What the Future Holds

What the Future Holds

My name is Keira Haine. I'm 15 years old. I live in London, and get home at 5PM latest. But today, I didn’t. Today, things were different.

A man who works for the FBI picks me up today.

Aaron had never been to a funeral before. Nobody he knew had ever died. So when the news of Trace and Flora Templar’s assassination reached him, he was more than surprised. The funeral was held inside a church in London - thankfully only an hour's drive from where he lived - and once the speech was said and the services were held, it surprised him even more when he and his wife were told to stay behind.

“As you were told, Trace and Flora were killed. They were shot through the head by a man who appeared at their door with a gun. We don’t know who they are, but they clearly weren’t good at their job, because they left a list indicating their next targets." The man who called himself the representative of MI6 was short and fat, with his sharp uniform and badge being the only indicators that he wasn't a humanoid pig. He struggled with taking a piece of paper out of his pocket, and pushed it over to Aaron and Solana.

"Trace Templar, Flora Templar, Creeper, Jelo Elducal, Solana-wait...These aren't our names. These are nicknames we used back in the Rooms." Aaron pushed the paper away. "This is faked."

The fat representative shook his head. "Not so, this is the real paper, and all of the people written on it are participants of the Locked Room Phenomenon, correct?" Solana nodded. "And these are the nicknames you used during that time?"

Solana reluctantly nodded. "Does that mean whoever killed Trace and Flora was with them when that was happening?"

"Bingo. Currently, we know that they had to be in the Locked Rooms at the same time as you guys, meaning in the time we call "Period 2A". If we take the members active in that period, and subtract those who weren't close to the names on the list, we have only 32 suspects."

Aaron started to get up, but the representative stopped him. "Not so fast, 'Creeper'. We're deciding to send a force of the members available to us and part of the Locked Rooms in order to find the assassin. If they don't find him or her within one month, it's one of them and they'll all be killed. As for you two, you and 'Jelo Elducal', real name Gerald Edmarkson, will be put into protective custody. The leaders and recruiters of this team, sans Lillie Nefelo, who is a special case, are highly skilled agents. These highly-skilled agents are...

Shotaro was struggling. This case was nothing like he'd ever seen before, and he wasn't prepared - physically or mentally.

Philip felt sorry for his partner, seeing him ponder deeply over whether to put the triangle-shaped building block in the square or circle hole. A few hours before, a client called Jacob Dixon called and told them that his friend, Daniel, had suddenly gotten the intelligence of a baby. After a painstaking hunt lasting between 10 and 23 minutes, they found the culprit; the Mental Dopant.

They easily defeated it, but before they did the Mental Dopant hit Shotaro, reverting him into his current state. It would wear off, sure, but they were assigned an important task which they had to do immediately. There was no other way, Philip would have to go alone.

He wrote a note and taped it to the triangle hole, both alerting his partner to his absence and somewhat helping him solve the triangle block mystery.

Lillie ran. Faster than ever before, faster than she even knew she could. She and Gladion ran, because if they were caught, they would be subject to a fate worse than death. She sent out her Heatran, and it sent a wave of magma though the gleaming, perfectly white halls of the Aether Foundation. Everything was so stupidly perfect that Lillie almost wished she lived there again. They were almost to the exit, Lillie and Gladion were almost free from this terrible world.

Something came through the door. Something tentacled. Something that used to be their mother, until it fused with the same beasts that it was obsessed with. The Nihilego-Lusamine shot forward and Lillie, only 12, was frozen in fear. She was going to die, no, something even worse would happen and-

Gladion pushed her out of the way and was pulled back by a translucent tentacle. “Run!”, he shouted, and Lillie did. Gladion himself pulled out a syringe and injected himself with something, making his body turn translucent and a blue-ish purple. Lillie couldn’t see what happened next, as she was already out the the door and never coming back.

Lillie was back. With Nebby as her only weapon, she was going to the Aether Foundation again. The recent rumor was that a Necrozma had gone loose and imitated the legends of Alola. Lillie just knew, if it was true, that the dastardly leader of the Aether Foundation, Lusamine, her mother, was behind it. She decided to take the stealth approach, and was hiding behind a bush, about to strike...

