Kamen Rider Tarock, Re-Dealt – Reading Nine: Lurking in the Dark
So far on Kamen Rider Tarock, Re-Dealt…
Delinquent Liss Decker found herself caught between combatants from a strange alternate world called the Sphere, and afterward found herself with the ability to transform into Tarock, a warrior of awesome powers. Tarock's creator asked Liss to become a champion for his people, who were being plagued by a resurgence monstrous beings they call the Mythos. Mainly seeing an escape from her oppressive everyday life, Liss agreed.
But as she battled the Mythos and searched for the special cards that were the keys to unlocking each of Tarock's special powers, Liss found her years of self-righteousness shaken by the gratitude of the people she ended up helping. Confused, and on the run from a pair of warriors from the Sphere bent on her death, Liss's only goal now is to find the last of the cards she needs and then figure out her next move. As she heads underground in search of it with her enemies close behind, Liss doesn't know how much more than her last card waits in the tunnels below…
The strange shape that had identified the secret passage to Tarock flitted ahead as she dashed through the tunnel after it. The tunnel curved multiple times and more than once she had to jump over piles of dirt and stone that had fallen from the ceiling. How long had it been since anyone had been down there?
Another turn and the shape led her into a wide ovular room. There were two exits on opposite ends and she looked to the shape for guidance, but it just hovered in the middle of the room. "Damn it, they're gonna be here any second!" she chided it, but the shape flew closer and circled around her belt buckle.
Was it trying to tell her something? Like to deactivate her powers? That seemed suicidal with Ven and Donis right behind her, but…what if they could sense Tarock, like she could sense Mythos? If she did change back, then maybe she could give them the slip. She'd certainly learned the value of being able to fool her enemies over the last couple years. If not, though…
The card ejected and Tarock faded away, leaving Liss Decker in her place. She felt naked without her armor, but ducked into a shadow behind a fallen column and waited. Ven and Donis dashed into the room a second later then looked around.
"Where'd she go?" growled Ven.
"Don't know, can't feel her around anymore," Donis answered her. "I'll go this way, you go that way." Their armor shimmered with energy and they flew down the passages leading away.
Once she was sure they weren't coming back Liss stood up again. The shape darted to her side, did a few loops to get her attention and then drifted toward the tunnel Donis had taken. Well, if she had to meet either of them again she'd probably choose the less psycho one, even if she knew less about his powers. Liss followed, but said, "This better not be some kind of trick.
The shape spun faster a few times before it continued to lead the way, and Liss got the impression of laughter.
A piece of gravel skittered across the road. Sue Gand watched it roll, then sighed and looked away. The story of the century had just slipped through her fingers. Apparently Liss Decker had never made it back to her sister's place the night before; she'd retreated to the Sphere after being attacked two people in black and white armor. Without Liss she had no way of getting there herself and keep up with what was going on.
She should've never let that kid out of her sight.
As Sue turned a corner toward that one diner she'd noticed to see if they had a good dinner menu, she almost collided with a man in paint-splattered coveralls carrying a ladder on one shoulder.
"Sorry, lady!"
Curiously, Sue peered around the corner and saw a flaking mural painted on the side of the building. It looked like it was once an image of a skyline, and it was only really clear on the edge closest to the corner where they were standing. After looking for a second Sue realized it was clearer because that part had much fresher paint on it.
"Ah, touching up the picture, huh?" Sue asked.
He smiled a little and nodded. "Been meaning to forever but just never cared enough to make the effort. After, well…"
"After what?" Sue pressed.
"Well, after whoever that was killed that bat monster at the high school and that scorpion down by the bridge…," he shrugged, and the ladder clattered. "Just seemed like I'd been putting it off long enough."
"Have a good night," Sue said and walked on. He smiled and waved her goodbye before going on his way. Sue wandered to the little restaurant she was headed to before, wondering a little more at what was going on.
The restaurant wasn't hard to find, but only two older men were there as she came in, sitting in one of the booths and telling mumbled stories and laughing over beers. Sue took a seat in the corner and looked at the scuffed menu on the table without really seeing it. A waitress came up a minute later.
"Can I get you anything, miss?"
"Um, I'm still deciding," Sue said. "I know it's kind of late but could I maybe get some coffee?"
"Sure thing, miss. I can start a pot if you don't mind waitin' a few minutes."
