Chapter Text
“Well, my friends, this is not exactly how I imagined this day would go.”
Pomni glanced up at a horrendous creature. Its body was a patchwork, like a gruesome combination of cloth, plastics, and metal. It had a draconic appearance, with a neck that looked like it was made out of plastic tubing and bubble gum.
It was standing in the middle of an utterly wrecked circus tent. Flames roared—not as loudly as the creature before them, but loud enough that it made Caine hard to hear.
Right.
Caine.
The absolute genius who decided to take Jax’s suggestion of “something deadly,” Gangle’s suggestion of “something out of an anime,” and Kinger’s suggestion of “something with drama and pathos” and just… smashed them together.
Now, the circus crew sat in the ruins—ruins that Caine obviously could fix, but clearly was too transfixed by the carnage not to fix.
“...maybe,” Gangle mumbled, “I should have been more specific. Shoujo anime, maybe. We could have been like the Sailor Scouts.”
“I don’t know what those are,” Jax replied, “And after today, I have absolutely no interest in finding out. Anime was a mistake.”
Pomni felt a hand on her shoulder. “Well, uh… let’s think about this positively, alright?” Ragatha tried, tried to beam. “We keep saying this place needs a makeover! This is the perfect excuse!”
“She’s got a point.” Zooble readjusted her scorched arm, grimacing as her pinky burned to ash. “Maybe we can ask Caine to turn this place into… I don’t know, a jazz bar.”
Kinger wiped a bead of sweat off of his forehead with his cloak, ignoring (or not noticing) the ash left behind. “I’d like it to be a little more air-conditioned, honestly.”
Jax sighed, pushing himself up to his feet. “Whatever it is, I’d like it to be now and not twenty years from now. So, Caine,” he began, “Let’s get this over and done with—”
“Um.”
Jax’s ears flopped down. “Um. ‘Um,’ he says. What’s ‘um,’ chatterbox?”
Caine’s expression had turned into a grimace, his pupils dilating. “I… may have… given the monster admin privileges.” He paused. “ My admin privileges.”
“You what?! ” Pomni heard her voice before she felt her mouth moving. “Are you nuts?! ”
“Kinger wanted pathos!” Caine twiddled his fingers. “I… didn’t quite know what that was, but I presumed it had to do with drama, and what’s more dramatic than an unstoppable, life or… death…danger…”
All eyes in the wreckage turned to stare at the Ringmaster.
Caine had the decency to look embarrassed. “I’ll admit. This was not my finest moment.”
“Pathos,” Bubble began, popping up from behind Caine. “Something that evokes a pitiful or sad quality!”
“Why didn’t you tell me that first, Bubble?!”
Bubble’s grin was perpetual. “A new paradigm is about to unfold!”
Caine grabbed Bubble by the sides, and Pomni didn’t want to ask how that worked. “I don’t care about your dimes, or how many you have! Go stop that thing before it—”
“Isn’t that your job,” Zooble pointed out, “And aren’t you, I don’t know, still letting the monster rampage?! ”
The crew glanced over, and— Oh, yep, Pomni realized, everything is even more on fire now. Great.
“Uh, Gangle!” Ragatha turned to Gangle with a pleading, hopeful expression. “I may not know much about anime, but aren’t there usually… good guys to fight the bad guys, or… something?”
Gangle’s drama mask twisted, briefly, into a look of shock. “Yeah—yeah, you’re right! Like the Sailor Scouts, or— or Kamen Rider!”
“Why would we need a common rider?” Kinger asked. “Shouldn’t we get some kind of super squadron?”
Gangle reached into… wherever it was and pulled out a sketchbook. “Technically, it’s Masked Rider in English, because Kamen is the Japanese word for—”
“We’re all going to die.” Jax turned and began to walk away from the circus. “If this is my last day here, I’m going to… I don’t know, punch the Sun or something.”
Pomni tried to ignore the way the Sun’s eyes gleamed maliciously at that statement. “You can try~!”
“Ragatha has a point.” Zooble gestured up to Caine with her rapidly disintegrating arm. “But he’s the only one with the power to make something happen, and he gave that power to the Muppet from Hell.” She paused. “...huh. I can say Hell now.”
“Fucking fantastic, ” Jax called out, halfway down the road. “We’re all going to die, but at least I can say balls. ”
Said Muppet, attempting to devour the towers of blocks that still littered the circus grounds, seemed to hear the comment—given the way it immediately focused its attention on Zooble.
“Oh no.”
“Wh—” Caine pulled his top hat down, slamming it to the floor. “— look , my little rapscallions, this is no time to get fatalistic, or to swear! It’s inappropriate!” Pomni raised her hand. “Yes, Pomni?”
