Michi pulled herself out of bed. There was school to attend, always, and she really was trying to keep her grades up before her brother started getting worried. She stretched slowly, aware that parts of her still hurt from the fight in the Forest. She was trying not to move too stiffly - her brother had bought the explanation of her not paying attention to where she was going at school and banging into a door, but best not to push her luck.

Reaching down to pick up her Driver and Lock Seed, she frowned as her hand encountered air. "What?" she said to the room, looking at her dresser.

Had she somehow forgotten to put her Driver on her dresser? Apparently so. Which meant that they were in her team clothes, which she had to put in her bag anyway.

A quick lookthrough turned into a frantic one as she couldn't locate the Driver anywhere. She'd been wearing it when she'd gotten home, hadn't she? She thought she'd put it on her dresser.

She couldn't look for it much longer and make her brother wonder why she wasn't going to school. So she reluctantly picked up her bag.

Hurrying downstairs, she noticed her brother just sitting down on one of the chairs. "Michi," he said gravely.

"Big brother," she said, "Is something wrong?" It would be a good thing to pay attention to how he was feeling, even if he didn't bother about how she felt. The only thing that mattered to him was her scores.

He looked down, and she froze as she realized what was in his lap. Her Driver and both Lock Seeds! She quickly schooled her face.

"We have to talk." He held the two items tightly.

"I have school, and don't you have work?" She could deal with this later, when she had time to formulate a plan.

"I already called in for you and for myself." He stood up. "Let's go upstairs." It wasn't a suggestion. It was a command from her older brother.

She was trying to think of how to salvage the whole thing. Sid's words to her came back, and she could always claim she found it. Why she wanted it? Well, she could always say that she had a secret admiration for the Beat Riders and wanted to be one, sort of. That would protect Team Gaim. After all, Bravo wasn't originally a Beat Rider, why should Ryugen be?

Following her brother into the parlor, she sat down opposite him. "I'd ask how long you've been involved, but...." He pulled out his laptop, opening it and entering his password.

On the screen was a document with a picture of her in her school uniform, her default form as Ryugen, and lines of information.

"I had them send me everything on Ryugen." His voice was unsteady, unusual for him. "Michi, what were you thinking? Joining a Beat Rider team, lying to me... becoming an Armored Rider."

He knew about Team Gaim. He knew she was part of it. "How much information on me is in there?"

"A whole biographical writeup and every report that anyone had made on Ryugen. Your medical records. Now answer me. What were you doing on Team Gaim?"

She had to warn Kouta to dispose of his armor without telling him why. She couldn't bear to see him unhappy. That assumed that she could get out of the house any time soon.

"I needed something to buoy up my spirits after school. I get bored so easily there, and I figured if it made my scores better, you could hardly complain. But I knew that you wouldn't approve, so I couldn't tell you. I know my scores dropped after becoming Ryugen, but...."

She could live without being Ryugen if she could be with the others.

"Your scores were dropping before that," her brother corrected. "The highest drops were after you became Ryugen."

Michi nodded. "I'm sorry, big brother." If she acted genuinely sorry, she could always steal her Driver back somehow. She didn't like the attention he was now paying to her. She'd take cold and distant any day.

"My sources say you picked up a lost Driver." It was probably in the reports, she guessed. Apparently the Lock Seed dealer had reported it that way.

"Yes, I needed the driver to protect my team. I was intending to return it, but Kouta told me it was locked to me now, and I couldn't. And after that, I needed to be able to defend people." Mostly her team, though Kouta could sometimes be annoyingly infectious.

He looked at her like that was the stupidest decision she'd ever made. She just schooled her face so that it didn't reflect the worry she truly felt.

"Normally, I'd just have you put in a containment cell until your body got used to being without the Driver. You would have been going through it anyway, like hte rest of the Armored Riders."

She froze at that. "It's addictive?" That might explain some of how she'd ended up doing so many things with Kouta and why she'd found it so hard to face letting go of her own Driver. Of course, why any of them would have had to be put into containment was a question to be asked later.

"In a way. You'll learn why shortly." He was staring at her file, then he abruptly closed the lid on the computer. "Get into something more comfortable."

Michi got up, wincing a little at her bruises. "I'll be right back."

"Stop. How hurt were you?" Her brother asked. "Let me look."

She felt a vindictive happiness as she shrugged out of her jacket and lifted the back of her shirt so that he could see exactly what he'd done to her. It was nothing compared to what else he'd done in her life, but it was a start.

"We're going to the doctor as soon as we're finished with what I need to show you. I'll meet you in the hallway."

Michi tried to hurry out of there as fast as she could. Changing into something more casual but respectable, she joined her brother in the hallway. He led her out to the car, and they were soon being driven to his work. Even she couldn't help but gawk a little as he led her to the other side of the crack that Kouta must have seen.

He handed her the Driver. "Put it on, it's safer." She noted that she hadn't gotten her Lock Seed back, but followed his instructions.

The trip to wherever they were going was mostly silent. Michi didn't really have anything to say to him, and he was busy concentrating on their route.

"Here we are." He stopped, and motioned for her to join him. She saw that they were on the edge of a cliff. "Look."

She saw where he was pointing. "That's...." she'd wanted to say cliffs, but they were plainly structures.

"Remnants of a civilization absorbed by Helheim forest, years ago." His expression was grim. "Yggdrasil estimates that Helheim will take over our world in less than ten years."

Her legs were giving out, and Michi was glad that she'd been wearing pants on this trip as she landed on the ground. "But the people...." Team Gaim. She had to protect Team Gaim.

"We can save about a billion people. Maybe more, if you get involved." He was talking to the air more than to her, she was sure.

"More if I get involved?" she asked. She was aware of how dumb that sounded.

"Yggdrasill actually needed you last year, but I wanted to protect you. I guess you're a Kureshima - you don't need protecting." She looked over as he knelt beside her. "These Drivers that we're wearing convert Helheim Fruit safely into Lock Seeds, and then allow the wearer to safely absorb the Lock Seeds as nutrition. Since the Forest will kill the native vegetation, we'll need them to stay alive."

She looked down at her Driver. "But the Armored Riders use them to fight." Best to let him think she was on his side.

"We needed these versions so that they could be distributed among people who could test them without any preconceptions." He stood up, helping her stand as well. "We needed the test data so that we could see what we needed to improve. I understand that someone was ecastic that Ryugen was female."

From his expression, she guessed that her older brother wasn't thrilled about this.

"You said that you would have tossed me in a containment cell to fix whatever the Driver did to me," she said, to prompt him to get off the topic.

"Yes. If I'd had to. We'll be capturing them shortly in little groups to start the process. It's the least we can do for them." He looked over at her. "It's time for you to leave behind this... group of yours and join Yggdrasill. We need you far more than they ever would."

She doubted that. Nobody could need her more than Team Gaim. But she had to pretend to be the good younger sister until she found a way to make sure all of them had the Drivers. At least Kouta had one, and she just had to work out a way for him to keep it and not be captured and separated from it. Even if it meant that he would keep doing those silly heroics of his, it would keep him safe.

He wouldn't have to sacrifice for his team. Now it was all her turn.

"I understand. I'll work with you." But only to keep the Team safe.

Her brother smiled. "Thank you." He stepped away from the cliff. "Now, let's get you to a doctor...."

Maybe she needed one of those. But her mind was too full of plans to really think about it, and she followed him back in silence.