//------------------------------//
// To Catch a Star - Hello Sis 
// Story: Kamen Rider Alchemy 
// by Layton13 
//------------------------------//

Within a day life had changed, from weird to completely insane. At the time he hadn’t thought about what might happen after everything was wrapped up and done or what might come from his decisions. But it didn’t take long. The day after he had defeated Cerberus and saved his friends his life had been turned upside down, even more so than it was already. Thankfully Ocean wasn’t really hurt and a night at the hospital was all that she needed to get back to health, and everything else would be taken care of during their next fight. But they could have never expected what happened the moment they left the hospital.

At first, it looked like they had stepped into a thunderstorm, something that shouldn’t be the case since the weather report had said that the entire week would be sunny with almost no clouds. It took Phoenix and Ocean a few minutes to realize what they got themselves into, paparazzi, dozens of them. Like hornets, they swarmed the hospital, and at first glance of Phoenix they freaked out. He could hear them screaming questions, shoving microphones in his face and generally making almost impossible to get through them.

It hadn’t taken more than fifteen seconds until he had already enough of them. Questions like: “Where are you from?” “How was your childhood?” Why did you keep your identity a secret?” or one particular blunt one: “Are you single?” This was all just too much for him, it felt like they were crushing him, one question here another there and about twenty other ones from elsewhere. As much as he kinda liked the attention at first, it was kinda charming, in a weird way, but it didn’t last long. He just wanted out at this moment, these people were like vultures and Ocean seemed to agree. She quickly grabbed hold of his arm and dragged Phoenix through the hordes of paparazzi till they reached their bikes, but they still didn’t want to give up. They were swarming them, completely cutting off every way of getting past them.

That was until Ocean let her engine roar and screamed: “If you don't get out of the way I’ll arrest you for hindering a government agent in their duty. I give you ten seconds! Ten! Nine!” The paparazzi immediately went dead silent; they stared at her in shock and confusion. “Eight! Seven! Six!” Now the chatter began, all of them quietly asking the others if she was serious. “Five! Four!” They grow louder and louder just like their speed increased as well. Several of them looked at the two Riders with a mixture of fear and anticipation. “Three! Two! One!” Ocean let the engine of her bike roar one last time, and like a miracle, a path emerged from the swarm of people. Not wasting any time both of them let their machines roar and rushed past the paparazzi that looked after them with a mixture of disappointment and relive. 

The rest of the week didn’t go any better. It didn’t even take them an hour till they swarmed the Magnum Opus, at first much to Thunders delight, that however quickly changed as they just kept coming. No amount of telling them nicely that no place was available could deter them from trying to storm the restaurant. That went even so far that Thunder lost it and raised his voice. “Everyone that is just here for Phoenix, you can leave right now! I had enough of you! You don’t appreciate my cooking, you don’t care about my art, you are just hungry locusts looking for the next big scoop! So out now! I only want guest that appreciate my cooking and not that want to see my brother! And if I see you near here again you are going to regret it!” That did get their attention and with it their ire. Loud complaints were raised, and they tried to protest, much to Thunder’s annoyance.

After a bit more shouting, shoving and a broom he actually managed to get the slimy bastards out of his restaurant and even at least a few meters away from it. The customers that stayed looked at him for a moment before simply shrugging while others just let out a sigh of relief. Still, the paparazzi stayed outside, just waiting for the moment they could snack a picture of Phoenix or any other Rider. It was disgusting really.

And as the week went on it didn’t get any better. Every day Phoenix and Ocean tried to search for ivory and Alkahest they had to waste precious time on these pests. It even got so bad that Ocean didn’t even come anymore, at least in the morning and Phoenix just meet her somewhere else. Neither of them were pleased, just like Thunder who was fuming. While he was thankful for the new customers that actually stuck around thanks to his pizzas he just couldn’t stand the people that asked him about the Kamen Riders. 

At the end of the week, Phoenix and Ocean finally had enough of this. At least for one day they didn’t want to deal with this annoyance, so a plan was made. Instead of fighting through the hoards of reporters and meeting up somewhere in the city they would just skip the meeting up part. Phoenix would have just to stay at Ocean’s apartment for the night. If you would ask either Thunder or Summer about the conversation, they would probably start to giggle and say something about bright re heads and awkwardness.

