Episode 2 - The Source
A week had passed since the incident. Vinyl received an email the day after from the owners of the comic store apologizing and offering extra payment as compensation. She would have been fine without it but gladly took the offer since it was there. She spent the week relaxing, recovering from her injuries and reading more of her novel. She was getting a little sick of doing nothing and decided to drive around. Grabbing her headphones and her trademark purple shades, she left the apartment and drove off on her motorcycle with no particular destination in mind.
---
An incident at the Cover Page comic store in Manehattan last night. Footage has been immediately surfacing of a monster attack. The footage comes from a few civilians on the scene who captured the incident on their cellular phones. As you can see, the man, identified as Page Turner, appears to have turned into some kind of monster or alien and began wreaking havoc on the customers. That's all the footage that was taken from the scene, but eyewitness accounts also reported what they describe as a white armored ninja arriving on the scene and defeated the monster. Unfortunately no footage has surfaced of this account but we have received the same story from at least four witnesses who remained on the scene. Rumors that monsters or aliens have been hiding among us have been circulating since last month and people are now starting to believe that these rumors were true. More coverage on the situation as the investigations contin- *CLICK*
The Doctor sighed as turned the TV off and put on his coat. “Nothing on the Noise Driver's Rider. I wonder how Noise and Music will respond now...”
---
Vinyl drove for two hours, making turns whenever she pleased. Getting home wasn't an issue as her phone's GPS could easily take her back. She arrived at an old pier on the eastern side of Manehattan. Though she had never come here before, she was aware of it's existence. The famous Ship Shape Pier. It had a long history way back in the day for being the prime location of many lucrative deals and deliveries. The place had long since been abandoned and the city showed no current interest in dealing the pier in any way. People nearby still occasionally used the place for various purposes, but it was for the most part, empty. Vinyl looked around to make sure no one was around to see her. Taking a deep breath, she held down the button on her headphones and transformed. She was glad no one managed to get any footage of her that day. With every news crew in Manehattan swarming on the story, any possibility of tying her to the incident could have been catastrophic. Today, she felt like messing around more with the headphones...the Driver as that armored guy called it. She was determined to get better, though she still wasn't entirely sure why she was so hung up over it. She didn't care about being a hero or fighting evil or anything. She pushed her questions aside for the moment began experimenting. It seemed she was more agile than she initially though in this form. She was able to run on walls, much longer than any normal human should be able to. She also learned that the vinyl records that she could materialize could also be utilized as chakrams that were able to bounce off walls. The most interesting discovery though was her ability to utilize the records that still rested on the floor long after being thrown. She was able to use the mixing board on her right arm to make them do various things. She had figured out how to make them explode, emit any noise she desired and talk through them. She had made them emit a strange humming vibration but nothing seemed to come from that. She was sure it had some function but she was unable to figure it out.
“Didn't take you long to appear again. Now, will you hand over the Driver willingly this time? I intend to return with it this time, one way or another.”
---
“The Noise Driver just went live! The point of activation is...the old Ship Shape Pier. Can you make it out there Bolt?”
“Sure. Let's hope this one hasn't figured out how our tracking works.”
Ditzy sighed into her headset. She wanted nothing more than to fix her mistake, yet all she could do for now was deliver information and hope for the best. “Yeah... Also, Music just went active too.”
“Forget about Music, just let it do what it wants for now.”
“But, Music activated close by. She's within a five mile radius of Noise.”
There was a brief silence. “...I'll worry about finding Noise first. If Music decides to show up, then we'll go from there. Will Trixie be joining me?”
“Uhhhh...she's at work right now...”
“Figures. Whatever. I'm on my way. I should be there in about thirty or so minutes.”
---
Vinyl turned around, surprised to see the yellow armored stranger again. “You!? How did you find me!?”
“I take it that's a no then? Oh well. This time, I won't let you off the hook.” He removed the strange firearm holstered to his hip and pointed it at her. He began firing large energy spheres from the firearm, bombarding the area around Vinyl. She was able to avoid all but a few shots.
“Alright, I've been wanting a rematch anyway! Bring it on!” She threw a small barrage of records at him, all of which he calmly evaded and deflected. She grinned as she brought her right arm up and pushed up a slider. “Gotcha!” The records exploded around the armored man, catching him off guard. “And let's wrap this show up!” She materialized the large white and blue record in her right hand and threw it into the cloud of smoke, waiting patiently the dust to settle.