...when her phone rang loudly. Lillie jumped back and tried to turn it off - but it was too late; the Aether Foundation workers turned her way, and were walking towards her. There was no way to escape now, so she looked at who was calling her. Oh. Him.

Lillie ordered Nebby to use Protect, and answered. “Hello? Where? How? Oh.“ Lillie was happy she answered after all.

The flight to London was as long as Lillie would expect, but getting Nebby through security took a while, and so when she arrived, he was already there, waiting.

With his stained shirt, his untied trainers and bright-orange trousers, Lillie found it hard to stay infatuated with Gerald Edmarkson.

“Sorry, they called me here in the middle of the night from Los Angeles and since I was still in pyjamas they gave me random clothes to wear. How are you?” Gerald attempted to give a smile, but it was clear he wasn’t very happy.

“I..uh...”

“I mean, how have you been since we cleared the rooms? Have you got a job, are you in a relationship, that kind of stuff?”

“Um, I’m not in a relationship and I won’t be, uhh, unless you want me to and, uhh...” Lillie was getting very flustered, so she tried to change the subject. “Why did you bring me here?”

“Trace and Flora were assassinated. The assassin’s list had a few names of the people we know on them, all of which partook in the Locked Room Phenomenon, so they’re assembling a force to find and stop the assassin.” Gerald seemed less like he was telling Lillie this, but like he was reading it off of a list.

“Where is it?”

“Here, in London, 10 Downing Street.”

I‘m sitting on a couch in the building that the woman who took me in calls her headquarters. People in suits and shades move around me, taking no notice of me or each other. I wait for a while until another woman in the same suit comes up to me and takes me to a room where my mom is waiting.

"I didn't know the FBI would pick me up, I didn't know I was breaking the law, I-" I try to explain, though I don't understand myself, but my mom stops me.

"No, It's my fault that you're here. I'll explain..."

Philip observed Lillie and Lillie observed Philip. Neither of them thought the other were very impressive, and each thought they were smarter than the other. Between the two of them, Lillie was the first to speak. “You’re Japanese. Can you even speak English?”

“You’re American. Can you even house-train a pet?” Philip retorted. “I’ve read about you. Nebby too.”

Lillie was taken aback by this. “How do you know about that?”

“I have books about you.”

“That’s creepy. Why don’t you stop nosing in other people’s lives, creep?”

“Why don’t you stuff yourself in that bag of yours?” The dislike between the two was instant and tangible, so much so that both imagined that the other would have a hard time breathing.

“Look, if I’m going to be your partner, you need to stop insulting me.”

“Shotaro is my only partner. You can be my acquaintance, though I do agree.” Philip offered a smile, but even that had distaste running through it. “By the way, we still have a list of people we need to collect.”

“Who? I only have one person.”

“Sam, Samantha and Carmen. They are technically the same person, but our force would sound more dangerous if it had more than just three members.”

“What about your partner?

“He’s...sick.”

“Sure. Where are we going first?” They decided to go back to ending the conversation as soon as possible.

“The location where Sam was seen last. The Keidran Islands.”