And so the evening came and with it an extremely nervous Phoenix. The two Riders had a long and drawn out day of looking for clues about Ivory’s or Alkahest’s whereabouts, but like before they turned up empty. Besides an explosion in the warehouse district a week ago nothing had really happened. No Corrupted attack, no Riders, no nothing. In one way they were glad that the city was peaceful, but on the other hand, it just lowered their chances to ever find Ivory. But if that what Cerberus had said was true, it meant that Alkahest had something planned for their friend, something that couldn’t be good. 

So with the day coming to an end they returned to Ocean’s apartment, but left their bikes at least five hundred meters away in a Parkhouse, they really didn’t want to risk anything. Add a shoddy and trying to walk as normally as possible and you got two normal civilians that just wanted to go home. Like expected there were a few leaches in front of Ocean’s apartment. Apparently, they hoped that they would have better chances to snatch a foto there. The worst part was, they were actually correct, but luckily they didn’t know that. 

Walking past them felt like operation on an open hearth. One wrong move could make everything worse for them and could cause a wave of reporters to crash down on them. The moment they stepped into their field of vision Phoenix tensed up, he could feel the eyes of them, eyeing him, looking at him with their seemingly all-knowing suspicious eyes. He hated every moment of it. His breath also started to grow infrequent and heavy, something that a few of them actually took note of and more and more eyes were diverted towards them. Still, he moved forward. He had only like ten meters between him and the door to the apartment, just a bit more. 

Then it happened, one of the reporters simply stepped into his way, a bright smile that couldn’t have been faker on his lips as he asked him one question: “Sorry sir, but do you know when agent Skies might come back here? She generally comes home around this time, and we were wondering if you might now if she would come soon?” 

Phoenix just froze, sweet started to pour down his forehead like a waterfall. Fighting monster? No problem, but this? What was he supposed to say? No? Yes? Tell a lie? He really didn’t know, that was always the job of others like Ocean and Thunder, but Ocean hadn’t noticed that he had been left behind and was just walking further towards the door, leaving him alone with this damned reporter and his slimy voice. 

“Sir?” The reporter asked again, tilting his head in annoyance as well as confusion. 

That was when Ocean finally realized that Phoenix was not right behind her, but instead in the claws of the reporter. At first, she thought the worst had come to pass, but since this was the only reporter asking him something she could safely assume that their covers had not been busted. That, however, didn’t mean that they wouldn’t be if she wouldn’t intervene before Phoenix ruined everything.

“Ember! Hey Ember, what’s taking you so long?” She huffed only to walk back to Phoenix, apparently fuming, her hands balled together to fists before she grabbed him at his color and dragged him after her, much to his confusion. “Seriously, why can’t you be less awkward around people. If you can’t talk to them just say ‘sorry, no time’ and be done with it. But no, you have to stay there and look like a complete idiot. Now come, we don’t want to miss my show,” she continued, dragging him through the door, Phoenix still so confused that he didn’t even get a single word out. A few of the reporters snickered while the on that had asked him the question just stared after him with a quiet confused expression on his face.

As the door closed behind them, Ocean let out a loud sigh and shoved Phoenix forward only to give him a light smack on the back of his head. “Owww! What was that for?”

“What was that for? Are you kidding me? You almost blew our cover, note to myself, never ever bring you along for undercover work, like ever. That the loudmouth of Kamen Riders would almost choke on his own tongue is just baffling to me,” she returned with an exhausted tone, shaking her head in defeat.

“Ahm, to be fair, you never said to me what to do,” he awkwardly chuckled only for Ocean to spin around and star right at him, her eyes looking more like the two glaring fires at this moment. “On the other hand, I’m an idiot,” he quickly added.

“More like it. But you are my idiot,” she returned with a small bump to his shoulder. “Come on, we should get going, we don’t want them to figure out who we are, right?” She continued with a far softer tone, Phoenix trotting after her with a happy nod.

The rest of the way to the apartment was a piece of cake, neither reporters nor annoying fans, just empty hallways. They definitely never valued the simple things like privacy until the whole Cerberus fiasco. The door swung open and revealed Ocean’s apartment. Everything was clean; nothing seemed out of place and oh boy the view. A large window gave him a great view of the city below them, it was mesmerizing. Then there was the couch that looked far more comfortable than the thing that he had been sleeping on for three months. This would be a great night, especially if she held up her promise about ordering pizza and a very, very special topping she had been working on. It sounded like the perfect evening, away from all the bullshit that had happened in their life in the last few weeks.