Standing with the record in his hands, the man broke it in half and tossed the pieces to the side, causing the record to vanish as it hit the ground. “Definitely a nice trick, you're gonna need more than that to beat me.” Vinyl was starting to panic now. She hadn't thought beyond that attack. She was sure it would have been enough to beat him. The man read her body language like a book. “I see. That was all you had, huh? A one trick pony. Enough wasting time.” He readied his fire arm and fired more shots at her, forcing her to dodge as many as she could again. She was able to dodge them all, but he charged at her while she was distracted and delivered another explosive punch to her chest, sending her flying back like last time.
She quickly rose to her feet. She abandoned her desire for a rematch. He was right, he knew how to fight with this armor. Vinyl on the other hand was a stranger to this kind of combat. If she went on any further, she was going to lose. She had one last trick up her sleeve. “One trick is all I'll need!” She created more records in her hands and began throwing them at the armored man.
“If it didn't work the first time, it's definitely not going to work again, especially not when you're making it so obvious!” He charged at her, ready to deliver the finishing blow.
A voice called out from behind him. “GOTCHA!” He stopped his advance and turned around, gasping at the potential threat behind him. He was confused to find nothing but the records on the ground. Before he could question the voice, the records all exploded at once. Vinyl used the confusion and smoke to escape. She quickly ran behind him, through the smoke and up a nearby building. She threw some records in various places on the ground as she made her escape.
As the dust settled the man looked searched for Vinyl. He kept hearing odd sounds and footsteps and sudden battle cries emanating from random locations every few seconds. He was unable to rely on his senses anymore. Frustrated, he came to the realization that his opponent had managed to trick him and escape. He brought his hand to his ear.
“She got away...”
---
Vinyl undid her transformation as she approached the street. It was nighttime, no one would have been able to see her clearly. She ran clutching her chest. She was utterly defeated and was lucky to escape again. She ran for awhile, finally turning an alley and allowing herself to catch her breath. “Dammit...he's right...I suck at fighting...”
A woman in a cheongsam dress approached Vinyl from further in the alley. “What interesting things you find this time of night.” Vinyl turned to get a look at her mysterious alleymate. “What drives you my dear?” Vinyl gazed into the woman's eyes. Her eyes were a haunting bright green. They seemed glow and pulsate the longer she looked into them, as if they peering into the very depths of her soul. Vinyl's current current pain suddenly seemed incredibly trivial, her body slowly starting to turn to face the woman. “Interesting. You have desire to hold on to an object, yet you are not entirely sure why. Your emotions...they are conflicted.” The cloaked woman took a few more steps towards. Vinyl was starting to feel terrified of this woman. Every fiber of her being was screaming at her to run, but she found herself unable to do anything at the moment. She could only continue staring into those eyes of hers. “I've been observing your kind. I find humans to be quite interesting. They are slaves to their emotions. Their desires, their needs, their actions...all driven by emotions. Their emotions drive them to achieve or even sabotage their own goals. Such an interesting phenomenon, but a phenomenon that must be eliminated before it drives the world to utter chaos.” The woman took a few more steps, now only inches away from Vinyl. She whispered to her. “I can set you free and rid you of your emotions.” Vinyl was internally screaming for help, her body breaking out into a cold sweat as she stood helpless, unable to escape. The woman held her hand out from the cloak. Her hand was jet black, her fingers sharp like claws and their appeared to be a hole in her palm. She slowly moved her hand towards Vinyl's chest. “I shall give you the power to conquer your emotions. To take what you've always wanted.”
The woman was less than an inch from making contact with Vinyl when she suddenly looked up and quickly backed away. Something was fired down at the ground, exploding as it landed in front of Vinyl, knocking her back and freeing of that captivating stare. She could suddenly feel the pain from earlier again. A strange minty green figure landed in front of Vinyl. “Don't look into her eyes! She uses direct eye contact to paralyze you.”
“What the heck is going on?!”
The armored figure glanced back at Vinyl, making sure not to drop her guard towards the mysterious woman in front of her and tossed a piece of paper at her. “Get out of here and read it! I'll hold her off!” Vinyl grabbed the note, scrambled to her feet and ran. She was in no mood to question anything right now. Putting distance between her and that strange woman was the only thing she cared about right now. She ran back, to her motorcycle, still parked near the pier and opened the note, looking around frantically to make sure nothing else wanted to kill her.