## ```

```

It was their last night together. The last night before they were put into protective custody, separate from each other, and Solana wanted to make it count. She rolled onto her side and nudged Aaron “Hey, are you awake?”

“Yeah.” Aaron opened his eyes and looked at her.

“Since this is our last night together...”

“If you’re going to end that sentence like you usually do, I’d like to remind you that there are security cameras watching us.”

“Right.” Solana was about to go back to sleep when Aaron spoke again.

“I do have something I want to discuss, though.”

“Hmm?”

“I don’t think the small force MI6 are assembling will be able to do anything, I want to find them myself.“

“You can’t do that. We’re supposed to stay in custody.”

“I have an idea. We’re both on their list, right? The killer, seeing both of us defenceless, won’t resist the chance and he’ll attack.”

“And then we die.”

“No, that’s where Shotaro comes in. He’s agreed to work with us, and he'll turn into his LunaTrigger form to deflect their shot and show us where the killer is without alerting them. He’s gotten ahold of the T2 Invisible Memory in order to make his shot invisible, so all you need to do is do your thing to make the killer want to shoot you first, and one other, tiny thing.”

“What is it?”

“I need you to be the other half of W.” Solana groaned at this, but Aaron continued. “Philip wouldn’t agree to the idea, and your consciousness leaving you would look more natural than just pretending to be shot.”

“I...I don’t know about that. What would you do after we found the culprit.”

“Sneak up on him and shoot him in the head before he has a chance to turn around.”

“Woah. That’s a bit...extreme, don’t you think?”

“He would be put on death penalty anyway; it would ultimately reduce the amount of casualties.”

“You’ve really though this out haven’t you?”

“Of course. I promise, once this is over, I’ll do anything you want.”

“Anything?”

“.........most things.”

“Alright.” Solana kissed Aaron and they went to sleep.

## ```

```

When Aaron woke up, Solana was still sleeping so he got dressed, brushed his teeth and called the MI6. They told him to take himself to 10 Downing Street, and they’ll take him to the cell from there.

He was taken to the cell at 9:30 and was given the key before being locked in across from where Solana would be held.

At 10:30, Solana still wasn’t there.

At 11:30, a representative was sent out to find her.

At 12:30, Aaron was told that she was in hospital.

Something had choked her during the night, and she needed to wear a oxygen mask over her mouth and nose until she recovered. This would last a week at most, they said. This meant that, in between worrying about his wife, Aaron had to worry about how this could affect his plans.

In a cold cell, with a murderer after him and his wife in hospital, Aaron wondered what he did to anger the universe.

Lillie felt sick. She had been on two planes and a boat in the last few hours, and all the time she spent on land was walking. That's why, when he landed on the Keidran Islands, she just lay down and rested. "Come on, we have work to do." Philip clicked his fingers in front of Lillie’s face, so she sat up, making sure to scowl at him before she turned toward their destination.

The village was made mainly of wood and rope, and was populated solely by tiger-people - the Keidran. Philip and Lillie walked into the village, but the villagers didn't seem to notice. "Be careful, the Keidran are superstitious of humans." Philip walked warily, while Lillie walked wearily.

Lillie walked up to one, but Philip pulled her back. "We're looking for one called Isobel, and we shouldn't interact with the others."

"They all look the same!" Lillie hissed, and she walked up to another and tapped it on the shoulder. "Excuse me, but do you know where we can find someone named Isobel." The Keidran looked back with a smiling face, and didn't respond. "Hello?"

"Perhaps they can't understand us. Let me try." Philip walked over and the Keidran turned his way, but seemed to look right through him. "«Hello, can you help us find someone called Isobel?»" Lillie looked at him, confused. "I read about the Keidran language on our way here."

Suddenly, the Keidran jumped at them and slashed, Lillie barely dodging it. Philip wasn't so quick. Its claws dug into his shoulder and he cried out. "Is this the part where your *boyfriend* comes to save you?" Lillie mocked.

"Wrong." A grey, robotic dinosaur blocked the Keidran's next attack and jumped into Philiip's hand. He twisted it until it became one of those things Lillie knew Shotaro and Philip used to transform. The driver materialised onto his waist with another transforming thing, this one purple. "Shotaro! *Henshin*!" Philip shouted, and as if in response, a disembodied voice announced the names of the devices.

"Fang! Joker!" Philip transformed into W, and ran forward. He pushed
the Fang device down, and a blade grew out of his arm, with the disembodied voice announcing "Arm Fang!". W dug the blade into the Keidran's shoulder, and *it* cried out.

"A shoulder wound for a shoulder wound, eh?" W proudly taunted. It cranked the Fang device twice and it lit up, W's leg growing a blade.

"Fang, Maximum Drive!" The disembodied voice announced, and W jumped into the air, too high for any human, and started coming back down at an angle, spinning and aiming directly at the Keidran. Once they collided, a burst of energy shot out from both of them, W standing there, the Keidran knocked out next to him. Lillie watched, trying very hard not to be impressed.

