[guncannon109]

Episode 2: Genesis

Alex stood frozen as the grown man began to make his way towards him. Cole’s parents keeping a smile on their faces while Cole watched from the corner of the room taking a gulp every so often as he felt himself begin to sweat.

“Rachel and Dominic have been telling me a great many things about you in the time I’ve been here Alex,” he said extending his hand to the boy, Alex gritting his teeth and balling his hand into a fist, “I trust you have been taking good care of yourself?”

In that instant, Alex threw his fist into the air and struck his father across the face knocking him to the ground.

Cole’s parents gasped, “Alex!” Rachel cried out, “Jason came a long way to come and see you. Why on earth would you-”

“I SHOULD ASK YOU THE SAME QUESTION!” Alex barked back at them, he looked back to the man he just knocked to the ground, “As for you! I don’t know what the fuck you’re trying to pull but it’s not going to work, so just crawl back to the rock you crawled out of and just FUCK OFF and DIE already!”

Alex then turned around and grabbed the doorknob and forced the door open slamming it into the wall beside it.

Jason jumped to his feet and took two steps forward, “Alex wait, can’t we-”

Alex stared back to him with eyes filled with burning hatred that had been built up for several years without any way of venting it and shouted, “FUCK YOU!” before storming off through the door and slamming it behind him.

“Sorry about that, I guess he still hasn’t gotten over the fact that you left him for dead all those years ago,” Cole’s father sighed glaring angrily at Jason, “Not that I can blame him I guess.”

“I’ll go talk to him,” Cole sighed before, heading for the door and passed Jason, “after all, someone needs to look out for him.” he whispered before walking out the front and slamming the door behind him.

Jason let out a small sigh then looked out the window, “Perhaps coming here was a mistake.”

“It wasn’t,” Cole’s father called out, “that boy hasn’t seen you in over ten years, it makes sense he would be upset with you.” he explained looked Jason in the eye, “However, I feel that leaving again would only make matters worse. You understand Jason?”

“Yeah… I suppose you’re right,” Jason nodded,” thank you Dominic, I needed that.”

Down on the lower level of the complex, Alex stormed into his apartment and slammed the door behind him.

“FUCK!” he shouted before collapsing on the coach by the television, “Disappears for ten years then expects me to forgive him? What the fuck is that man’s problem!”

At that second a small knock came from the door followed by Cole calling out, “Al?... can I come in for a minute?”

Alex let out a sigh then looked over to the door, “Yeah sure, door’s open.”

Cole opened the door and stepped inside, “Listen,” he said softly closing the door behind him, “I know you and your dad don-”

“He’s not my father,” Alex interrupted looking away from Cole and out the window, “my father died years ago… he’s nothing but a shell to me now.”

“ENOUGH!” Cole shouted causing Alex to look back with his eyes wide open, “I’m trying to talk here, so just keep quiet and listen.” Cole demand looking Alex in the eye, “I get that you don’t like the guy, but he came all this way just to see you. I understand, but you think maybe you could just give him a chance?”

“He had his chance and he blew it,” Alex put simply, closing his eyes and lying down on the couch with his arms behind his head, “You might not want to believe this but to tell you the truth, as soon as my mom died… he didn’t want anything more to do with me.”

Cole frowned then sat down on the couch beside Alex, “Tell you what,” he said looking over to the collection of DVDs on the shelf, “Have a small chat with him and I’ll…” he hung his head and pointed over to the shelf, “I’ll watch any of those that you want me too.”

Alex’s eyes shot open as he looked up to Cole, “Y-you serious?”

“Dead.”

Alex thought for a moment, then let out a sigh, “Alright fine… but if that’s the case we’re watching Neon Genesis Evangelion.”

Cole chuckled, “Okay okay, whatever you want.”

{Insert Opening Theme - “Period” by Chemistry}

Joel stood alone by the throne of Vainglory’s chamber. He stepped up to it and ran his fingers along it, a thin layer of dust coming off on his hand. The two large doors at the front then opened up as Vainglory, the doors closing behind him.

“Inertia?... where’s Spite?” Vainglory asked walking up to Joel.

“She’s out at the moment,” Joel returned, “that’s all you must know.”

“I’m right here you nitwit,” Rylee scowled coming out from behind a pillar, “I was here first, you simply didn’t take the time to notice.”

“Excellent,” Vainglory called out reaching into his cloak and pulling out Cheshire, “because I have found something for you.”

Rylee gasped, “where did you find him?” she asked taking the large cat from her commander.

“Found him wandering the cemetery on my way back,” he proclaimed, “must have gotten lost on a patrol or something.”

“So the cat is found… but what of the boy?” Joel asked raising an eyebrow.

“I ran into him while I was out,” Vainglory put simply, “He wasn’t exactly what I was expecting, but he has seemed to have grown quite a bit since the last time I saw him.”

“So,” Rylee spoke out holding Cheshire closely in her arms, “what do you suppose we do?”

“The boy and his friends are strong, but he seems willing enough to listen to reason,” Vainglory explained, “I’m going to see if I can convince him to see things from our point of view.”

“And if you can’t?” Joel asked crossing his arms and watching Vainglory closely.

Vainglory then extended his arm out to an empty corner of the room where a single lone pillar stood, in one quick instant a dark shadowy blade fired from the palm of his open hand and sliced the pillar into as if it were nothing more than a single sheet of paper before falling to the ground.

