Star Driver Ep. 20: The Rainbow Painted that Day

Ryousuke sits in a resting car, commenting upon a rainbow he sees in the sky. Hideki talks to Madoka and Kou about the restoration of the Qophlite Cybody and how impressed he was with their commitment to the regeneration process. He and Madoka comment on using the Heigent for another experimental system and that it will be at least another week before it is usable. Wako stands in the water, naked, and sees a crow cawing at her from a rock behind. In the Vanishing Age lounge, Takeo, Ginta and Ryousuke talk. Ryousuke says they shouldn’t have to worry about any possible nuclear attack against the Cybodies. They discuss further about whether they need to have been apprivoised with their Cybody to be protected and Ginta thinks about how he’ll need to apprivoise before the Souther Shrine Maiden’s seal is nullified. He thinks of boarding his Cybody and nullifying her himself. He thinks the world is there’s for the taking and asks Reiji why he won’t tell them who the Eastern Shrine Maiden is. Reiji comments on how Ginta keeps losing at darts and Takashi realizes that he has been losing on purpose so as to not risk going through the regeneration process. Ryousuke thinks about how Reiji’s laugh hasn’t changed all this time, calling him Tokio. He flashes back to years before when he first met Reiji painting. Reiji calls himself Tokio Tsunashi. Ryousuke picks up in a car a girl named Sora, who comments on how conscientious he is to pick her up every day, since they are to be married only due to arrangements from their parents. Ryousuke thinks of how at the time he was a researcher on the island, looking into the underground ruins there, but that job too had been given to him by his parents. Sora asks him to stop and she walks out to look at a rainbow, which she calls beautiful. Sora reaches out to take Ryousuke’s hand but hesitates. Tokio stops by and comments on how amazing it is. He sets up his canvas and starts painting. Ryousuke thinks of how entranced he was and that he soon started up a habit of often meeting Tokio painting, although it wasn’t always easy to find him. Tokio paints a lighthouse, commenting on this being the best place on the island to immortalize a moment. Ryousuke asks him why he signs his paintings with an “R” and he claims it is a future pseudonym of his. Tokio asks if he can paint Sora. Back in the present, Ryousuke looks at a painting of Sora. Meanwhile Takuto helps Tiger and Jaguar remove a clock from the wall at Sugata’s home. He sees Wako sleeping on a chair outside. Tiger and Jaguar says she often takes naps there and it’s her favorite place since she was little. Sugata walks up to her and kisses her on the cheek which causes her to wake up. Later, Ginta sits down with Keito, who is reading by herself at the cafe. He asks if she is studying. They signal “Glittering Crux” at each other and he asks if she is Ivrogne. She in turn asks him if he is Camel Star, and wonders what he is doing here as he normally spends his free time possessing animals and sniffing around the island. Ginta realizes she knows what his first phase ability is. He comments on how lax Reiji has been with him and that she has an emblem. He says he thinks he knows her secret and asks why her seal as Eastern Shrine Maiden hasn’t been broken. She says it is a matter of timing. Meanwhile in Reiji’s room, Hideki works on a computer while Ryousuke and Reiji watch over their comrade, Shingo, who is in a coma. Ryousuke flashes back to them being in that very home, finding Tokio and Sora kissing each other while they were over having Sora painted. Ryousuke asks if they should head out and Sora leaves the room, silently. Tokio reveals he knows about the secret research going on the island and Ryousuke wonders how an outsider knows about it. Tokio also knows that Ryousuke is a member of the group investigating and Ryousuke says it’s because he has inherited it from his parents, living his whole life only as his parents have dictated. He is jealous of Tokio’s freedom. Tokio says a seal was passed on in his family, but his father declined to pass it on to him, his only son. Ryousuke asks if Tokio really loves Sora. Ryousuke comments upon how Tokio’s works depicted beauty that he could never see himself. He finds it strange how Tokio was so interested in the underground ruins when he had this ability. The seal on Ryousuke’s chest glows and he sheds a bloody tear. He flashes back to a later time, being angry at finding Tokio in the underground ruins. Tokio introduces him to Shingo Makiba who has agreed to give Tokio his emblem. Tokio says from now on he is not Tokio, but Reiji Miyabi. In the present, Hideki says that Shingo is getting closer to regaining consciousness. Meanwhile Ginta thinks that Reiji is afraid of the risks of Cybody regeneration as well which is why he is stalling them from going to the next phase before he can inherit a new emblem and Cybody from Shingo. Ginta thinks there is no need to wait to nullify the southern maiden’s seal. Meanwhile Takuto sits alone by the shore and is found by Keito.

Keito tells Takuto this is her favorite place on the island and her mother when she was alive used to bring her here. She thanks him for keeping her love of singing a secret. Ginta is currently inhabiting a nearby snake and overhears them. Takuto asks her if she grew up with Sugata and Wako and is about to ask her further but then says never mind. She says they have been close as long as she remembers. When they were little she was treated as a close friend but always wondered if she was a third wheel. Ginta’s possessed snake bites Takuto. Keito tears off part of her skirt to put around his leg and sucks out the snake venom with her mouth. Later an ambulance has picked up Takuto and drives him off. Zero Time begins while Takuto is being injected with medicine. The Cybody Gimelock, piloted by Ginta appears. Takuto apprivoises into the Tauburn. Ginta pulls out the star sword Corail and launches at the Tauburn, which blocks with its star swords. Ginta is confident he can win against a weakened Takuto. Keito realizes the snake was Ginta in his first phase. Part of the Gimelock’s body flies off and lunges at Wako, but Sugata forms the King’s Pillar to block it. Ginta claims a first phase attack will have no effect on a Cybody in third phase. Kou jumps out of the sphere she is watching from and apprivoises, firing at the Gimelock with the Qophlite just as it’s about to grab Wako. Takuto realizes they are turning on each other and this is his chance. He attacks the Gimelock, destroying half of its body. Takuto calls for the Tau missile attack which blasts through the remaining half off the Gimelock, blowing it up. Time returns to normal. Later, Takuto plays with Wako and Sugata with a hose while Ryousuke watches. He notices a locket in Wako’s pocket. He flashes back to Reiji revealing that Shingo has fallen into a coma, just before he was to give him his emblem. Sora and Ryousuke talk and he says he was fond of him when he was an artist, but now all his has is ambition, not for his part or her. He wonders why the three of them couldn’t have gotten along better and how things have come between us. He thinks she is pregnant. Sora says Tokio hasn’t changed since they met and doesn’t think that Ryousuke ever cared about her. He says he did and gives her the locket, which had a picture of her inside. Shortly afterwards she left the island, leaving her baby in the care of Tokio’s father. He has yet to discover what has become of that child. In the flashback, Ryousuke tells Reiji he’ll give him his emblem, and that he was able to see him and Sora together because of it, something he didn’t want to see. Struggling how not to see it, he lost sight in one of his eyes. In the present, Reiji comments on how Shingo will be waking up soon. He says he doesn’t remember when Sora left the island. Ryousuke thinks his soul is captured by Zero Time.