At around the same point in time, Shotaro was finishing a call with Aaron, confirming his role in the big plan. He thought Aaron was too sure of himself - especially with these setbacks. His new version of the plan was to use Philip still as the other half of W, and distract him before he noticed anything. He was going to call him back, and tell him it wouldn't work, but Philip had to transform, so he did that first. He made sure not to talk through the transformation as not to reveal the fact that he had recovered from the Mental Dopant's attack. If Philip knew he had, that would mean he would have no excuse to be out of action and would be called to join their team - which Shotaro didn't really want to join. On the other hand, he would play along in Aaron's rubbish plan - which he didn't really want to join. Each would be justice and each had the same motives, but when Shotaro agreed to join the latter, he wouldn't be able to unjoin.

Life was hard for Detective Hidari Shotaro

There was no escape. Her former brethren had turned against her, and she had no way of defence. There were hundreds of them; smiling faces belonging to Keidran. Those smiles weren't natural, not at all, they were plastered on there by their oppressor. She didn't know *who* it was who did this, but when she found out (assuming she survived the current onslaught) she would beat them so hard they wouldn't be able to stand up. But for now more pressing matters were being dealt with, such as the mob of Keidran snarling at her. Their submission was engineered through poison, one that, if it reached her bloodstream, it would be game over. Isobel was familiar with blood poisoning, and she knew it could be deadly.

Living proof of this was Sam, a strange 'man' who Isobel had fallen in love with, and who had died from ink-infected blood. Where he was now, Isobel didn't know, but she dearly hoped she could see him before the mob of psycho-cats got to her.

Suddenly, another cat appeared, one Isobel would judge to be a Birman - though it's hard when the cat you're judging is made of sand. It meowed proudly, and jumped at the first in the crowd of Keidran, giving it a mouthful of sand. The Keidran grabbed it and squeezed and the cat broke apart into a million grains. Oh well, Isobel thought, it was sort of helpful while it lasted.

Isobel would've used this distraction to escape, but due its weak timing, she was now somehow even more cornered. This was the end, there was no escaping that. Until one of the Keidran collapsed. And another one. And another one. Soon, the crowd had all collapsed and, despite everything, the first Isobel did was check their pulses. Evidently, they were all still alive, and she was going to check their breathing when sand shot out of each of their mouths, converging into the same sand-cat that broke apart before, affectionately purring and rubbing against her leg.

"His name is Chi." A voice came from behind Isobel, and she didn't need to turn around to know who it was. "He's a mythical sand creature that decided to model himself off of a cat, and he used to be Aaron Kobalt pet, until he became a Killer Robot." Isobel turned and scratched up Sam, and a middle-aged man reeled back.

"You're not Sam!"

"Yes I am!"

"The Sam that I know is much younger!"

"The Sam you know is...not me in that case. I'm a Time Lord. That means when we die, we regenerate. You probably know a different one of my regenerations - future probably, since I have no idea who you are or why you scratched me, tiger lady."

"Oh. So is that your cat?"

"No, I just told you whose it was, if you were paying attention. Aaron Kobalt's. And since he might be murdered, I thought I'd give it back to him."

"Never heard of him."

"Then you have no business with me other than explaining why your own kind turned against you."

"They were hypnotised. I don't know who did it, but they're still here, and they're planning to attack other places too."

"Ah. Dimentio, I assume. In that case, Aaron's cat will have to wait, and my comrade and I will have take action. I assume you already know of Philip and Lillie's arrival?"

"No?"

"Oh. You should probably stay away from them then, and if they ask where I am tell them I'm in a microwave oven."

"Ok..."

"Goodbye." The man who claimed to be Sam ran off with his cat and Isobel was left very confused. Whoever these Philip and Lillie were, they sounded like trouble, and possibly part of the hypnotising plot. Isobel had a mystery on her hands.

Philip and Lillie were, meanwhile, not having any luck in finding any of the Sams. Between attacking a few hypnotised tiger-people and futility following tracks, hope only sparked in them when they found a microwave oven. Lillie looked at it, quite confused. "So, uh, why is there a microwave oven? I thought these tiger people didn't have electricity."