Vainglory looked to Joel, “I think you can figure that part out for yourself.” A small shadow moved in the background, catching Vainglory’s attention. He looked to his subordinates with one simple instruction, “you’re dismissed, both of you.”

Rylee and Joel left the room without a second word. Once they were gone, a tall busty woman with raven hair dressed in a dark blue dress, high heels and long gloves stepped out from the shadows and walked over to Vainglory.

“You’ve certainly become quite the commander,” she proclaimed with a smirk, running her hand down Vainglory’s face, “with any luck, you’ll be able to open the gate before too long.”

“Desire…” Vainglory looked over to her with cold tired eyes, “what are you doing here?”

“The tides of battle shift in many ways,” she spoke out as she pulled out a large case, “I have come to even them out,” she said as she held the case open to Vainglory. Inside were three single slotted x drivers along with three silver gaia memories, three more in the colors of black, blue and green were lined along the top.

Vainglory reached into the case and grabbed the black gaia memory that was marked with an s with a star on top of it, “where did you get these?”

Desire smirked, “I think you can figure that part out for yourself.”

---

The next morning, a young man with a guitar case strapped to his back stood at the bottom of the hill leading up to the school. He wore a dark red t-shirt with an open black button up shirt over top of it, he also had worn black denim jeans with a chain linked to two of the belt loops. Stubble was visible on his chin.

“So, this is Ardent Secondary School hun?” he said with a sigh followed by a chipper grin, “Doesn't look like much, but I suppose I can make the most of it.”

A few feet away, a city bus pulled into a bus stop and opened up it's doors. Madison quickly jumped out with a piece of jam covered toast in her mouth and a knapsack overflowing with papers strapped to her back.

“Oh my god, I am so dead!” She panicked as she dashed over to the foot of the hill. She looked to her watch not really paying much attention to where she was going, “Seven fifty-nine, if I hurry I can still make it!”

As she hurried around the corner, she slammed into the young man who had just arrived knocking both of them to the ground and sending everything Madison had stuffed in her backpack, including the piece of toast in her mouth, up into the air. The toast landing jam side down onto the top of the poor boy's head.

“Ow...” Madison cried out rubbing the top of her head. She then opened her eyes and noticed the boy who sat on the ground next to her as the jam ran down his face, “Oh my gosh! I'm so sorry!” she pleaded pulling out a tissue from her pocket, “Here, let me get that for you.”

“Nah, it's okay,” the man said with a smile, throwing the toast off of his head and taking the tissue and wiping the jam from his face, “happens all the time really,” he said picking himself off the ground and laughed, “I should stop standing in the middle of the street.”

Madison rose to her feet and brushed the dirt off of her, “Well, it was my bad for running into you still... there anyway I could make it up to you?”

“Hmm, let's see...” the boy thought to himself for a moment. He then pulled out a folded up piece of paper from his back pocket and handed it over to madison, opening it up as he did so, “You think you can show me to each of these rooms?”

Madison looked at the sheet of paper and saw it was an Ardent Secondary School student timetable. Out of simple curiosity, she looked up to the top where the name of the time table's owner was normally placed, “Lark Pearlman,” she read aloud to herself. She then looked to the boy and smiled, “rather nice name.”

The boy shrugged blushing a bit, “Eh, not really... it's too flashy for someone like me.”

“Well it's still a nice name for such a nice person,” she said with a smile grabbing the boy's hand with both of her's, “Come on, I'm running late but I can still show you to your first class. It's actually right next to mine.”

Lark smiled at her, “thank you.” He took one step forward as a small crunch nose came from below him. He looked down to see several of the paper's madison had brought with her scattered on the ground.

He picked one up and saw a poorly drawn red chinese dragon directly above an equally crude red stick figure with the words red ranger/fire – Zord: Dragon written below it with four question marks directly beside it in the colors of blue, yellow, pink and the final one be half green and half black.

Lark raised an eyebrow, “Uh... what are these?”

Madison's face instantly turned a bright red, “NOTHING!” she panicked as she snatched the paper away from him and grabbed the others that were scattered on the ground. She grabbed his hand and starting pulling him up the hill as fast as she could, “IIT'S JUST A TINY FITTLE JET PROJECT SO LET CURY UP A KOH!”

While this was all going on, Alex had just finished up his early morning laps and had changed back into his normal clothes. However, when he came out of the change room he came across a sight that he had honestly not expected. Shiore, sitting on the bench by the window with her bag on the floor as if she were waiting for him. This was odd to him had he had not seen her since the other day at the cemetery.

Alex took one step forward feeling he should say something, however Shiore beat him to it even though she kept looking out the window, “Sorry for disappearing on you… I had somewhere to be.”

Alex smiled and patted her on the shoulder, “Don’t worry about it, you didn’t miss much.”

At that second, the bell rang signaling the start of the day, “We should be going.”

Alex then got down and picked up Shiore’s bag and swung it over his shoulder, however it didn’t last long as Shiore quickly grabbed it back from him and began making her way down the hallway, “We’ll be late.”

Alex simply rolled his eyes and followed after her down the hall. They walked down two different hallways before coming to a stairwell, however as they turned the corner Alex heard a familiar voice as Madison came up the stairs with Lark.

Madison stood in place upon noticing him, “oh hi,” she said with a wave, “Uh… Alex right?”

