
The sand stirred on the breeze, his cloak swayed, and beneath the armour, the flesh shuddered and trembled, no longer human.
1992:
It was a warm night, the heat of summer in the air. She felt drowsy still, sleepy, slumped over before the table in the kitchen, her head muddled and full of dreams. On the stirring of the weak breeze, Shimazaki Akane thought she could hear chanting, thought she could hear song; on the stirring of the weak breeze, she thought she could hear someone calling her to her life's cause, her true purpose.
Her eyes drooped, her head slumped.
'What do you want out of life?' she seemed to recall her older brother asked her, his voice rising up from the past, a conversation held many, many years ago.
She could not stave off sleep, could not resist, and the deeper she sunk towards the dreaming, the louder it seemed came the voices chanting outside the window.
Dimly, she became aware of what she thought was a reassuring presence; dimly, she became hands upon her shoulders.