“Ok, wow. You got an eye for apartments. This looks amazing!” He finally broke the silence after he had stared at the room for at least a few seconds, receiving a chuckle from Ocean.

“Yeah, I use something that is called ‘order’, maybe you heard about it?” She slyly returned, throwing her boyfriend a taunting look. 

“Yeah, heard about it, but I’m more of a chaos guy,” he sarcastically returned, raising one of his eyebrows, all while stepping into the room and letting himself down on the couch. “Oh, yes, this is great. It feels like sitting on a cloud,” Phoenix sighed while stretching himself with a loud yawn. 

“Make yourself at home, not that you didn’t do that already anyway,” She looked over towards Phoenix while razing an eyebrow, he in return just sheepishly looked back at her while rubbing the back of his head. “Ah, don’t worry. I’m lenient today.” She then proceeded to sit down right next to him.

“Oh, how merciful of you, oh great queen of this apartment,” he returned, even bowing to her, getting a good laugh out of her. “So, this really didn’t turn out well for us, didn’t it?”

“No reason to complain about spilled milk and in all honesty, even if there was a better way of handling this, it doesn’t matter now. You just went with it, and I’m not complaining that you saved us, that would just be ungrateful. It’s just another challenge like any other before this, we just have to keep on moving forward, or how you would say it,” she smiled back at Phoenix.

“You really know how to wrap me around your finger, you know that?” 

“Yep, and I enjoy every moment of it.”

“Yeah, I can see that. By the way, Thunder is going to a date tomorrow,” Phoenix returned with a wide grin on his lips. “They grow up so fast.”

“Oh, he does? He was even faster than you,” Ocean said, not without letting her tongue stick out for Phoenix to see.

“Hey! That’s unfair!” This was enough to get him out of his comfortable position and to almost jump up from the couch. 

“Oh, but he is your younger brother, so how is it unfair?” The smirk on Oceans face just grew wider and wider with every passing second. 

“You know that I hate you sometimes, right?” He grumbled while crossing his arms. 

“I know, but it’s just so fun, and you aren’t that resentful anyway,” she smirked at him with that oh so innocent face of hers, Phoenix just pouted, much to the amusement of Ocean. “Who is the lucky girl then? I have a sneaking suspicion, but do tell.”

“Yeah, it’s Summer. They had a bet on our first date.”

“Oh, did they thought that we would screw it up?”

“Nope, they bet on something different. If we would kiss or not, fair to say, Summer won. That are siblings for you,” he returned while shaking his head. “Seriously, do you believe it. A friend you know since a few months has more trust in you than your own brother.”

He had expected a snarky remark or a small chuckle at least, but Ocean remained silent. As he looked over to her, he could see that her relaxed and pleasant expression had vanished, instead replaced with a sober look in her eyes. That was when it hit him. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t want to remind you of her,” he quickly added, almost stumbling over his own words.

“No, it’s ok. You don’t have to be so careful. I can take it,” she returned with a low voice and her eyes directed towards the floor. “On another note, where are they going? I would very much like to know that,” she continued, putting on a new smile, but something was just off about it.

But before Phoenix could answer, he heard the ringing of the doorbell. “Oh, I’ll go take that, you’ll just go to the table already, food will be there right away,” Ocean jumped up from the couch and rushed over to the door, leaving Phoenix behind. He just shrugged and did as she told, dragging himself over to the table and down on the chair. Like the rest of the apartment the table was set up properly and seemingly without even the smallest piece of dust on it, really impressive.

“Ah, there we go. Here Phoenix,” he shared from behind, and not even a moment later he saw the pizza carton being placed down right in front of him. “Be prepared to be amazed. My best creation yet. Behold: A pepperoni-extra-cheese-ham-pineapple-strawberry-wasabi-pepper-pizza. I don’t know how I could make this any better than it already is,” she smiled at him before taking of the slices for herself, Phoenix doing the same.

For any normal human, this probably would have sounded like the worst thing someone could ever eat, but Phoenix had learned that Ocean didn’t believe in such trivial stuff, she was all for experimentation and the unusual, at least when it came to food. Picking up a slice he slowly guided it to his mouth, the strange and intense smell already burning his nose, but he trusted in Ocean, so he swallowed his hesitation and with it a good bit of the pizza. And indeed, it tasted wonderful. Like a fire in his mouth, but not too much, a certain sweetness and a certain lustiness from the ham, it all mixed together so well, it was magical. “I gotta give it to you, you are a god when it comes to food, at least figuring out how it works,” he returned, a bright and satisfied smile on his lips as he spoke, the food not even properly swallowed yet.