Seeing her with another guy other than him bothered Alex greatly as his mind already jumped to conclusions upon seeing Lark come up next to her. He simply nodded to Madison, “Yeah… that’s it,” he then looked down to his wrist which had no watch on it, “Oh would you look at the time,” he looked to Madison and forced a smile, “sorry, wish we could stay and chat but unfortunately we need to be going” he said before grabbing Shiore by her wrist and pulling her up the stairs.

Shiore raised an eyebrow at how strangely the boy had been acting, “Is there something the matter?” she asked delicately.

“Of course not,” Alex said as he tried to keep his chipper attitude, slowly but surely letting go of Shiore’s hand in the process, “She’s safe now…” he said before sniffling a small bit, “that’s all that matters.”

Shiore looked at him not fully convinced but at the same time was not about to intrude into someone else’s business, “I certainly hope so.”

---

A little while after the bell had rung, Kat wandered outside with a tin of wet cat food. She went over to a tree with a small burrow of trash and other scraps of metal and opened up the can, whistling a small bit as she did so, “here kitty cat cat.”

After a few moments, a large black cat came out from the burrow and rubbed itself up against Kat’s leg. She scratched the cat’s ears and placed the can of food down in front of him, “here you go,” she said with a grin as she licked off a small bit that got on her thumb.

Just then, Cole walked by curious to know what she was up to. He walked up to her without her realizing and spotting the cat.

“You know pets aren’t allowed on campus right?” He called out to her.

“Gah!” Kat jumped and spun around as she was nearly given a heart attack. She then let out a small sigh, “Yeah, I know… it’s just that,” she stumbled poking at the ground with her foot, “well the poor thing has nowhere else to go.”

Cole patted her on the back and grinned, “Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me,” he said before walking away from her.

Kat blinked for a moment only to remember what Ms Seraphina had mentioned to her the other day. “HEY MISTER!” she called out to him, “What’s your name?”

He turned back and grinned, “It’s Cole, Cole Desmond… and you?”

“You can just call me Kat,” she said with a smirk, “and thanks again.”

“Don’t mention it,” Cole turned on his heel and waved back to her as he began to make his way to his next class, “see you around Kat.”

As soon as Cole left, a small buzz erupted from Kat’s sweater pocket. She reached in and pulled out a black cell phone with the caller ID marked as restricted service. She flipped the phone open and brought it to her ear.

“Hello?” Kat answered, she bobbed her head then returned as she reached down and grabbed a small bit of cat food with one finger and put it into her mouth, “Nya, I just talked to a few seconds ago actually,” she licked her lips and smirked, “Alright, I’ll meet ya there.”

Kat petted the black cat on the head and took off towards the school building, only instead of entering through the front door she chose to scale up the wall to an open window. She hoisted herself up and climbed into an empty classroom which had the lights shut off.

She looked up to the clock on the wall which currently read 9:25, five minutes before the time she was given to meet up. Feeling that she could take a small break for the time being, she put two desks together and climbed on top of them before laying herself flat on the desk tops.

Five minutes passed by in a matter of moments and the door to the room opened up as Ms Seraphina walked in, Kat quickly sitting up at attention.

Ms Seraphina smiled at her, “Right on time… very good girl,” she said scratching her on the head, Kat smiling and closing her eyes enjoying the sensation.

“So, what’s the sitch?” Kat asked pulling away from her.

“There has been a slight change of plans my dear,” Seraphina stated as a older blond haired man entered the room.

Kat raised an eyebrow, “Wait a sec, that’s...”

“An old friend of mine, and your new commander.” Ms Seraphina said with a smirk, “you be sure to do him well, understand?”

Kat looked at her and nodded. She got up with a smile and walked over to the blond haired man who cast a shadow upon the already dark room.

“So commander,” she asked trying to make herself come off as friendly as possible, “whatcha want me to do?”

“You are to keep a close eye on these five young ones,” he instructed holding out five photos, each depicting one of the five riders, “think you can do that without screwing it up?”

Kat took the set of photos and glanced over them, her eye instantly being drawn to Cole’s image. She looked back up to him and smirked, “it would be my pleasure.”

“Good,” he said once more in a cold and stern voice as he turned his back to her and headed over towards the door, “because I’ve had more than my fair share of failures… I don’t need any others,” he added before shutting the door behind him.

“Cole Desmond…” Kat said aloud to herself starting laugh a small bit, “I’m looking forward to getting to know you.”

{End of Part A}
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
{Start of Part B}

It was now lunch time. Tara was working shifts at her father’s cafe so Alex and Cole decided to spend the lunch hour in the school’s library, Shiore choosing to tag along as she was going there anyway to ‘study’ as she put it. Cole and Alex ate their lunch at the back of the library while making light conversation, Alex reading volume 14 of the manga series Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle.

“Look, all I’m saying is that if the girl was that madly in love with the main character and saw them die over and over and over again then obviously they’d eventually hit a breaking point and turn psycho,” Cole said to Alex.

“Yeah, I understand that but… it just, still makes me feel cheated is all,” Alex let out a small sigh, “doesn’t exactly help that the main character doesn’t even remember all that she’s done for her…” he shut the book in his hand and got up, “Well, I’m done with this one. I’ll go grab the next one.”

Cole jumped to his feet and grabbed the book, “That’s okay, I’ll get it for you.”

Alex blinked, “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, it’s no problem at all,” Cole returned as he took off down a row of bookshelves to where the manga was kept, “I’ll be right back.”