"No, that'll be fine," Sue answered. The waitress left and Sue was left alone, trying to think of any angle she could follow up on to wring a little more out of her visit to this town. The bell on the door jangled and someone came in. He had dirty blonde hair and a tattered denim jacket on, and a slight look of relief came over him as he spotted Sue.
She recognized him. It was the boy who wouldn't stop trying to impress her with how amazing it had been when his ex-girlfriend put on armor and saved the school from a vampire. But now there were bags under his eyes, his hair was dirty and tangled, and he looked like he hadn't slept in days. It was Ben Corland, and he sighed before he walked over and took a seat across from her without waiting for an invitation.
"You," he wheezed. "You're the reporter here to find out about Liss Decker, right?"
"Yeah."
"Do you know where she is?" he asked, an intensity appearing in his eyes that Sue could tell meant her answer would either fulfill all his hopes, or destroy them. She sighed inwardly before she gave it to him.
"Long answer's kind of, short answer's no," Sue replied.
Ben clenched his fists. "Kind of?" he asked, sounding angry now. "What do you mean, 'kind of'?"
Sue's eyes narrowed. "Why don't you calm your ass down, young man, if you want me to keep talking to you?"
"I can't," he said, less angry and more simply desperate now. "I have to know what's happened to her."
"And like I said, I don't know," Sue said. "Her sister tells me Liss's old kung fu teacher told her about how two people attacked her last night, and she rode away and hasn't been seen since."
"You didn't say no," Ben reminded her. "You said 'kind of'."
Sue steepled her fingers in front of her face. "She's in a different world, the one where those monsters came from. I don't know how to follow her there; going back and forth is one of her powers."
Ben hissed in frustration and held his face in his hands. "I just want to know if she's okay," he mumbled. Everyone in the little restaurant was staring at the back booth, thanks to the noise from Ben's breakdown. Sue fidgeted and was about to offer whatever condolences she could when the world around her seemed to distort outward for a fraction of a second.
She prepared herself for the worst as she peered out the window to see what had just happened, but was still surprised by what she saw.
The shape had shifted into the form of a ring turning over and over as it continued to drift down the tunnel ahead of Liss. They'd gone down stairs and around corners for what seemed like hours. There hadn't been any forks in the tunnel as they went, and Liss was a little unsure about how she'd be able to fight Donis off if they caught up to him in this cramped passage. After all, Tarock had been around for a while. He probably knew more about her powers than she did about his.
She shivered unintentionally as she followed the shape. Why was everything underground lately? Would she have to fight a monster in a tiny hallway like this? It didn't matter, Liss told herself. She'd be able to focus, definitely, she told herself. Then shivered uncomfortably again.
The passage emptied out into a chamber almost the size of a football field, but there was no sign of Donis. Then again, other passages dotted the walls and if he still thought Liss was ahead of him he could've gone down any one of them. Liss looked to the shape for guidance but it was rising up toward the ceiling and disappeared as it touched.
The shape drifted through the stone and dirt until it reached the surface where another shape waited. First a golden sphere, then an electric blue netted form, then a bright yellow rhombus. The smaller shape floated up to the larger and disappeared into it, and with that the larger shape flew off.
Liss looked around the room for some sign of the last card, since this seemed to be where her strange guide had decided she needed to be. The only outstanding feature in the room was the stone coffin or sarcophagus in the middle with its lid leaning against it on one side. There were metal bands with weird symbols on them that looped underneath but had been snapped when it had been opened. There were even curved pieces of stone that looked like they once formed a cage around the empty coffin scattered all over the room.
She winced as even her softest steps echoed down the length of the room. At this rate it wouldn't be long before Donis heard her and came back, so she'd have to find the fourth card fast. Liss crept over to the sarcophagus, but saw no sign of the card inside. For a second she worried that whatever had broken out had taken it with them, but that didn't seem likely. Jack and Shardak might not have told her everything, but they'd never flat-out lied to her.
What if that shape hadn't been leading her to the card, though, but something else? Like what?
Liss checked the room again and spotted a dull blue gem lodged in the roof right above the coffin. She picked up a rock and tossed it at the gem, which fell into her hand. And immediately, Liss wasn't standing in the crypt anymore.