“Oh, I know. This is great, I love it. And I’m happy that you like it too, but I have the feeling I made one mistake,” she said with a low voice while staring at the pizza in front of her.

“Huh? And what would that be? I have no complaint,” he returned rather confused.

“I should have ordered two of them, not just one,” she chuckled back. “Knowing us two, this probably won’t be enough.”

That got a good chuckle out of Phoenix as he stared at the food as well. “Yeah, come to think of it, you might be right…” He threw Ocean a challenging look. “So, who is going to eat what?”

“Oh, you want to fight over food? Try me,” she returned, a certain fire in her eyes that he really didn’t like.

“Well, I saved you, so why not give me one more slice?”

“And how often did I save or help you?” Ocean returned, picking up another slice of the deliciousness. “And what happened to your manners? Be a gentleman for once. You wouldn’t let your cute girlfriend go to bed hungry, now would you?” She gave him her most innocent and adorable puppy look. 

No, he wouldn’t cave in, he wouldn’t, ho he… “Fine, take it you managed hungrily…” The rest of what he said quickly was lost in incomprehensible mumbling, all while Ocean was enjoying herself far too much.

“Knew you would, and I’m very grateful for it,” she said with glee before picking up her last piece and biting into it with delight. “So, good.”

“Yeah, yeah, you don’t have to rub it in,” he returned, his arms crossed over his empty plate. 

“By the way, you never said on what kind of date they are going on.”

“Oh, you heard about that track competition that will take place in the city. Tomorrow is the first day, you probably heard about it. The best athletes in the nation come together, and it’s supposed to be really great. Too bad I’m not so into sports, neither is Thunder, but he has to bite that bullet because of himself and in all honesty, I’m not so sad about that. Not believing I could get a kiss on the first date,” he jokingly finished, but again Ocean remained silent, and as he looked up he could see that Ocean’s face had twisted into one of shock, and desperation. “What?”

“Well, I might have forgotten something, a small little thing. The labs of the MRG in the city have been in the rebuilding process for a while now, and they finally finished, and they managed to get to the technic up and running and with it Ivory’s computer. I know he had several projects he hadn’t gotten to there. And indeed, some of the other scientists found interesting data on his personal pc. Problem with the data is that only he knows the code. I wanted to see if I could get the code for them to data from the pc and that was planned for tomorrow. I think there might be incredibly useful information in there. Ivory said something really important he was working on and it wasn’t the Friendship Charger. Maybe we could find something important there,” she returned, sounding rather sheepish.

“And what does this have to do with me? I’m not really a computer scientist and am actually really bad with anything beyond a phone, how could I help you?”

“well, I forgot that I have a meeting with my sister tomorrow as well. She is a professional track racer, and she is in the city thanks to the competition. She wanted to meet me before the whole thing starts, but now I have this thing with the computer and…” she started to get rather hasty, and her breath was starting to pick up. “And… You know…”

“So I should stay with her for a while till you…” Phoenix asked rather unsure.

“Till I’m done there. Don’t worry, it won’t take long, and if there are actually complications, I’ll just do it later. I would change the schedule, but I already told them that I would be there around twelve A.M. and I can’t really cancel that now. I’m sorry, I just forgot about it,” she continued, sounding incredibly embarrassed.

“I don’t like this one bit. She is your sister, I don’t think it’s such a good idea to let her wait for so long, especially since you said that you two were rather distant during the last time you saw each other. In all honesty, you should just go to your sister and not to the lab.” Pheonix voice was nervous, and his forehead had been filled with wrinkles as he looked back to his girlfriend. 

“I know, I know, but please, do me this one favorite. I’m sure she’ll like you, and you can soften her up a bit till I get there,” she had this perfect puppy look in her eyes he could just not say no to, and he hated it.

“Fine, ok. I’ll do it, but just for the record, this is a really stupid idea. But you have to actually come, and not just after the competition starts, got it?” Phoenix sounded extremely serious, much to the surprise of Ocean. “You shouldn’t risk your relationship with your sister so easily, you might regret the outcome.”