“What’s up with him today?” Alex asked to himself as he sat back down. He looked over to Shiore who was still working at a desk with a large fortress of books built around her, “So… how’s the studying going?”

“Hm?” Shiore looked at him, “It’s going.” she put simply, not going into details looking down at several sheets of paper with formulas and equations that looked far too complex to have been given out by any teacher with tech diagrams and long strings of data scribbled down on huge sections of grid paper. “Going to take a lot longer than I expected though.”

Alex raised an eyebrow, “You need any help?” Shiore shook her head not saying another word. Alex shrugged and went back to eating, “Alright then.”

On the other end of the library, Cole was looking through the manga shelf to find the next volume of the series Alex was reading when out of the blue his cellphone rang. He fished it out and read the caller ID which read Cat’s Eye Cafe.

He flipped the phone open and held it up to his ear, “Tara? What’s up?”

“I’VE GOT AN IDEA!!!” Tara shouted at the top of her lungs through the other end of the line, nearly deafening Cole who was forced to pull the phone away from his ear.

“Okay, what is it?” he asked partially curious and partially deaf.

“Well you know you said that Superstar and his pop pop needed a place to hang out for the afternoon?” Tara asked already knowing the answer.

“That’s not exactly what I said, but yeah,” Cole rubbed his ear and continuing searching the shelves, “why do you ask?”

Tara started to squee out of excitement, “Well I ask thinking, maybe we cou-”

“Bring them by the Cat’s Eye?” Cole cut her off with a slight chuckle.

“Yeah!” Tara shouted back, “... wait, how did you know?”

“That’s your solution for everything,” Cole returned trying to keep himself from laughing to hard, “Two people not getting along? Bring em by the Cat’s Eye! I swear that should be your slogan or something.”

“THAT’S A GREAT IDEA!” Tara began jumping up and down hardly being able to control herself, “Wait, you’ll talk to Superstar about it right?”

“Yeah, I’ll tell him,” Cole grinned, “just promise me you won’t try to fix every problem with tea and cake next time okay?”

“Deal! Anyway I gotta fly, Boss is gonna kill me if I don’t get back to work, later,” she said in her usual hyper tone before hanging up the phone.

Cole dropped his phone back into his pocket and looked back at the shelf. As soon as he did though, Kat poked her head through a gap in the books on the shelf, “Who ya talkin too?”

“GAH!” Cole shouted jumping back a small bit, “Oh, hey Kat,” he said forcing a smile, “Just a friend of mine.”

“Oh?” an almost cat like smirk appeared on the girl’s face, “Just a friend, or was it your girlfriend?”

“Tara and I are just friends,” Cole explained trying to ignore her and look for the book that Alex wanted, “that’s all there is too it,”

“Oh, I see…” she returned eyeing him a small bit, “what are you looking for?”

“Just a book for my friend,” he held the book up to her, “you see these around anywhere?”

The red bow in Kat’s hair flexed for a moment, “Oh that one! I know where that is!” she grabbed the book and disappeared for a moment only to return moments later with the next two volumes, 15 and 16. “Whoever your friend is, he has really good taste.”

“Could have fooled me,” Cole shrugged. He waved to her with the books in his hand, “well anyway, thank you.”

Kat smirked at him, “no problem, I’ll see ya around okay.”

“Yeah, see ya,” he said with a smile before walking back over to where Alex and Shiore were. He handed Alex the books, “Here you are.”

“Oh, thanks,” Alex grinned taking them from his friend, “you have trouble finding them?”

Cole smile and shook his head, “Nah,” he laughed a small bit as he sat back down in his chair. He looked over to Alex, “So… by any chance have you thought about what we talked about earlier?”

“You mean about that bullshit idea you had about my favorite anime character that would ruin the entire series if it actually happened?”

“No,” Cole glared at him, “I meant about having a sit down with your old man. You give it any thought?”

Alex crossed his arms and looked away from Cole, “Out of the question.”

“Oh come on, you’re being childish,” Cole sighed, “I’m just asking for one small talk, is that too much to ask?”

Alex nodded without saying anything else.

Cole grunted and crossed his arms, “Fine, be that way.”

“If I can offer some advice,” Shiore spoke up taking her focus off of her work, “regardless of what they’ve done in the past, family is still family. You should try and mend old wounds while you still have the chance, because you never know when people will be taken away forever.”

“She’s right you know,” Cole looked back to Alex and uncrossed his arms, “If it helps, there is an idea Tara had. You two could spend sometime at the Cat’s Eye, that way both her and myself will be there so it’s not like you have to face him on your own.”

Alex opened his eyes and looked back to Cole, slowly putting his arms down on his lap, “Alright… I’ll do it.”

Cole smiled, “Great, I’ll go tell Tara to make the arrangement,” he said as he got up and pulled out his phone before making his way out to the hall, “You get in touch with you dad and talk to him about it alright?”

Alex nodded, “Will do.”

“Watch yourself,” Shiore spoke out once again keeping her eyes fixed on the paper’s in front of her, “Shadows lurk around every corner nowadays, they’ll consume you if let your guard down.”

Alex wasn’t too sure how to react to what the girl in front of him just said, though for whatever reason it still struck a chord with him. Even after being her supposed friend and comrade for more than a few months now, Alex still felt as if their was an impenetrable wall between him and Shiore. He wanted to get closer to her, that much was certain, however he was unsure of how to go about it what with the two of them being so different. He was about to say something but as soon as he so much as lifted a finger the bell signaling the end of lunch went off, and Shiore had a class next period where as Alex didn’t.