She could see the room she'd just entered, but the coffin was closed with a dome-shaped cage of stone over it. The room was littered with bodies, the only one moving being someone in Tarock's Swords armor. But the armor was burnt and slashed from a heavy battle and only barely recognizable. He kneeled over the cage and chanted something Liss didn't understand. The cage glowed for a second before returning to normal. Gripping his chest, Tarock rose to his feet and staggered into one of the tunnels.
That must have been when after the fight with whatever had started the first Mythos outbreak, and something—or someone—important to it must have been trapped in the coffin. Something even Tarock wasn't powerful enough to destroy completely. But what had it been?
For a long time she only saw the empty room, but all of a sudden a small army of Mythos monsters stomped into view. A hulking blue one with horns and a tiger-striped loincloth grabbed the cage over the coffin. There was a flash of light and the Mythos exploded into blue smoke like they always did upon death, but a hunk of the bar that had been in his hands was gone too.
Another monster, identical to the first except for having bright red skin, marched up to the cage and grabbed it. He exploded too, but another bar was missing when the light cleared.
A third monster, a four-legged, scaly beast like a dragon walked up next. It exhaled a cloud of icy blue gas at the cage, which shimmered and sent the gas back to envelop the Mythos. Almost instantly it froze solid and shattered, but a few of the bars were still coated with frost. A nine-foot-tall, two-headed giant hefted his club and smashed it down where the frost had collected. He burst in a flash, but a gaping hole was left where he'd hit.
So it went. One by one Mythos attacked the cage, either with their bare hands, energy blasts or other abilities. One that looked like the two-legged version of the scorpion Mythos Liss had once fought spat a glob of green slime from his mouth before the cage's protective force rebounded and blew him away. Eventually the cage and the bands around it were shattered. Only one Mythos was left, a strange humanoid with a green face and mass of vines hanging down from his shoulders reaching almost to his knees. They extended out and flipped the lid off the coffin.
Inside was a woman who looked two steps away from being a corpse. Her skin was the same ivory white as her hair and dress. It was hard telling where one stopped and the next started.
But then she opened her eyes. They were coal black with red irises. Even though she knew she was watching something that had already happened, Liss swore the woman was looking right at her.
The woman sat up and held out her hand imperiously for the remaining Mythos to take, which he did and helped her stand. The woman walked quickly and with an inhuman grace toward one of the exits of the crypt.
The scene faded and Liss was in the empty room, holding the gem which had gone totally dark. It was starting to make a little more sense. That woman in the coffin, she was probably the one Lost had talked about, the one who said the horrible things to her she couldn't shut out. If Lost was creating Mythos monsters and a huge group of them had so eagerly given their lives to free the woman in the coffin, who else could it be?
But Liss realized she wasn't alone anymore. Standing in one doorway, visor fixed on her was Donis. "Looks like you found something," he said, then his body was surrounded by light as he came flying at her.
"Pentacles Suit!" the Fate Driver cried and Tarock's armor finished forming only a second before Donis crashed into her. Shouting in frustration Tarock linked her hands over her head and brought them down on Donis's back in a fierce downward smash. Donis fell flat on the floor and groaned. Maybe Liss wasn't a model citizen back home, but what would people from the Sphere care? She hadn't done anything but help people out since getting here, but all anybody could think about was how the original Tarock had killed somebody and she wondered if anyone even knew why. He'd locked up the leader of the Mythos, right? He must've had a reason for killing that one Arcanum…
But even as she summoned her warhammer, Tarock hesitated to pound Donis back to the ground as he was scrambling to his feet. "Why are guys so set on killin' me?" Tarock asked. "For something another guy who had this suit did forever guy? Seriously?"
"That and more," Donis gasped. "The Arcana have promised to give me back my soul mate's love." He attacked then, aiming a chop at her wrist but Tarock twisted to avoid him and his hand struck her side instead. Tarock gasped from a surge of pain but her thick armor in Pentacles Form and not catching it on a joint this time had saved her from the worst of his numbing attack.
She slammed her fist into his chest and staggered him for the second she needed to pound a kick into his chestplate that knocked clear across the room. Donis recovered quickly and came flying back at her, only for Tarock to bat him out of the air with a swing of her Gran Crusher. He rolled a few times, but got to his feet and turned to face her again.