Ocean couldn’t just remain silent, but her expression told him everything he needed to know, that sadness and fear in her eyes were enough. She nodded somberly before looking back at him and finishing her last slice of pizza. “I think I’ll head to bed now. The meal was great,” she said before standing up from her seat and walking toward her bedroom door.

As she reached the door, she looked back and towards Phoenix who was slowly making his way to the couch. “Where are you going?” She looked at him with complete confusion, as if he was a complete idiot, ok an even bigger idiot than usual.

“What do you mean? Going to bed, like always,” he returned quite confused himself.

“On the couch? Since when did I say that you would sleep on the couch?”

“Uhm, what do you mean? Where should I sleep otherwise?” He returned, his confusion growing with every second.

Ocean just chuckled, put on a devious smile and just winked him over to her. Phoenix at first didn’t get it before he suddenly turned crimson. “You mean… I… You… Is this really o…” He was again interrupted, but this time by Ocean simply grabbing him and dragging him inside, not even giving him any chance to wiggle out of this and to be honest, he really didn’t want to. The door fell shut behind them with a silent *click*


>-------<A>-------<


He had slept like a rock, all thanks to Ocean’s wonderful, comfortable bed. Really it was godly, or it was just the fact that it was the first time since he had come to Canterlot City that he had slept in a bed at all, well minus his hospital visits and in all honesty, a hospital bed really didn’t count. He probably would have slept till noon if he hadn’t been interrupted by a loud alarm. Not having expected the ear-bursting sound he jumped up and only barely managed to suppress a scream only to frantically look around the room for the source of the horrid noise. Right on the nightstand stood the little offender, a small clock that was surprisingly loud for its size. 

Whit a pained groan he pushed the thing, and that sound finally ceased thank goodness. The little thing also showed him the time, ten A.M. actually a really good time for him, but still, there was never enough sleep and being so rudely interrupted definitely somewhat soured his mood. As he looked over to the other side of the bed he could only see that it was empty, no surprise there, she had said that she would probably be already gone when he woke up. He really was impressed by her, he could probably never get up that early, or at least not without any good reason. 

Letting out another yawn he finally forced himself up from the bed again and trotted out of the bedroom. To his surprise, there was a note left for him on the kitchen table, complete with breakfast. Really, he had made a good catch, and his stomach agreed with him in that regard. And in typical Ocean fashion, the breakfast was as weird as it tasted good. A cereal mixed with yogurt, bananas, chilly and weirdest of all, pineapple, still this ranked low on her imaginative creation list. He sat down on the table and started to enjoy his meal, complete with a cup of hot chocolate. 

“So, what did she want to tell me?” He muttered in between bites as he unfolded the latter and started reading it.

“So you woke up and found the breakfast. Good. At least you didn’t oversleep, was really worried about that,” he let out an annoyed groan, even if she was somewhat right probably. “Anyway, don’t forget that you are supposed to meet my sister around twelve A.M. at the Canterlot Stadium, please don’t forget about it.”

“Yeah, I’m doing your work here. Still can’t believe that you pulled this over your sister,” he mumbled only to add: “Maybe a little.”

“Her name is Star Catcher, and you can’t miss her, just look for the woman that looks pretty much exactly like me in front of the stadium since you know, twins. And for the love of all that is holy, don’t do anything stupid. Probably would be best if you went there more or less undercover, she doesn’t need any stress before the competition starts. And most importantly, have fun you two.” That was the last thing written on the note. 

Phoenix just shook his head. “Who does she think I am? A complete idiot? I’m at worst a half idiot. I’m sure this is going to go great, at least I hope so.” With this he swallowed the last piece of his meal and headed for the bath, he didn’t want to be late. If Ocean wasn’t coming from the start at least, he could be on time.


 



>-------<A>-------<


She could still see some of the damage caused by Alkahest’s attack on the lab, several corridors were still under construction, and she could see scorched parts of the wall and floor everywhere. But still, things were starting to get back to normal, even if it was slow. On her side stood a small woman with white skin and long blond hair. She had introduced herself as Light Bulb, seemingly with a lot of enthusiasm. She had been sent here by the higher-ups to take Ivory’s post, even if Ocean was not entirely ok with that. It just didn’t feel right.