Shiore upon hearing the bell quickly packed her stuff away back into her bag and swung it over her shoulder. She looked over to Alex, “you have a spare right now right?”

Alex nodded, “Y-yeah.”

“Take this time to set things up with your father,” Shiore instructed as she casually walked by Alex avoiding eye contact with him, “it’ll be easier if you have a clear head.”

Alex didn’t say another word as Shiore passed him by. As she proceeded down the rows of bookshelves, Alex noticed something about the way Shiore walked. She always kept her eyes focused on what was directly in front of her, putting one foot right in front of the other in a quick and precise motion as if to get to where ever she was going as quickly and efficiently as possible.

After thinking about this for more than he thought he needed to, Alex then shook his head and went out into the hallway long after Shiore had already left. He sat down on a bench around the corner from the library’s front door. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone, flipping it open and pulling out a small piece of paper that Cole’s parents had given him with his father’s phone number on it.

He let out a small sigh, “here goes nothing,” he said before entering the number and placing the phone up to his ear.

The phone rang once, then again and three more times after that. Alex hoped that after the seventh ring it would go straight to voicemail and he wouldn’t have to speak to his father at all. However that sadly was a hope that was quickly dashed as on the sixth ring the phone was picked up on the other end of the line.

“Hello?” Jason called out from the other end, “Alex, is that you?”

Alex planted his face into the palm of his hand and ran his hand through his hair, pulling on it before answer, “H-hi dad… look, I was thinking… would you by any chance like to, I don’t know, hang out tomorrow or something?”

“Hmm… let me see,” the rustling of paper’s could be heard from the phone’s speaker, “I should have something open for tomorrow. Where do you want to meet up?”

Alex groaned, “You know the Cat’s Eye cafe?”

“I’ve been there once or twice,” Jason returned, “that’s the place your friend Thea’s dad owns right?”

“Yeah, that’s the one,” Alex said with a slight huff as he was a bit annoyed that his father who left him for dead several years ago suddenly knew all about his personal life, “I’ll meet you there at five okay?”

“Alright, sounds good. I’ll see you then, take care.”

“You too… bye,” Alex quickly hung up his phone and placed it down on the bench next to him letting out a disgruntled sigh of both relief that it was finally over and frustration that he was going to need to put up with the same thing tomorrow afternoon.

Before he could get a single second of silence however, Madison turned the corner in a sprint carrying several sheets of paper in her hands. She instantly noticed Alex and as she panted rapidly she asked him one simply question.

“Oh… hey there,” she panted as the name of the boy in front of her eluded her, “you see Ashley anywhere?” Alex shook his head, “Oh great,” Madison moaned as she continued down the hallway, “just when I need her I can’t find her anywhere!”

Alex laughed to himself as a small tear formed in his eye, “even without her memories… she’s still the same person she always was,” he sniffled wiping the tears from his eyes, “but still… it isn’t easy seeing her like that.”

---

The next day after school got out, Alex found himself wandering over to the Cat’s Eye where he and his father agreed to meet. He didn’t want to see him, but part of him still felt like he had no other option. This was something he had to confront even if it killed him in the process.

He walked in through the front door to the sight of Cole and Tara waiting for him, the two freezing for a moment upon laying eyes on him. Cole was dressed in his regular street clothes where as Tara was dressed up in Cat’s Eye waitress uniform which was comprised of a formal black skirt and a deep violet blouse with a solid red trim. A simple red apron was wrapped around her waist making the entire uniform to regulation save for a pair of bright yellow cat ears that Tara had decided to wear for extra flare as well as her own pair of rollerblades and her usual black shorts which she always wore under her skirt.

“Is he here?” Alex asked simply, Cole nodded and pointed over to a booth at the back of the cafe. Alex sighed and began to make his way over, “guess there’s no way of avoiding it then.”

“Hold it!” Tara shouted placing her arm out in front him, she pulled out a small blue bottle of lord only know what and gestured to Alex in a way that told him to come over to her, “open!”

Alex opened his mouth as Tara squirted a small bit of the spray into it. Upon making contact with the back of his mouth, the spray somehow managed to trigger his gag relax.

“THE HELL IS THAT!” Alex coughed with a sharp pain in his throat.

“Uh… Breath Spray?” Tara looked at the label of the bottle and realized that she had grabbed the wrong one. It was a bottle of lavender scented perfume and not the mint breath spray she had intended. Her eye twitched as her face began to turn a bright red, “Uh… oops.”

Alex began to growl at Tara in anger, “I’m gonna kill you, you know that?”

Tara leaned in a took a sniff of Alex’s breath, “Hm, well hey at least it worked didn’t it?” She grabbed him by his arm and smirked, “Now come on, we don’t want to keep daddy waiting now do we?”

“I certainly would,” Alex whispered aloud.

“Aw, don’t be such a soursop!” Tara said playfully as she pushed Alex towards the booth that Jason was sitting at, “Tell you what, if you behave I’ll give you something on the house,” she winked, “and I ain’t talkin about the menu.”

Alex’s face then became bright red, “The hell is that suppose to mean!”

“THEA!” a loud voice shouted out as a young girl dressed in the same uniform as Tara minus the cat ears who looked about the same age as her with light shoulder length chestnut and deep hazel eyes ran up to her and grabbed her wrist, “What have I told you about manors?”