Damn it, the longer the fight went on the sooner it would be before Ven was bound to hear it and come running, and she still had no idea where the fourth card was. Had Jack lied to her just to get her here and maybe see for herself what had happened, knowing the one thing she was really after was the card she needed for her last form?
Donis ran at her unsteadily with an arm raised high, and Tarock jumped, somersaulted in the air and smashed her heel hard into his shoulder. He yelped and fell to his knees, clutching at his shoulder with his other hand. Still he rose, determined to continue the fight.
He didn't get the chance. A dark figure lunged into the room, and for a second Tarock thought it was Ven, until a chill covered her arm right before the intruder plowed into both of them and knocked down. Tarock jumped back up with all the speed her special powers allowed, but while she was down she spotted a small blue rectangle lodged in a crack in the ceiling.
The Mythos snarled but high and triumphantly instead of angrily. He looked like a gorilla with wiry green fur, with curved fangs extending from both jaws. His eyes were a red so deep it actually glowed, and Tarock felt a shiver run down her spine as she got the worrying feeling the woman from the coffin could see her through this monster. He charged her on all fours then threw a punch at her face with a fist the size of a manhole cover. Tarock brought up her free hand and caught it but the Mythos pushed her back foot after foot until she was pinned to the other wall.
He started to bring up his left arm but Tarock smacked his other fist away with an awkward one-armed swing with her Gran Crusher. She smashed it against the Mythos's left shoulder over and over until it was coated with the blue ichor these evil things had instead of blood and the monster was pounded to the floor in submission, breathing but gurgling unintelligibly in pain.
But as soon as the monster was out of her face Donis was on the attack again. His foot flashed out and caught in the back of her knee, and as she expected there was no pain, her leg simply went numb. Tarock slumped into a crouch but as Donis lashed at the back of her neck with a chop she brought up her hammer and blocked his attack on the haft. "You idiot, the Mythos isn't dead yet!" she yelled.
"You think you're a lesser menace than a senseless Mythos. How amusing," Donis replied. He chopped at her neck from both sides at once, but Tarock grabbed his wrists, headbutted him and kicked him to the other side of the room while he was dazed. The Mythos was getting up again, and Ven just flew into the room from one of the doors. This was getting out of hand, and Tarock wasn't going to wait for her enemies to regroup.
"Cups Suit!" The feeling of overpowering strength gave way to a greater agility as her green armor turned to the thinner yellow breastplate, greaves and mask of her Cups Form. Right away she summoned her Sea Hand. She'd need all the firepower she had get for the dash she was about to make. At her feet was the Mythos, still barely conscious, Donis getting up on the right and Ven on the left between her and her goal.
It was as good as hers.
Tarock jumped over the Mythos and broke into a run. Donis had risen and was about to throw himself at her but she aimed the Sea Hand at him. "Woe! Aqua Burst!" The high-pressure water ball slammed him into the wall. Ven screamed with rage and charged Tarock, but she aimed at her black-clad enemy next. "Calamity! Jaws of Frost!" A thick wall of ice formed between them and Tarock raced toward the corner where she'd seen her objective.
Then something that felt like a wrecking ball crashed into her back and knocked her flat. As quick as she could Tarock rolled onto her back and pointed the Sea Hand but a giant fist grabbed it in a crushing grip. She screamed in pain as she recognized the Mythos as he tightened the fingers of his right arm around the Sea Hand. The armor started to buckle and crack and Tarock kicked repeatedly at the Mythos's feet with all the strength she had. The Mythos grunted as he lost his balance and his grasp weakened just enough for Tarock to yank her arm free.
She clenched and unclenched the fingers of her left hand carefully and was relieved that they seemed uninjured, but the Sea Hand was cracked and sparks jumped from the jets. The state it was in, she didn't dare try to use it again. The Mythos was getting his feet underneath him, but he didn't get another chance to attack. Ven and Donis flew at him from opposite sides, striking him with their fists, and he was enveloped in an orb of yellow light before exploding into blue smoke. Tarock jumped and stuck her hand into the crack while they were distracted, seizing the blue rectangle, which was a card with a golden image of a two-pronged wand on the front. It could only be the one she'd been looking for.
"You're next, Tarock," Ven said.
Damn. She'd been hoping for some time to study this card more before having to go into battle, maybe even practice a little.
But she knew perfectly well how rarely life accommodated people. And right now, she needed some surprises.