They had stopped right in front of the door she last had stormed through, frantically looking for her friend, now it just stood there, slowly opening, revealing an empty lab behind it. With a week sigh, she stepped inside. She had to say, while there were still clear signs of the struggle that had occurred here, they had managed to restore the lab quite well, at least all the technology. Ivory’s personal save had been opened and was now empty. However, there were several rather interesting items on the lab table instead.

First, something that looked like a large cylinder with what seemed like a Charger sticking out of it. Ocean stepped closer to it, picking it up and examining the little device. On a second look, it had a similar shape like her cylinder on the Driver. Sadly it didn’t seem to be finished, several wires hanging out of the device. 

Right next to it laid something she was however familiar with, the artifact that had belonged to Timber. She knew what Ivory had planned with it, but without him, it probably would never come to pass. And lastly what seemed like a small necklace, just half finished.

“So, that was what he had to hide from me? I’m kinda disappointed, I had expected more from him,” she said jokingly to herself.

That was when she received an awkward chuckle from Light Bulb lightbulb “Well, we haven’t gotten into his computer yet, who knows what dirty secrets we might find there.” Ocean just stared at her in a mixture of confusion, shock, and disgust. “But that would probably pail in comparison to the secrets this little thing houses.” She picked up the strange device with the Charge sticking out. 

“What is it?” She returned, eyeing the small device carefully, trying to figure out what it was.

“It seems to interact with the Charge Driver, but right now it’s nothing more than a high-tech paperweight. It lacks the programming that makes it work and the only place it could be…” She finished, pointing at the computer.

Ocean sighed again, putting down the strange device before turning back to Light Bulb. “Ivory’s computer. You said that you managed to repair the computer, but you lack the necessary password to get in?” 

As she noticed that Ocean was now looking at her, still with a bit of a weirded outlook in her eyes, she quickly let her head sink to the ground and whimper: “Yes… That… That is exactly how it is.”

Ocean took one look at the computer and the devious login screen before simply saying: So, this is going to be fun. You should get comfortable, I have the feeling we will be here for a while.”


>-------<A>-------<


Ok, he had to admit, he was impressed. The Canterlot Stadium was truly a sight to behold. The crimson walls and the oval shape were breathtaking. Phoenix never had really cared for this portion of the city that much, not that it was ugly, but he had just nor reason to be here for any reason what so ever, he might regret this now. Around the stadium, several stands had opened up and were selling stuff like fan articles and food, a lot of food. After parting with a bit of his money, he was walking through the different stands, on the lookout for the woman that looked like his girlfriend.

It took him about five minutes, but he finally caught someone that did indeed look very similar to Ocean. She wore a black tracksuit with a black cappy, but he would recognize the light and dark blue hair that hang out from her cap in a ponytail everywhere. Her skin had the same light blue color as Ocean. She was sitting on a well in front of the stadium, feet in the air and seemingly waiting for someone. He chuckled a bit as he saw here, her outfit reminding him a good amount of what he himself was wearing, a leather jacket and cappy to hide his face.

With a smile on his face, he casually walked over to her until he just sat down next to her. She looked over to him, her face almost a perfect copy of ocean’s, well minus her expression. Star Catcher was cocky, very cocky. “Huh, who are you? What do you want?”

“Star Catcher, right?” He merely responded, looked at her with a confident grin.

“Great, another paparazzi. How often do I have to tell you people that I don’t want to give you an interview? I need my time before the race, and you are just annoying me, so piss off before I get angry,” she growled back at, Phoenix raising an eyebrow at this.

“Ahm, not really. I’m no reporter. Believe me; I dislike them just as much as you do. Clingy guys never know when it’s enough. But back to the topic at hand. My name is Phoenix Feather, nice to, meet you. I’m the boyfriend of your sister. She sends me to meet you here, she currently still at a meeting, but she’ll be here in half an hour, don’t worry;” he returned with his usual upbeat tone.

“Oh, what a surprise, madam decides she has better stuff to do than to meet her sister. Typical, she is becoming more and more like mother,” she muttered in annoyance.

“To be fair, it’s nothing small. It’s really, really important Kamen Rider stuff,” Phoenix tried to calm her down, to less than stellar results.

“Yeah, and next time it’s important MRG business. She always has something to do when I’m around. I have the feeling she is turning into our mother, and you saw how that turned out,” she abruptly stopped, her expression changing from that cocky, arrogant and somewhat angry look to a far more sober one. “Stupid Monochrome, always knew she would get herself killed, just not like this.”