806 Melonbread Dr.
Room 204
Meet me there. Make sure you're not followed.
Vinyl quickly input the address into her GPS and drove off. She was having doubts about meeting this mystery person, but would rather take her chances with her than anyone of the others she had been dealing with the past few days. She was at least relieved to be on the road again. The prior events replayed in her head. She decided that if this meeting also ended in an attempt to retrieve this Driver from her, she would just give it up. This thing wasn't worth her life.
She examined the apartment building and scanned her surroundings to make sure she wasn't followed as the note instructed. She approached room 204 and knocked, mentally preparing herself for the worst. Two more attempted knocks later and nothing happened. She examined the note again to make sure she was at the right place and knocked one more time. She heard footsteps climbing the stairs nearby.
“Sorry I was late, I'm glad you showed up. Please come inside. I'm sure you'd like to relax after that nasty run in. Oh! But one quick question. You didn't transform on your way here did you?”
“No. Why?”
“Here's your first bit of useful information today. Next time you transform, don't stay in the same place for more than a few minutes. They can track your location when you do it.”
“So, that's how he keeps finding me!”
“Mmhm. Seems they can only track the location where you initially did it though. If you move far enough away, they won't know where you are. That's how I've been avoiding them.” She unlocked her door and held it open. “Come on in. Oh, and take off your shoes please.”
The place was small but cozy and well kept. She had a small kitchen area, a table big enough to seat at about six people and a flat screen TV with two bean bag chairs laying across from it. “Oh, by the way, my name is Lyra Heartstrings. What's yours?”
Vinyl was jolted out of her trance. Now taking in the girl's appearance. The girl had nice long minty green hair that stopped above her eyes on the front, along with a small line of hair that was dyed white. She was wearing a simple white shirt and jeans. “The name's Vinyl. Vinyl Scratch.”
She grinned. “I thought you looked familiar. I've heard of you.”
“Good to hear people know me. Does good for work. By the way, mind if I crash on the bean bag?” Lyra nodded, prompting Vinyl to quickly walk over, spin and fall on the bean bag chair.”
“You look like you're wiped. I'll make some food for us. You like spaghetti?”
Vinyl threw her hand up lazily. “Yeah. Sounds good.” She pulled her phone out of her pocket and quickly texted Trixie that she would be staying at an old friend's house for the night.
Lyra began boiling water on the stove. “So, I take it you found one of these 'Driver' things as well and accidentally figured out what it did too?”
Vinyl shuffled around the bean bag, pushing all the stuffing to the back so she could sit up a little while she talked. “Yeah. Some delivery chick with a big bag sat down with me at a sandwich joint and when she left, I noticed she left this package. I tried to find her but she was gone. And next thing I know, I was turning into some kind of armored super girl. How'd you get yours? Also, have you met with that guy in the yellow armor?”
“I was getting on the bus back home and I saw some kind of brown box with nothing on it. I assumed it was someone pulling some kind of harmless little stunt and I just kind of took it. A few days later, I figured out what it could do. As for a yellow Rider, kind of. When I transformed for the first time I was in one of our university auditoriums. I freaked out a little bit and then found out how to undo the transformation. I was leaving the school grounds and I did see a yellow Rider walking around the grounds. I kind of got even more freaked out when I saw him and took another route off the grounds. School was out and almost no one was there. There was some female blue Rider with a cape that attacked me when I transformed again and tried to test my Driver out. We had a small conversation and I didn't want to give my Driver up. She was going to attack me but I managed to run away.”
Vinyl stayed quiet for a minute. She was very curious about one part of that story. “Why didn't you want to give up your Driver, Lyra? I've been holding on to mine but...I honestly don't really know why I'm still holding on to this thing when it's nearly gotten me killed like three times already.”
“I'm keeping mine for now because I have something I need to do with it. Believe it or not, I know about the Changelings. I knew about them before I got my hands on this. I've heard the rumors floating around and I got really interested in it. I found out a little bit about them, though no one on the internet has been able to figure out why this is suddenly happening.” Lyra paused for minute. Vinyl noticed Lyra eyes were starting to get misty. It looked like she was holding back tears. “And as fate would have it...not even a day later...I had a bit of a changeling encounter of my own...” Lyra set a timer for the noodles and moved to the counter, folding her arms down it and staring at the wall. “Do you know what Changelings are or how they're made Vinyl?”