Philip sighed, and looked at Lillie in what she imagined to be the most condescending way possible. Lillie didn't like it at all. "It's his TARDIS."

"Tardy?"

"TARDIS. Time And Relative Dimension In Space."

"That makes no sense, and I'm 99% that's a microwave oven."

"One of the TARDIS' features is to camouflage itself as anything, though it's the one with the most glitches. It's normally much bigger than this." Philip opened the door and gestured to Lillie.

"I'm not climbing inside an oven, Mr. Hansel and Gretel. You go first."

"Ok." Philip sighed and climbed in. Lillie looked inside to see where he was, but all she could see was what looked like a control panel. "Its Outside camouflages, but its inside doesn't. In other words...it's bigger on the inside." Lillie climbed in and immediately gaped.

The inside was completely white, with a circular pattern spreading across the walls. The control panel was adorned with countless buttons and levers and in the center was a huge, see-through pillar. She didn't have much time to look around, however, as a man came running it too, with a cat. Lillie thought the cat was pretty cute, and she could imagine herself having a cat like that, sans the fact that it was made of sand. It jumped happily into her arms, and she couldn't help but pet it. Then she remembered someone had come in with the cat, and turned back to find Philip chatting with them.

"This is Sam. He's here to join our team." Philip explained. Lillie didn't know why they had to climb into an oven to say this, but at least she got the cat. "He'll also be contacting Samantha and Carmen so-"

Before he could finish his sentence, a seemingly female version of Gerald burst in. Wait. A female version of Gerald. Lillie started to burst out laughing but at the last minute, upon realising it would be disrespectful, she tried stopping herself, resulting in a weird snorting noise that made everyone in the room worriedly. "What's funny?" Philip asked, still looking at her as if she had just vomited or something.

"Nothing, it's nothing." Lillie turned to the girl-Gerald, trying not to laugh again. "So, who are you?"

"I'm Samantha. You recruited me for your team?"

"Oh. Yeah. You just kind of look like..."

"Jelo? Yeah, I took his appearance because I couldn't think of one myself." Lillie didn't like her. She didn't know why, but she really didn't like her.

Philip turned to all of them. "Now the only member left is Carmen. According to Sam, she doesn't want to join, and has fled. Where in the world is Carmen Samdiego?"

Carmen was hiding. She was being as sneaky as possible, but flashbacks to a show in the 80's made her worry that somewhere some kids were looking at her through a monitor.

She had been informed a day ago that people would come to find her and force her to be part of a team. Carmen didn't do teams. The only social interaction she had was at parties, and what made it worse was that Dimentio had told her they would simply dispose of her after. She *really* didn't like that.

Such a sneaky little jester. Orchestrating so many murders, Carmen almost loved it. But then she remembered she was listed as protagonists, and so her dreams were disintegrated. Oh well. For now she was hiding, and that was all she could do. They would never find her here; this was the sneakiest place she could think of.

Whichever child owned the bed she was hiding under dropped their giraffe toy, and it landed right next to her. Oh. They reached down to retrieve it, and almost screamed when they saw Carmen's face. "If you scream I'll kill you." She said, quickly shutting the child up. They were an infant boy, 4 or 5, and they continued to stare at Carmen even after picking up their giraffe toy.

"Who are you?" He asked.

"I'm the monster that hides under children's beds." Carmen tried to do an evil smile, but the child just smiled back, not getting the evil part of it.

"You weren't here yesterday."

"Yes, but there are so many children in the world that we can't cover them all. Me and the other monsters are on a rotating schedule." The child looked at her blankly. "We take turns."

"Why? Because, because taking turns is nice and monsters is mean."

"That's actually a stereotype. It's fake. You ever seen *Sesame Street*? Cookie Monster is a monster right? And he's not mean."

"My, my brother say Sesame Street isn't real. And monsters not real either."

"Guess what? Your brother is completely wrong. Who are you talking to?"

"Um, um, a monster."