“Yeah, actually ocean wanted to talk to you about the whole thing. She said you were really distant during the whole funeral, pretty much like everyone there. I think-“

She rudely interrupted him: Yeah, not my finest hour. But if she acts like this, I won’t feel bad about that. But it wasn’t really a surprise why everyone was so hostile to her. Monochrome was pretty much a god to them, someone that could do no wrong. The shining jewel of the family, and if you ask me, a lot of them knew how she really was and what she planned, I assure you that. They hated Ocean for ruining it, destroying their precious reputation and plans. You know, my family is known for having a lot of police officers and other similar jobs. Our dad was the Manehatten Chief of Police, a very prestigious position and with mom, as the head of the MRG, we were the pride and joy of the family. The rest was just stuff like local chiefs or simple officers. There were very few that didn’t go into that branch, and those that did were pretty much shunned by our family,” she muttered, sounding angrier and angrier the further she came.

“Hu, I never knew your father was the Chief of Police of Manehatten, impressive. Wonder why Ocean never told me about that?” Phoenix returned before it came back to him.

“Yeah, probably because she doesn’t want to talk about it and I can’t blame her. It was pretty much what turned our family upside down. Up until that point, she was the unruly one, and I was the perfect child that looked out for her. But when dad was killed during a hostage situation. He was negotiating with the criminals as one of them just snapped and started to shoot like a madman. Dad was one of the few that were hit by him,” her voice was starting to grow weaker, and as Phoenix looked over to her, he could see small tears starting to form in her eyes. “And worst of all, people blamed him for all of this, a dead man that couldn’t defend himself. That was when I saw police work for what it truly is. You are trying to play the savior for a few ungrateful bastards,” Star spat out, her expression now back to angry.

“I wouldn’t say that. Some people have to play the part of the protector. It’s nothing other than what I do as a Kamen Rider,” he returned.

“Oh, yeah, you were a Kamen Rider. I don’t get it, throwing your life away for nothing. I saw you on TV as you thought against that stone guy to save Ocean. I’m glad you did manage to save her, but I don’t get why you fight so hard. When I saw my dead die like this and the people more or less missing on his grave, I just gave up on becoming like him. Mom really didn’t like that. But Ocean saw it as something noble, even if she hated the people that spoke badly about dad. She wanted to be just like him, and so our roles in the family shifted. I turned my attention to the sport and edged on more and more with mom and Ocean became the perfect child that mom ever wanted, determined to get herself killed like dad. I tried and tried to get her out of that, but she wouldn’t listen and when I decided against police training mom finally had enough. She said I could follow my stupid dream and see where it would get me. Save to say, I made the right decision. Forcing someone its something they don’t want is always a stupid idea, and I damn well showed it to them,” Star gloated, her malicious smile on her lips.

“I know what you mean. My path in life was pretty much decided upon on the day of my birth. I was the firstborn of our family, and the firstborn would always be the guardian of the Alchemy Driver and risk his life to complete the Magic Discs that were part of it. Save to say, I was not really thrilled about all of this, but what could I do? Not much really and so I just endured it, not without a lot of complaining, but I followed their wishes. In the end, I ended up here and in this entire fight of Corrupted and Riders. But I made my own decisions, I became my own person, and in the end, I think even the old geezer understood that” Phoenix stopped for a moment to take in a deep breath.

“Huh, so you know how all of that is? Then why are you still helping everyone in this city? They will turn on you in the drop of a hat. One mistake and they will abandon you, so why?”

“Because I don’t do this to be famous. I could have lived without that really. It’s really annoying, can’t even leave the house without being swarmed by reports. I do this because I want to help people simply because I can. I don’t want them to suffer. I don’t care if they like me, I just want to help. That is the way I want to live my life, and that is just it,” he finished, looking off towards the sun and the horizon.

“You know, you sound exactly like my sister. I think she made a good catch with you and not just because of your looks,” she chuckled, hiding a devious smile under her hand.

Phoenix just let his head spin around and stared at her in shock, trying to hide his blush. “Apparently the snark runs in the family, great.” That just got him a few good chuckles from her.  

“Well, siblings, am I right?”

Before Phoenix could respond, he heard the scared screams of people. Jumping from the well like a bee had stung him he stared in the direction where the noise had come from. People were running towards them, screaming for dear life and to no one surprise there was a reason to that, one Phoenix was half surprised of. Remnants! He hadn’t seen them in ages, where were they coming from? Didn’t matter now anyway, he had to act. “You should probably seek a safer place, I’m taking care of this,” he said to Star before rushing off towards the monsters. 