Vinyl slowly sat up at full attention. She could see an ocean of sadness in Lyra's eyes with just a small, faint glimmer of hope. The face of a person with one goal and nothing left to lose. “N-no...”
“You almost became one earlier.” She paused for a moment to let that statement sink in. “That woman is the one who creates Changelings. She appears almost out of nowhere at night to random people...she pierces your heart with her bare hand...and corrupts it. She does something to you...corrupting your emotions...it's like something slowly eats away at your humanity...and once the person finally sheds off their skin...the last remainder of their humanity...all that's left is a hideous monster...a Changeling... You saw it, right? I saw the story on the news a few days ago. I'm almost certain that was you. You saw his skin just fall off, right?” Vinyl nodded slowly. “That's the final stage. But I believe... I believe a person can be saved before they get to that point.” Her tear ducts were slowly losing the battle as she continued. “I tried asking that blue Rider when she confronted me that time... She said that no one has ever recovered before that...but...there's a first time for everything right?” She looked at Vinyl, her expression begging for a positive response.
Vinyl didn't know who she believed at the moment, but she didn't want to crush her hope. “Y-yeah. I think you could...maybe if you could snap them out of it beforehand or something...or maybe if you beat that woman making them...”
“That's what I was thinking. That's why I've been transforming a lot and practicing with this armor. If I can beat her before... Vinyl...would you consider helping me? You don't have to if you don't want to...”
Vinyl had to put some thought into the request. She wasn't exactly keen on the idea of dying, but just like last time, she couldn't just let someone die in front of her. She had a feeling that a close friend or lover of Lyra's had probably come in contact with that mysterious woman and had her heart corrupted. She couldn't find it in herself to leave Lyra like this. Especially not after she had just saved her life. “Yeah. I'll help you get your friend back.”
Beeeeep beeeeep
Lyra wiped her eyes and removed the pot from the stove, looking back at Vinyl. “Thank you.” She brought the pot to the sink and went to grab a strainer.
Lyra had composed herself before she served their late night dinner. The two sat together at the dinner table and continued trading information. “By the way, you kept callin' those two 'Riders'. What's that all about?”
“That's what that girl called us. She said those who carried and used these Drivers were called Riders. Armored Riders.”
Vinyl swallowed a mouth full of spaghetti, entranced by this moniker. “Yo, I like it. Armored Riders...” She was still completely against the idea of parading about as a hero of justice, but coming up with some kind of 'hero' name already sounded really cool to her. “How'd you figure out that you could avoid those guys by just moving somewhere else?”
“After my encounter with that blue Rider, I wanted to see what would happen if I transformed and transformed back to normal. So I went to the Starry Brew in that small mall not too far from here, did it in the bathroom, got a coffee, sat outside and just waited. I didn't see a Rider, but I did see someone wander around the plaza, looking for something or someone. I did it a few more times that later that day, though those times I was hiding as well. I didn't want them noticing me every time. I saw a girl the first time and the other times I saw a guy. A day or two later, I did the same thing, except after I did it, I went somewhere completely different after I transformed and untransformed. I never saw either of them those times. I figured they could only track your location at the time of transformation. Anything you do after, it doesn't seem like they can track.”
“That makes sense. Every time I used mine, I stayed in the same place. So, at least now I know how to avoid that guy. But they did say they needed the Drivers to fight the Changelings...should we really be holding on to these?”
Lyra finished her plate and wiped her mouth clean. “I can return it after I'm done with it. I know it's a bit selfish, but I will save my friend.”
“Fair enough I guess.” Vinyl finished as well. She reached into her pocket to check her phone for the time. “Jeez! It's 3 AM?!”
“Oh! You can stay if you like. I have a spare mattress for guests. It's comfortable don't worry, not some old throw away mattress or anything.”
“Thanks. That'd be great.”
The mattress was indeed comfy. Lyra was glad to see her guest satisfied and turned off all the lights. She stopped at her door, remembering something. “Oh! I almost forgot, the blue Rider gave her name when we met that one time. I doubt it's her real name or would help us find out who she is, but she called herself The Great and Powerful Armored Rider.”