"Exactly. If monsters aren't real how would I be here?"

"What will you do?"

"I'll just lurk until midnight. Maybe grab a snack. You can't feed me after midnight though."

"Like in movie?"

"You watched *Gremlins*? How old are you?"

"Two and two." The child paused. "Thor."

"Four?"

"Yes, thor. How old are you?"

"Fifteen hundred."

"Is that one five or one six?"

"That doesn't matter. Your parents let you watch Gremlins?"

"Yes. It's my best movie besides Potty Guys."

"Poltergeist?"

"Yeah, and also The Shiny."

Carmen silently vowed to call the police on this kid's parents. But that hardly mattered, right now she had to keep this kid chatting until he fell asleep. Or...."Did you know monsters can teleport?"

"What is teleport?"

"We can disappear. Watch this." Carmen grabbed her Sonic Screwdriver and pressed the bottom button. The summoning button. The TARDIS, cloaked as a Microwave Oven, came into view in front of her and she began to climb in.

She realised too late there were people on the other side.

They started to pull her in as she pulled back, and so she pulled off her jacket, making whoever it was pull that in instead. She pressed her Sonic Screwdriver in order to dispel the TARDIS, but it didn't work; she was going to get caught.

Carmen jumped into the TARDIS and, making a mad dash for the controls, flung her shirt at whoever was inside. She reached the control panel and started to set the TARDIS to materialise to a location only she knew, but they grabbed her and pulled her back.

She saw her past self, Samantha, yank her by the shoulders before she kicked her around the face. They would both feel that in the morning.

Something small latched onto her arm and a not-quite-so-small blast of energy threw her backwards. "Good job Nebby." A girl cheered from somewhere, but Carmen couldn't really see anything after being blasted directly in the eyes. She heard the signature pop of a PokéBall, and was covered with dust that made her sleep.

"That was...easy." Lillie mused, making her Tangrowth return to its PokéBall. "I was sort of expecting a journey across the world to find her, taking up quite a bit of time."

"I guess not." Samantha rubbed her cheek. "At least we have a full team. What now?"

"I'll ask." Philip took a strange-looking phone in his pocket and punched in a number. Almost instantly, a voice came through, its words so full of fat that Philip thought it was a pig wearing a uniform.

"Who is it?" The pig demanded.

"Philip. We completed the team."

"Really? I hoped it would be a journey across the world to find the last member, taking up quite a bit of time."

"No. We're all here, and we've gotten a lead."

"Who?"

"Dimentio. Last seen in Earth-2.D, the reports of hypnosis that have come through suggest that he's behind this."

"Oh. You may pursue him as you wish." The voice cut out and Philip turned to the rest of the team.

"You all heard the call. We need to come up with a plan to find Dimentio."

Lillie immediately smiled and twirled around to where Philip was to face the team. "An old guy, a Japanese dude who misses his boyfriend, a genderswapped version of my friend, a uncooperative TV character and some random teenager - me of course - versus...a deadly and wanted criminal on every dimension with both hypnotic and reality bending powers. What could *possibly* go wrong?!"

The assassin was as fast as possible. He threw the canister in and as soon as it emptied he retrieved it. He made sure to cover his tracks and made sure only Solana wasn't human, she was close enough, sure, but not completely. She was an Augment, a creature designed from a human template but given inhuman abilities. But this came with the weakness of being vulnerable to substances that humans can endure, such as certain types of gas. Like what the assassin put in the room.

The assassin laughed to himself, and left.

It isn't a heist if you put it back. That was at least Lillie's way of thinking. Being brought up in a gang *may* have inspired this view, but she didn't really think it did. Therefore, they weren't stealing the Void Cannon from Locked Room Headquarters. They were *borrowing* it.

She and Carmen snuck through the halls, being as quiet as possible - which wasn't that quiet with Carmen's high heels continuously hitting the marble floor. "Isn't this fun?" Carmen smiled, making as much effort to mask her voice as she did to mask her footsteps. "I've always wanted to steal something, but my character is one of the good guys."