"If you want a piece of me, you'll have to be ready to lose a couple yourselves," Tarock said, then loaded the Fate Driver.
"Wands Suit!" it announced, and the card's image jumped from the crystal dome on the front to drift down over her body, leaving the sparse yellow armor of her Cups Form with even thinner dark blue armored vest, bracers and greaves. The only ornament on her mask was a short blue spike with a tiny green gem in it like the ones set in her bracers and the knees of her greaves. The feeling of power was different again in this form; there was none of the overwhelming strength of Pentacles Form, but she could feel an awesome speed in her waiting to be unleashed.
Ven held one of her wristblades beside her mask and a ray of light traveled up it to the tip. "Enough of this. Now you die, Tarock."
"I couldn't agree more," Donis said.
"Shining Strike" said his bracelet. Donis's right arm was wreathed in white light and he chopped down at Tarock but she dodged to her left, seeming to simply disappear out of range of his attack. The ground exploded where his hand landed, and she could feel the power she'd just avoided.
"Ven Split!" Tarock readied herself for another pair of opponents, only to see Ven split into five total copies of herself. Tarock knocked one back, but not down, with a kick to the stomach but another jumped and stabbed Tarock in the chest with her wrist blades. Blasts of sparks flew and Tarock staggered into the wall. The gang of black-clad attacks surged forward and Tarock passed a hand in front of her belt to summon this form's weapon.
"Arms of Fate! Pyre Brand!" announced the Fate Driver. A blue metal wand, the Pyre Brand, appeared. The next Ven stabbed at her but Tarock knocked her hand away with the wand then spun and smacked her on the side of her shiny black helmet.
Two of them jumped at Tarock with their blades but she darted back and they cracked the floor with their attack instead. Tarock dashed around them in a circle, dragging the Pyre Brand on the ground. In the blink of an eye she'd finished and her belt said, "Calamity! Ring of Helios!" A wall of blue-tinged flames jumped from the circle she'd made and engulfed her attackers.
But even as she was awed by the power she found herself wielding, Tarock found her thoughts turning to escape rather than flattening Ven and Donis. If they were going to have this feud with her it would be when she decided. That, and…they weren't Mythos. She'd wished death on people for giving her a hard time more than once, but that was when they were still only people. Could she do that to someone, someone who thought they were fighting for their world, even if they were being stupid about it and thought she was the problem, Liss asked herself.
Donis came at her from behind at the same time two more Vens rushed at her from the front. Tarock concentrated and the Pyre Brand extended from a wand into a staff and swept it in a wide arc close to the ground, knocking the Vens off their feet. She jumped, flipped and kicked the last one four times before landing, then turned to block Donis's kick at her back with her staff. Tarock clouted him on the side of the head before hitting him on the back of his knees to knock him down. Donis did tumble forward, but turned it into a somersault, came out of it and did a sweep-kick on Tarock that knocked her down and allowed him to pin her arms behind her back.
"Hold her still so we can finish this," one Ven growled. She and two of the others gathered around Tarock while Donis kept her pinned. Their wristblades pulsed with dark energy but Tarock hardly noticed. Behind them she saw something about the size of an apple roll into the middle of the room, then crack open and start seeping a dark puddle.
"The Mytho is still alive!" Tarock yelled.
"Anything to drag out that miserable life of yours," all three Vens said at once.
"Nema," Donis interrupted. "She's not lying, something is happening." The puddle was starting to churn and rise, taking on a humanoid shape but a gigantic stature. It looked like the Mythos, a green-furred gorilla, but twelve foot at the shoulder and its left arm from the elbow down had grown even larger with a fist big enough to cave in the side of a house.
The trio of Vens that hadn't been dispelled by Tarock's fire and Donis flew forward to face the giant. A single Ven ran around to the monster's left but he smashed her against the wall with his oversized fist and she seemed to shatter into black dust. "Shining Strike!" Donis punched with a brightly glowing fist at the Mythos's arm. A small plume of blue ooze dribbled down from where Donis had hit, but in the next second the Mythos's arm blurred out and pounded Donis flat.
"Guess I get to try out what this form can really do," Tarock whispered. She focused on the name of a power this form had, one that was given at the bottom of the card as, compared to her other powers, it was something of a cheat. Well, Liss knew that it wasn't cheating when there were no rules. "Mag Step," she said.