“This is, literally, the most motherfucking appropriate time to swear, and I’m going to do it, God damn it, unless you fucking fix this! ” the jester screeched, pulling her face down in exasperation. “So… do that! ”
“What do you expect me to do about it?!” Caine snapped back. “It’s not like I can just invent or—or summon a superhero just like—”
For clear dramatic effect, he moved to snap his fingers.
The sound never came, as it was drowned out by the massive, robotic creature that dropped in right behind him.
Clad in armor that shined a bright orange and violet, the colors alternating in plated sections running up its body (from its pointed boots, to its strange triangular chest piece, to its shark fin-like helmet), the… thing surveyed its surroundings. Its red visor settled, briefly, on the assembled crowd. It stared down at them, silently shifting its attention to each member of the circus.
Its sculpted mouth failed to move, but words emerged all the same. “I will deal with the kaiju. Stay here,” it rasped, standing up to its full height. It towered over the scenery, almost seeming to shatter the heavens itself. “I’ll only be a moment.”
“...uh, sure!” Caine replied, staring down at his curled index finger and thumb like it held all the answers to the universe. “You… aren’t one of my little heroes, are you?”
“...I do not know if I count as a hero. But if it is a hero you require…” The creature’s eye plate lit up as it took a fighting stance. “Then I shall act the part.”
Pomni clocked the sound of someone hyperventilating right next to her. Gangle had dropped her sketchbook and was staring up in utter awe at the giant before them. “Uh, Gangle? I know you like this whole… Common Rider stuff,” she began, “But are you okay—”
“That’s not Kamen Rider,” Gangle whispered, in reverence. “That’s not Kamen Rider, or Super Sentai, or even Ultraman! Who is that?!”
“Who comes up with these names?!” Jax called out, even further away this time.
The monster, finally paying attention to more than just Zooble, tilted its head as the giant manifested a—
Is that some kind of frisbee?
Pomni never had a moment to voice her thoughts, as the giant let out a battle cry, hurling a violet ring of energy at the monster. It spun through the air like a chakram, slicing into the monster’s neck.
The head hit the ground, the body disappearing into motes of pixels and graphical glitches.
The giant stared at the head for a moment, and with the way its shoulders had slumped, it almost seemed… sad? Pomni wasn’t sure why, but it didn’t stay that way for long. It stood up straight, looking into the sky. “I… am the protector of all digital worlds,” the giant began, wincing briefly from Gangle’s sudden screech of glee. “I am the one who carries on the moniker of the Hyper Agent in the true one’s stead.”
“Hypawhatnow,” Caine asked, his eyes bulging out of his jaw.
“...you may call me Gridknight,” the giant concluded, turning back to the circus members. “But you need not for long. My work here is—”
“Not done yet, Knight!” Pomni yelped as a pair of hands wrapped around her, and her vision was filled with...
Why is there an office worker glomping me?
“...2nd,” the giant grumbled. “I don’t want to stay here any longer than necessary.”
“Wellllll, we kinda gotta!” A green-haired, bespectacled, business-suited woman had attached herself to Pomni, refusing to let go. “We’ve got a buncha humans we gotta get outta here!”
Wait, you what with the huh.
“...and how long will this take?” the giant asked, with a clear tone of displeasure.
“I’unno! Maybe a week, maybe a month, maybe a year.” The office worker grinned. “We got time to figure it out!”
“...I suppose we do.”
A flash of light engulfed the giant, forcing Pomni to drag her hat over her eyes to avoid being blinded.
As she raised it back up, she took in the sight of… another office worker; this time, a silver-haired man with a—
Why does a salaryman have a sword?
The others, clearly stunned into silence (or, in Gangle’s case, one long, sustained note of glee) simply stared on as the man approached the group. “C’mon, introduce yourself properly!” ‘2nd’ chided.
“You haven’t.”
“...right! Hi, everyone!” The girl smiled like sunshine. “I’m Anosillus the 2nd, but you can just call me 2nd! Nice to meet ya!” She loosened her grip on Pomni to gesture at ‘Knight’ with a ‘come on’ motion.
“...I am Knight,” the man replied, his words monotone. “That’s all you need to know.”
Caine cleared his throat. “Weeeeeeeee’re gonna need to know more than that, my new, superpowered friend. Like… your whole life story, for example.”
Knight turned to face Caine, inadvertently popping Bubble on the back of his sword as the ball of soap and air breezed by. “I already told you. I’m Gridknight.”
“...but what makes you Grid, exactly?”
“...” Knight turned to 2nd. “You handle this.”
“Okey-dokey!” 2nd backed away from Pomni, who quickly did the same (and shuffled herself right behind Ragatha). “How to explain it… oh! So,” she began, “Have you guys ever heard of Kamen Rider or Ultraman?”
Gangle fainted. “Aw, shit,” Zooble muttered.
2nd blinked. “I guess that’s a yes.”