"We're not stealing, we're borrowing." Lillie corrected her.

"Without asking."

"Without asking." Lillie affirmed.

"That's literally what stealing is. Not that I object, of course."

"It's not stealing if you put it back. We're going to give it back tomorrow if all goes well."

"Sure." Carmen sighed. "This place has changed hasn't it. Last time I was here there was no such thing as a Locked Room Headquarters, but here we are. What do they even do?"

"File reports about the Rooms and continue studying them." Someone Lillie assumed to be an employee walked over to them. "A chain of pocket world like that is beyond our level of technology. If we could just harness a fraction of that power, we'd be unstoppable. You're veterans, right?" He tapped his tablet and a screen came up displaying a picture of Lillie and Carmen. "Lillie Nefelo and Carmen Samdiego. Active during the 2A period of the phenomenon. It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Thanks, but do you happen to know where they keep the Void Cannon nowadays?" Lillie smiled at him.

"Unfortunately no, that's classified information for people like me. I think Arin may know?"

"Arin?"

"The boss of this branch. They know a lot."

"Thanks!" Lillie smiled again and they walked off. It was only after they had walked off that they realised they had no idea where Arin was. "Hang on..."

"Thanks for the help, I'm going to get the Void Cannon now." Carmen began to walk off.

"How do you know where it is?"

"You told me after Arin told you."

"What?"

"I'm a time traveller, I can do things. Arin is behind you, by the way." Carmen ran off and Lillie turned around and screamed.

There was a woman in her twenties with red hair tied into a ponytail. She was wearing business clothes and was flanked by two robots. But this wasn't what made Lillie scream; it was the fact that her mouth went all the way around her face, in a circle. She smiled, but it only showcased rows of sharp teeth.

"You were looking for me?" She asked, and Lillie realised that that was Arin.

Lillie suddenly felt really guilty, "Oh, I'm so sorry for screaming! It's just that-"

"You don't normally see people like this, I know, I get that a lot. What did you want to see me for?" Arin closed her mouth, which made Lillie slightly less scared.

"Well, I'd like to know where you keep the Void Cannon. I'm one of the veterans of the Locked Room Phenomenon, and we need it to find something." Lillie explained.

"Sure. It's in Wing R3-4, under the corridor. Where are you going with it?"

"Dimentio's World." Lillie began to walk off, but was grabbed by one of the robots guarding Arin. "Huh?"

"Nobody is permitted to go there. The effects that dimensions has on people's minds is irreversible. I wouldn't wish that on anyone." Arin ordered.

"It can't be that bad." Lillie tried to squirm out of the robot's grip, but to no avail.

"I think you'll be surprised. I'll show you." She tapped a button on one of the robots, and a ping came through.

"Hello and welcome to intercom who would you like to talk to?" A probably-automated voice cheerily asked from the other side.

"Please state the effects of Dimentio's World."

"Sure! The symptoms include: forgetting everything and everyone but the instinct to kill, the need to inflict grievous harm to yourself, hallucinations, losing the ability to distinguish between fiction and reality, textbook insanity, Schizophrenia, and Dementia, the latter being named after its cause. Would you like to see more?"

Arin turned the intercom off and looked at Lillie judgmentally, her arms crossed and her head tilted. In other words, "I told you so."

"Fine, fine. I guess I'll go." Lillie began to walk to the exit.

Carmen rounded the corner.

"That was a nice description of the effects. Good thing I brought protection." Carmen tossed Lillie something and took out one for herself. "These are called GaiaMemories. You've probably seen Philip and Shotaro use them to transform, and we can use them too.

Lillie looked at hers. It was a silver rectangle labelled 'Metal'. The oned Lillie had seen Shotaro and Philip use was also silver for one, but labelled Fang, and the other was dark purple and labelled Joker. Carmen's one was brown and labelled 'Fortress'. And the man's was red and labelled 'Accel'. Wait...

"Who's that?" Lillie pointed to the Japanese man in a dark red jacket, the red memory and red rings around his eyes. Lillie guessed that his favorite color was red.

"Oh, he's another Kamen Rider. Accel.