\ MAGIC DISC DETECTED! /

“Henshin!”

\ FRIENDSHIP DISC ACTIVATED! /

\ Friendship Disc Attack Mode! /

\ Connect Protector! /

Now clad in his armor and wielding his weapon he rushed forward towards the monsters, and there were a lot of them. This had to be the biggest amount of them he had ever seen, made out of several different types of them. From water, to earth, to fire they were wildly attacking the civilians with no remorse and he couldn’t let that go on, right?

Letting his blade come down on the first monster he reached it immediately was cut in half and falling to the ground beside him. That got him the attention of a few of the beasts who let out a roar and rushed towards him. The first one to reach him just lunged at the Rider, its fists burning bright with smoldering flames as he tried to beat him into the submission. But that was all that it was, an attempt. The Remnant was quickly outmaneuvered and had a sword sticking in its stomach before Alchemy pulled it out of the limp body just to stick it into the next one that was approaching.

As both of the Remnants went up in flame, he was caught off guard by something from behind, a rock. One of the little buggers had thrown a rock at him. It hurt like someone had bashed him over the head with a newspaper, but nothing too worrying, at least for him. The Remnant however quickly learned that messing with a Rider was not a good idea. Throwing his shield, the star-shaped object sailed through the air and straight through three of the monsters, including the one that had just attacked him. “Serves you right. So who is next?”

While Alchemy was dealing with these little pests, someone was standing not too far away, slowly approaching the well Star Catcher was still standing at. She was watching the fight in aw, blown away by how easy the Rider was dealing with the Remnants. The woman with grey skin and light blue hair had a vacate grin on her lips as she kept stepping closer and closer towards Star. She wore a black leather jacket with a dark blue feather collar as well as a necklace around her neck depicting a wing made out of metal. 

Alchemy didn’t even look at Star anymore, he assumed her save, but that would be his folly. Fury hated the fact that she was explicitly told not to engage Alchemy, even if he would try to get in her way. It was tempting, the fight, the adrenaline, the excitement when things would turn serious, she lived for it, but this damned Shadow Gold said no. Usually, she would have just blown that order of, may be considered it if it would have come from Cerberus, but this was different. Shadow Gold and Checkbook had been furious with them when Cerberus had failed them. Worst of all, he had made the Rider even stronger. 

Gold and Checkbook had made their threat reality. At least ten of their men had been kidnapped and executed. The only reason that she and Elysium hadn't tried to rip the head from their bodies the moment they had been shown it was because if they did, they would just cause more harm than good. These bastards and for their stupid plan did Cerberus sacrifice his life, no for his men. They would pay for what they did, but even she knew that right now was not the time to strike, especially with their new advantage on their side. She was rash, not stupid. So, the only thing she could do right now was to follow their orders, no matter how much she hated it.

She was about to snatch up Star as she heard the sound of an engine roaring. Dammit! Another Rider was coming, and not even a second later she saw Charge’s bike jump up seemingly out of nowhere, talking some potshots on some of the remaining Remnants. With a resounding thud, her bike landed mere meters away from Star Catcher; The Rider bellowing out: “What are you still doing here? Get somewhere safe!”

“Oh, miss high and might finally come. A monster attack and she is immediately here. Too bad you don’t have time for your family,” Star hissed back, stepping closer towards her sister until she was mere centimeters away from her bug-eyes.

“I don’t have time for this right now. Let me quickly finish this, ok? After that, we can talk as much as we want, but right now I have to do my job. So please, get somewhere safe,” Charge returned, sounding like a mixture of annoyance and anger. 

“Forget it, I’m staying right here!” Star smugly said in return, grinning gleefully at her sister.

“Fine, whatever, I don’t have time for this right now. But don’t do anything stupid, ok?” With that, she jumped from her bike and stormed towards the Remnants with her weapon in hand.

“Pah thinks she can boss me around,” Star Catcher just huffed before returning to admiring the battle that was transpiring before her.

Fury just stood there for a moment before starting to quietly curse: “Dammit, two Riders? I can’t risk it, but don't worry little one, we will meet soon enough,” she chuckled before leaving the Riders to pick up the last few stragglers.