Immediately everything else seemed to stop moving as Tarock ran to the Mythos and kicked him over and over against the arm. Then motion returned and he gargled in surprise and pain to see a score of dents in his arm which were already dripping blue goop. Tarock gasped at how drained she felt just from that one effort. But then the Mythos lashed out at Tarock with his larger arm and she jumped over it, but concentrated hard in the middle of her jump and everything stopped again. She swiped her staff back and forth in the monster's face, trailing blue flame that singed its fur.
To Ven and Donis it looked like a blue blur was assaulting the giant Mythos, attacking in one spot too quickly to be seen then moving away attacking elsewhere before it reacted to the first. The blur landed on the Mythos's back and solidified into Tarock who jumped high, brandished her staff and called, "Dragon's Maw." A jet of blue flame surged from the tip and covered the Mythos's head. It screamed and thrashed but after a few seconds contorted and fell into a heap.
Then it smacked Tarock away.
In mid-air she turned into a blur again but solidified again next to Ven and Donis. "I've got an idea," she said, bracing herself on her staff and trying to hide how much the effort of using this form and being smacked by the monster was wearing on her. "If you guys think I can have those."
"What is it?" Donis asked, speaking over a fiery retort Ven had been about to make.
Ven and Tarock rushed the Mythos as he got up. Ven stabbed a wristblade into his face and black energy burst from it but the Mythos easily swatted her away with his smaller right hand and she shattered before even hitting the ground. Tarock jabbed his arm with her staff, only for the Mythos to smash his larger hand down on her like a hammer, but she turned into a puff of smoke as he did. He didn't notice the blur passing in front of him for just a second.
"Twilight Convergence," said their bracelets as Donis and Ven flew at the Mythos and rammed their fists into his shoulders. Their energies filled his body as they flew past and out of the way. Tarock came to a stop right behind the Mythos, having completed a full circle.
"Ring of Helios," the Fate Driver said as Tarock poured energy into the circle and a huge ring of fire erupted around the Mythos just as Ven and Donis's attack tore through his massive frame. Pieces fell off and dissolved from Ven and Donis's energy while flame lapped at his arms and legs charring whatever they touched to a crisp that broke even faster. The Mythos screamed and slammed its fists around the room but the three of them retreated to the corners to wait out the monster's demise. Within a minute a faint blue smoke already dissipating into thin air was all that was left.
"We can't forget what we came for her," Ven whispered once the Mythos was totally destroyed. They looked over toward where Tarock was leaning against the wall, but all at once she seemed to burst in a puff of smoke. "We've been tricked!" Ven yelled. "She's gone!"
Indeed she was. With all her might, Tarock forced herself to ignore the pain that seemed to burn from every nerve in her body while she blurred down the tunnels to the entrance of the tomb. This form had powers even more amazing than her others'. But as she'd used the Mag Step and created and sustained double of herself, she'd felt her energy ebbing quickly. Keeping up those powers was a constant drain. And she had no intention of leaving herself totally drained around two people who wanted her dead.
As Tarock made it to the first room even she couldn't ignore the pain of exhaustion coupled with the injuries from her last fight, and collapsed, her armor fading. Fingers trembling she dug into her coat and gasped at the feeling of a warm, wet stain on her shirt. Her right arm wouldn't move, and she had an awful feeling that her last battle had served to reopen most of the injuries she thought she'd just shrugged off after some rest…
She produced the amulet and threw it, and it shimmered into that strange metal horse it could become instead of her bike. Liss hauled herself up into his saddle, and thought one word. Shift Runner was up the stairs and away in an instant.
The word was "Help."
Liss faded in and out of consciousness several times while Shift Runner carried her along. She saw the sun coming up over the plain before she saw the woman in white from the images looking over her shoulder at Liss and smiling evilly. Liss felt a chill but wasn't sure if it was her power or simple fear.
The woman beckoned and whispered, "Come to me, Tarock. Aid me and your reward will be power ten times that of which you command now," she said in a silky voice.
"I don't sell out to anybody," Liss gurgled. Everything went dark after that until she saw a forest surrounding them. For just a second she thought she saw the woman again, but her head started to feel light, and darkness engulfed her again.