“Whoops, sorry Nadi-boss,” Tara laughed scratching the back of her head, “I was just showing my friend to his table.”

“Geez, how many times do I have to tell you it’s Nadia or Boss. You can’t use both,” the waitress said with a heavy sigh, “As for your friend, I’m sure he can find a place on his own.”

“Excuse me,” Jason spoke up with a warm smile, “she was only trying to help, there’s no reason to scold her. Besides, I find her antics quite amusing.”

Tara smirked at Nadia as if to say “I told you so.”

Nadia however simply rolled her eyes and pushed Tara away, “Let’s just get you back behind the counter before you cause anymore trouble,” she sighed as she escorted Tara away from Alex and his father.

Once back at the counter, Nadia sat back down on her stool and as if on cue instantly fell asleep. Tara laughing at her bosses’ unprofessional display.

“You know that uniform really does look good on you,” Cole said with a grin.

Tara smiled back at him and, grabbing the edges of her skirt, gave Cole a small curtsy, “Thank you.” Her smile however instantly went away when she looked out the window and saw Carter sitting on a bench with a large grey cat in his lap.

Cole raised an eyebrow, “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I just…” she skated away from him and took off in a random direction, “I need to get back to work.”

Cole blinked and then shrugged, “if you say so.”

Back on the far side of the cafe, Alex looked over to Jason with a face that gave the impression that he really didn’t want to be seen with him. Jason glanced back and gestured to the seat in front of him, “Have a seat son.”

“Please don’t call me that,” Alex sighed as he sat down in the booth, avoiding eye contact with the man sitting across from him, “just tell me this… what exactly are you planning?”

Jason raised an eyebrow and laughed, “Planning? Can’t a man just want to catch up with his son after years of being gone?”

“THAT’S NOT THE POINT!” Alex shouted as he slammed his fist down on the table resulting in the other patrons around them to stare, “You think you can just disappear… then come back without me getting upset?” he looked up to his supposed father as tears began to run down his face, “I don’t care what the reason is… I just want to know why… why did you leave when mom died?”

Jason frowned as the words of his clearly wounded son pierced his heart harder than anything ever had before. He had expected his son would respond like this, however now that it was happening before his very eyes he hadn’t the slightest idea what to say. What could he say? Sorry for running off now I’m back so we can be happy? No matter how much he wanted it to, this wasn’t going to be resolved with something as simple as that.

He placed his hands together and closed his eyes before taking a deep breath and then exhaling. He opened his eyes and looked directly into those of his son, taking a quick breath of air preparing to speak.

However, before he could say a word a large explosion went off just outside the cafe, shattering the windows and filling the entire building with a cloud of dirt, smoke and rubble. As the smoke cleared a pair of dopants hopped into the cafe. One was resembled a rusty yet sleek robot you would see in your average low budget science fiction movie with sharp metal claws and a solid red eye in the center of his face while the other was comprised of jagged shards of metal with hands made of large scissor blades with similar smaller blades covering the entirety of his body.

“WHERE ARE THE RIDERS!!!” demanded the dopant with the single red eye. Cole and Tara instantly glance over to one another while Alex sat puzzled has, unlike the other patrons, Jason stayed put in his seat and was completely unfazed by what was going on. “WE KNOW YOU’RE IN HERE! COME FORWARD OR I’LL BLOW THIS WHOLE PLACE TO BITS!”

Alex instantly stood up and reached for his Star and Runner memories that he kept in his back pocket, however before he could get a word in edgewise a familiar voice called out from the other side of the dopants on the street just outside the cafe, “right behind you.”

The two dopants turned around to see Carter standing behind them in his the dragon like crimson red armour of his rider form with his buster blade resting on his shoulder and the giant cat like dopant named Gorge standing behind him.

The bladed dopant stared Carter down and in a deep voice said to him, “you are one… we asked for all the riders.”

Carter looked over to Tara in the shattered window of the cafe then back to the bladed dopant, “Too bad, because I’m the one you’ve got,” he said as he aimed his sword at the duo, “and that isn’t going to change.”

“You search for the others,” the bladed dopant instructed the smaller one eyed one, “I’ll handle this one.” The one eyed dopant nodded and headed inside the cafe as the larger one stepped towards Carter and Gorge.

“Large blades covering your body as well as you hands…” Carter analyzed his new opponent, “you must be Glave, correct?”

The large blade covered dopant chuckled, “always good to know META keeps its tabs on me.” Carter chose not to respond to Glave and and snapped his finger to Gorge ordering him to attack. Gorge charged at Glave who quickly guarded with the blades on his right arm and gritted his dopant form’s metal teeth, “Hey there girl… long time no see.”

Back in the cafe, the second dopant threw small explosive charges at the feets of civilians as they ran away, “Yes you sacks of flesh! RUN LIKE THE RATS YOU ARE!”

“HEY TIN HEAD!” Tara shouted at him throwing a can of pop at his head, the dopant turning around to face her as she stood alongside Alex and Cole. Tara cracked her knuckles and gave her a glare with her anger filled eyes, “You best be planning to pay for this one way or another!”

“The name is Time Bomb,” the dopant chuckled, “and I only pay in bits and pieces.”

“Well unfortunately for you, we don’t offer payment plans,” Alex said as he, Cole and Tara pulled out their respective gaia memories. Cole and Alex’s driver materialized on their waists while Kree flew down and attached to Tara’s wrist, “so it looks like your rampage ends here.”