---
“Doctor! The Claw Driver just went active!”
The voice on the Doctor's headset sounded surprised. “It did?! Where? Is Bolt awake and willing to go check it out?”
“It's pretty far from here. It would be about a two hour drive from here. Bolt said he might do it, but he sounded really tired and annoyed...”
There was a brief silence. “Forget it. Tomorrow we'll have Bolt drive out there and we'll see if it goes active again. Let him sleep for now. Mark the location for now. “
“Will do! Good night Doctor!”
“Ditzy, I appreciate the effort, but you should really get some sleep. It's not good to be staying up so late like this."
“Don't worry, I'll be fine. I'll leave after I finish this up. Good night!”
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Grammar could use work and the structure, however, since it is your first fic, I kinda glazed over those minor issues. I enjoyed it and I await more.
I am really enjoying this, you are using the Kamen Rider inspiration very well. And i like the characters so far. Vinyl is a bit rough around the edges, but she is still willing to do the right thing even if she isn't really intent on being the hero. The monster concept is also interesting, these Creatures aren't just some random creatures from another dimension, but humans who have been caught in a trap. And, you have a interesting set up with Triexie and Vinyl living together and both being riders yet not knowing it yet. And i really like the form of the driver, as being a headphone.
Just keep striving to improve in your writing, and do your best. Overall, good job, please continue.
5079299
Hey, thanks. The inspiration for Vinyl's Driver actually came from my current headset actually. I'm using a slightly older model of the PDP Afterglow Headset. It's a white headset with glowing blue sides and headband. At first, I thought "hot damn, these are pretty much Vinyl Scratch headphones!" At some point after I finished KR Decade, I remembered that the Riders in KR Hibiki didn't use a belt to transform, but special objects (mainly instruments in their case). That pretty much justified the idea of using them as her Driver for me, and her headphones are just straight up the PDP headset. The Changelings actually fit rather perfectly with so many things I wanted to do. The idea for the Changelings came from the Yummies from KR OOO and just the MLP Changelings in general. The Changelings will be getting leagues better very soon.
5078634
5081714 Great! Oh and after OOO I suggest Kamen Rider Gaim, it's considered by alot of people to be one of the best Kamen Rider series (including me). It breaks away from the usual Heisei conventions like having a 2-Episode Arc each weeks and builds up it's story each episode. Plus rider vs rider fights are VERY common (and awesome).
AGH! I made one small mistake! Fixed a small typo! It's the Claw Driver that went active at the end, not the Power Driver. Sorry! That was a small relic left over after a small change in Drivers happened during early stages.
5081754
Argh. See, I already promised a friend I'd watch Kabuto after I finished OOO. Oddly enough, I DID see two episodes of Gaim. I actually used the whole aspect of calling them "Armored Riders" from Gaim as opposed to calling them "Masked Riders". I'll hit Gaim after Kabuto.
5083748 Kabuto is pretty good. Although it's a shame that the "clock up" function gets used less as the series goes on.
5083765
That just sounds odd considering how OP that ability would seem to be. Then again, it seems like a lot of really OP abilities in these series' tend to be thrown out the window when the writers actually realize how OP they are. Holy SHIT Luna/Trigger was so OP in Double and they rarely used it. Same with Fang/Joker. Luna/Trigger lost to ONE Dopant, and they got really downtrodden about that. Yo, that is a 9/1 matchup. You lost to ONE guy. Don't let that stop you from starting EVERY fight with that and pulling that trigger until your finger bleeds mang!
Wizard kinda did the same thing, but got worse when they started throwing just about EVERYTHING out the window. Beast? Yeah! Starts quickly gettin his ass whooped all day every day. Drago Timer? Neato! Rarely uses it. Beast gets Hyper form? DUDE! Rocks for like, two episodes and then goes back to being the punching bag...gawd I really wish they didn't sideline him so hard near the end...Beast was so friggen great...
5083808 Yeah, it seems like alot of kamen rider series have a tendency to do that. One exception would be Kiva, since when he got his emperor form he used it ALL the time (from what ive heard i haven't watched Kiva), apparently it was due to the normal form of Kiva being extremely heavy compared to his final form.