After waking up to see trees a few more times, Liss came to and saw a walled city not far off. It could only be Mazones, home to her biggest non-fans. Everything blurred and she topped from the saddle, landing hard. She reached into her coat, moving agonizingly slowly and pulling out the Fate Driver that she just managed to drop into the bag on his saddle. If she was where she thought she was, being caught with that would be a death sentence.
"Go," she croaked through her dry throat. "I'll call you when I'm ready. If I make it…"
Shift Runner reared and whinnied loudly before turning and galloping off. "What was that?" someone yelled. Liss could hear running footfalls as things started to go black.
"Look, papa! It's a girl, and she's hurt!"
"Quick, Rexia! Run back to town for help!"
Then Liss couldn't hold out anymore, and the darkness claimed her again.
Next time on Kamen Rider Tarock, Re-Dealt…
Shardak: Where are you, Liss? Could I have asked too much?
(A bandaged Liss lies in front of a fire while an orange-haired teen girl tends to her wounds)
Girl: How did you come to be out so far?
Ven: It doesn't matter if Tarock has found all her powers, we are the champions of the Sphere!
Female Voice: What are two against thousands…?
Narrator: Your fate is in your hands.
Well, there we are. It took a hell of a lot of fighting this chapter, but Liss managed to get the last of her cards, and we might have even seen a little deeper into the characters through it.
By the way, the monster the Mythos from this chapter was based on how I saw Grendel from the story of Beowulf. Not as clear as the others, but I don't feel like leaving a possible monster out just because they're not a general, well-known type if they still work well.
Since Liss has gotten all of her forms, a little summary of seems appropriate.
Her henshin device is the Fate Driver. Set in the center is a small crystal ball called the Quartz Eye that materializes her current form's main weapon. Her secondary weapon is the Rend Brace, a bracelet with a large, diamond-shaped blade that can function as a cutting weapon or a small buckler. It also functions as a different weapon specific to each of her four forms.
Swords Form, in red, is Tarock's most basic form that's average at everything. Pretty strong, pretty tough, pretty fast. Her abilities come from the element of wind, and she also has powers from storms and lightning. Her signature weapon is the Skycalibur, a sword four and a half feet long, and her attack with the Rend Brace is the Thunder Lash, an electrical whip.
Pentacles Form, in green, is Tarock's power type. It has massive physical strength and thick armor but trades off in speed and agility, which are the lowest of any of her forms. Fittingly, her powers are related to the element of earth. This form's weapon is a warhammer called the Gran Crusher, and the Rend Brace's power is the Pent Defender that gathers rock into a shield.
Cups Form, in yellow, has strong elemental attacks but lacks in toughness and strength. This form's powers relate to water and ice. This form's weapon is the Sea Hand, a gauntlet with jets in the fingertips that directs most of her attacks. In true glass cannon fashion, she'd lose the ability to use most of her attacks in this form without it. The Rend Brace's attack is the Tethys Cutter, a long blade of watery energy. Also, getting its powers from the element of water, this form is especially agile if Tarock has to fight underwater.
Wands Form, in blue, has the greatest speed but lacks the most in strength and toughness of any of her forms. Its related element is fire. Her weapon in this form is the Pyre Brand, a metal wand that can be used to channel her stronger fiery attacks or lengthen into a staff. In this form the Rend Brace can be used to perform the Zure Divide, which creates illusory duplicates. Being in this form allows Tarock to use short bursts of super speed with its Mag Step power. Her top speed is unknown. While exceptionally versatile, the powers of this form are even more exhausting to Liss than her others because they're a constant drain on her while in use. Used wisely it can be one of her most formidable powersets, but used impulsively it can quickly leave her vulnerable.
To put it in more familiar terms, Swords is Mighty, Pentacles is Titan, Cups is Pegasus, and Wands is Dragon.
And before anyone thinks it, no I did not just take the colors from Wizard and mix them up. I actually based the colors on a tarot villain team from the old Villains & Vigilantes RPG. A scan is up on Tarock's page at Spectrum of Madness, along with lists of Arcana and Mythos to help everybody keep everything straight.
Anybody catch the reference to Rider lore in the order Liss got her cards, by the way? It's easy.
Things are going to settle down for just a little bit in the wake of this chapter. Obviously it's going to be a while before Liss is up for anymore fights, anyway, but that gives me a chance to show some other stuff. Hope you're enjoying the story so far, because it gets even more intense before long.