“HENSHIN!” the trio cried out as the slammed their memories into their drivers and activated them at once. “STAR! RUNNER! GALE! ROCK!” all three of their drivers shouted as their armour formed around them, the Rock Smasher forming in Cole’s hand while Tara pulled out her flail and swung it around.

“Tara! Tie him up and bring him outside!” Alex instructed.

“With pleasure,” Tara returned with glee as she hurled her flail over to Time Bomb wrapping it around him with ease before spinning him in the air and throwing him out the whole he had made in the window up front.

The three followed him outside to the now empty street. Alex stopped for a moment and took a quick look back inside and noticed that Jason had disappeared. He sighed in relief, even though he hated the man for leaving him he still felt good knowing that he had at least made it out safe and wasn’t going to get caught up in the battle that was already in progress.

Back over with Carter, Glave swung his blade lightly at Gorge resulting in the beast flying backward and over onto the ground. Carter gritted his teeth in frustration.

“Useless animal,” he grunted as he tightly gripped his sword with both hands and swung it at Glave. Glave parried with one hand and punched Carter in the gut with the other, Carter simply winced and shot off a blast of fire from the palm of his hand into Glave’s face which knocked him back a few feet which then resulted in him tripping over himself and falling to the ground. Carter raised his sword to Glave’s face and looked down to him, “stay.”

During all this, a blond haired man stood in the shadow of an alleyway with his hand on a golden gaia memory, “There’s four... now where’s the fifth?”

Time Bomb continued to throw small chargers at Alex, Cole and Tara which exploded the second they hit them. As the barrage continued, the three felt it necessary to duck for cover behind the rubble from the cafe.

“This is insane!” Tara panted, “How the hell do we even get close to a freak like that!”

“Leave it to me,” Shiore whispered into the ear’s of the three as she dashed passed them and right up to Time Bomb, grabbing two kunai knives off of her belt and hurling them into the palms of each of his hands.

“OW!” Time Bomb cried out in agony as he looked to the knives in his palms which were burrowed so deep that he wouldn’t be able to pull them out without rendering his hands unusable, “Where the hell did these come from!”

Within a matter of moments, Shiore took both of Time Bomb’s arms and forced them behind his back with one arm before pushing him to his knees and raising the blade of her katana to his neck with the other, “From hell itself.”

The blond haired man in the alleyway smirked, “and there she is.” he hit the button on his gaia memory which marked with a C layered with teeth on the inside.

“CRAVE!”

“Thanks,” Alex said to Shiore as he, Cole and Tara ran up to her. “Now then,” he knelt down to the dopant and looked him in the eye, “who sent you? Was it Vainglory?”

Before Time Bomb could speak, a strong wind blew knocking all of four of them to the ground and shattering their transformations save for Time Bomb himself. “No,” a voice which sounded familiar to Alex called out, “That would be me, or rather... us.”

The riders looked over to see a group of five dopants standing before them. One was a harpy with fully extended blood red wings who was the one generating the strong wind, another being fairly scrawny with a lightly padded black body glove that cover his entire body that had wires and what looked like bright blue keypads covering his arms and legs, a sleek gunmetal grey helmet with a black glass dome covering his head. On the opposite side of them stood two others one looking like a slimy sea creature who was covered in slime that drench the ground he walked on leaving a trail behind him.

In the center of these four was a green overly muscular and demonic dopant with bright red eyes that stared into the very souls of four riders on the ground. Dull cracked emerald armour with a silver trim lined his body with the centerpiece of him being a rusted steel driver that bore a close resemblance to the ones worn by META’s commanders.

Gorge who had remained on the ground looked over to the group of dopants and scratched the ground with its claws making its way back up to its feet. Gorge snarled as it walked over to Carter, raised its claws and slashed Carter across his back knocking him to his knees and breaking his transformation.

Time-Bomb then threw four explosive charges onto Alex, Tara, Cole and Shiore which latched themselves onto the four riders. Glave grabbed Alex and Tara while the slimy sea creature constricted around Shiore and the harpy like one leapt up into the air and slammed him into ground.

“GAH!” Carter cried out in agony, he looked back to Gorge, “What the hell are you doing!”

“Following orders,” the green demon dopant declared, he raised his hand and gestured towards Gorge, “come here girl… your new master awaits.” Gorge snarled and made it’s way over to the group of dopants, kneeling just beside the green demon who seemed to be the leader, “good girl,” he said patting Gorge on the head, “you know where your loyalty lies,” he looked over to Carter, “unlike some.”

“Girl?” Carter snarled as he inched his way to his feet, “What the hell are you talking about?”

The leader dopant looked at Carter, “it appears you had a bug in your web… and changing the gender of one such as Gorge is easy for her.”

“DAMN YOU!” Alex shouted trying to break free from Glave’s hold only to be dragged back and held even tighter, “Just who in the hell are you guys anyway!”

The green demon looked to Alex, “I figured you wouldn’t recognize me the way I am now,” he said resulting in Alex raising an eyebrow not knowing what exactly he meant, “to keep things simple, you may refer to us as GENESIS… I am Crave.”

“Genesis huh?” a voice called out from behind Alex and company, “rather overly pretentious of you don’t you think...” all eyes turned to the source of the voice to find Jason walking up to behind where the group of dopants had the riders pinned, “Crave? or should I say… Greed?” he looked over Alex with a cold and shameful glare then back to the dopant that stood before him.

“And… you are?” Crave asked raising an eyebrow.

Jason held out a gold gaia memory marked with an equally gold demonic styled v with a slight violet tint to it, “the one who made you.” He undid his blazer revealing a META commander driver strapped around his waist and pressed the button just below the label of his memory.

“VAINGLORY!” the memory shouted as Jason slammed it into his driver.

Alex’s eyes shot open and gasped as the dark shroud of a deep purple aura surrounded his father transforming him into the same dark armored figure that had attacked the police station and left Marcoh with a torn up arm little over three months ago. He felt the urge to scream but was left frozen by the mere sight of his father’s new form and the realization that the angry red eyes that he swore revenge on that day were the same eyes of the one who brought him into this world.

Vainglory walked forward until he was a few feet away from Crave, leaving behind a trail of shadows which echoed a faint cry of many voices of agony before fading away just as they appeared. He looked Crave in the eye who looked back into his.

Crave looked over to the mechanical dopant covered with keypads that stood beside him, “stay out of this,” Crave instructed his subordinate as, it nodding and enveloping himself in a clear film before disappearing. Crave then looked back over to Vainglory,“I had hoped to meet you someday… but I never expected you to deliver yourself to me so easily.”

A shroud of several thousand shadowy blades shot out from Vainglory’s cloak and engrossed themselves around Crave, leaving him little room to some much as even breath. He narrowed his gaze and spoke in a cold haunting voice “Silence… you have done more than enough damage for my liking. So tell me, give me a reason why I shouldn’t just end you now.”

Crave angrily gritted his teeth, “I should ask you the same question.” he flexed his arms outward and pushed the blades around him away before jumping back and dashing over to one side as two pale green blades shot out from from his wrist guards, “JUST FUCK OFF AND DIE ALREADY!” He shouted as he lunged at Vainglory jabbing both of his blades into him.

Before Crave could land a single hit however, a thick wall of dark shadows formed by his side and blocked the attack before shooting out a barrage of spikes that covered the face of the wall and impaled Crave upon impact. Crave however wasn’t about to fall right when Vainglory was right in front him and gritted his teeth at the pain trying to stay planted on the ground.

Vainglory then pushed the wall of shadows away from himself before dismissing it resulting in Crave falling to his feet, panting heavily as he did so. He forced himself back up and set his gaze back on Vainglory, Vainglory simply looking back at him in the corner of his eye without so much as moving to face him.

“Seems I underestimated you,” Crave coughed as he snapped his fingers together resulting in all the dopants under his command to release the riders from their grasp and form up next to him, “Cyber, we’re falling back for now.”

Vainglory simply watched as the keypad covered dopant with the black dome helmet reappeared beside Crave and began typing away on the keys on his left arm. After entering a long and complicated string of codes, he lowered his arms as he and his fellow dopants along with Gorge were then broken down into data and carried away by the wind where they were to be reconstructed elsewhere. Vainglory watched as the data flew away and removed his memory from his driver as his dopant form faded away in the same dark aura it had appeared in.

“What… the hell…” Alex panted with his fists balled up as tightly as his body would allow. He gritted his teeth and narrowed his eyes at his father, “WAS ALL THAT!!!”

“A child like you would never understand,” Jason coldly said as he turned his back to his own son, “even so, it’s better that you don’t.”

“Like hell it is!” Alex growled as he ran up to Jason and threw a punch at him which smacked the older male in the back of his head.

A cold wind blew over them as Cole and Tara stood in silence, unsure of whether or not they should do anything to help. Carter and Shiore on the other hand knew that it was not their place to intervene, at least not yet.

After what felt like ages in the cold dead silence, Jason grabbed Alex’s arm which was still pressed against the back of his skull and thrusted his elbow into the boy’s gut before throwing him over his shoulder and down onto the ground.

“This world is not yours to understand, so don’t even try,” Jason said with a cold voice as he walked passed Alex without so much as a second glance. Alex tried to get back on his feet but was quickly met with Jason slamming his foot down on his hand and looking down on him with the eyes of a killer, “stay down… you’ll only make your fate worse if you fight it.”

Alex fell down on the ground burying his face in the dirt as Jason took his foot off the boy’s hand and simply walked away, “figures… if you can’t even keep your emotions in check, what chance do you have against me?” he said in the same cold voice which somehow sounded colder as he walked off into the distance and eventually faded over the horizon.

“ALEX!” Tara shouted as she and Cole ran over to the boy who was still in the dirt, Shiore looking away with her eyes closed as she couldn’t stand the sight in front of her.

“Are you alright?” Cole asked helping him to his feet.

“Not again...” he growled as he balled his hands into fists and looked with eyes filled with a fire that was ignited by years of built up anger and hatred, “I’m NOT going to let you hurt me again!” he broke away from Cole and Tara and gazed angrily into the sunset, “I’ll find you… and I WILL kill you! FATHER!”

To be continued

{Insert Ending Theme - “Reason” by Yuzu}

Next time on Kamen Rider Ultimate Xtreme:

With the identity of Vainglory known and a new force on the prowl, it’s up to Alex and the other riders to take both of them down while looking out for the other.

With a three way war about to begin, only the strongest will survive. But can each faction even trust themselves?

All will be decided when Kamen Rider Ultimate Xtreme continues in Episode 3 Crimson Bodyguard.
Ryu-O, where is your true strength?