Well, like 'The Other Two-in-One Hero', I'm pretty sure this is the first crossover on this site between these two shows.

I've got the first three chapters completely written, and plan for this to be either 5 or 6 chapters long in total. Chapter 2 will be coming out on Tuesday, and Chapter 3 on Friday, but we'll just have to see about Chapters 4 through 5/6. By then, I will have my main fanfic binder back, and will be focusing on 'Return to the Digital World IV: Value'. But until then, here's a little story called 'The Star-Crazy Cult'!

This story is loosely connected to 'The Other Two-in-One Hero' as a prequel, but I didn't put in too many spoilers.

For those only familiar with one of these two shows:

'Criminal Minds' is a crime drama about a team of FBI profilers, the Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU), that solves crimes all over the US, their specialty being serial killers. This is set during Season 10, the one that just ended, in between Episodes 15 'Scream' and 16 'Lockdown'. Agent Kate Callahan is on the team, but has not yet announced her pregnancy, or possibly doesn't even know. Agent Emily Prentiss, who left the team at the end of Season 7, now runs the London Office of Interpol.

'Kamen Rider Fourze' is the twenty-second series in the 'Kamen Rider' franchise, running from the fall of 2011 to fall 2012. A large chunk of it will be summarised in this chapter, but the heroic ensemble consists of eight high school students whose school is being plagued by monster attacks, and they form a group called the 'Kamen Rider Club' to stop them. Two of their members, Gentarō and Ryūsei, are Kamen Rider Fourze and Kamen Rider Meteor. A crossover movie partially set a bit over five years after the finale shows that Ryūsei becomes an Interpol investigator after graduating.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Criminal Minds or Kamen Rider Fourze.

WORD COUNT: 2235

"Nothing is impossible. Some things are just less likely than others." – Jonathan Winters

Tuesday, February 17th, 2015

FBI Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Hotchner's initial (internal) reaction to the young investigator who'd just walked into the Boston Field Office was one of disbelief. The kid looked like he should still be in college or even high school, to be perfectly honest. Hotch figured he was in his early twenties, at the oldest. He was dressed professionally enough, in a dark blue suit with black leather gloves, which he was pulling off now that he was indoors. His dark hair was just short enough to avoid covering his eyes, which were scanning the room with an experience that belied his youth.

This was the Interpol investigator that Emily had recommended; she'd claimed that he was the top expert on the Unsubs responsible for the recent string of gang murders, the ones who apparently dressed up in strange, elaborate monster costumes, according to witness statements and security footage taken around a few of the murder scenes. The strange thing (other than the obvious) was that they were assassinating members of two rival gangs, so their allegiance was so far unclear. The current theory was that they were aligned with a third, unidentified gang that wanted the other two to blame each other and kill each other off. The significance of the constellation patterns that Reid spotted on the costumes was still unknown.

Sakuta Ryūsei had just joined Interpol a little over a year ago, when the organisation had uncovered details about the Zodiarts and how the Kamen Rider Club had basically taken care of it where the police had utterly failed. Interpol had made job offers to all eight of the original members, but Ryūsei had been the only one to accept. The others had had their own goals to pursue. Jōjima Yūki had had her dream of being an astronaut since early childhood, and hadn't been about to give up on it. The same went for Daimonji Shun with football. Kazashiro Miu had been scouted as a model, Jingū Kaizō (JK) had gotten into journalism, and Kisaragi Gentarō and Nozama Tomoko had discovered their respective passions for teaching and writing. Utahoshi Kengo had been tempted, but he'd already been picked up by the best research institute in Japan to continue his and his father's work with Cosmic Energy. Ryūsei had had no idea what he wanted to do with his life, so when the offer had come, he'd jumped at the chance to use his skills to help make the world a better place. To keep being a hero.

So when Interpol had gotten wind of monsters with constellations on their bodies wreaking havoc in America, he'd been called in to assist in dealing with them. After all, he was the only agent who possessed the knowledge, the skills, and the means to take down a Zodiarts. The ones in question had been using their powers in an attempt to turn the tide in a gang war in the Boston slums. From the images he'd received, Ryūsei had identified two of them as Cetus (the sea monster that modern movies on Greek mythology had inexplicably replaced with the Kraken from Norse mythology) and Auriga (the chariot). Those two were on opposite sides of the feud, so bodies were dropping on both sides, and even though there was no obvious international component, Interpol's American office had requested that FBI allow Ryūsei to consult on the investigation because of his past experiences. He was to find out just how the Switches had gotten to the States and put a stop to it. The rest of the Club had been alerted, and were on standby as 'special consultants' if things got really hairy. Inga Blink would have joined him, but she was still busy with an op in France.

Hotch went over to greet the new, temporary member of the taskforce. "Agent Sakuta?" he checked, shaking the boy's hand when he got a nod in response, "I'm SSA Aaron Hotchner, with the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit. I understand you've seen something like this before?" Frankly, he had been surprised to hear that anything like this madness had happened before.

Sakuta nodded again in confirmation. "Yes, though the circumstances were a bit different. I can brief you and a few other agents on what I know of the situation when you're ready, but my supervisors are requesting that certain details be kept on a need-to-know basis. You and your team will be given full disclosure, of course."

Hotch was grateful for that. He didn't like it when his team was kept in the dark, especially when the information was needed for them to do their jobs. "Well, we're ready as soon as two of our agents return from the latest crime scene, but that should be any minute now. The briefing room is this way." Hotch led Sakuta there, gathering up the rest of his agents along the way. Introductions were made, and Morgan and Rossi returned from the field only a couple minutes later, then Sakuta began his explanation with the aid of a PowerPoint.

"The first thing you have to understand is that the world is stranger than you believe. Given what you've probably seen on the job, that may be difficult to swallow, but it's the truth. Have any of you heard of Kamen Riders?"

A bespectacled blonde in bright clothes near the back, introduced earlier as the BAU's technical analyst Penelope Garcia, raised her hand. "I've seen blogs about them online. They're an urban legend; masked superheroes supposedly fighting monsters in Japan."

An African-American man (Agent Derek Morgan) sitting next to her scoffed. "You're not telling us those are real?"

Ryūsei only gave the agent a mischievous grin. "Your culprits are using devices called Zodiarts Switches," he stated, bringing up a slide of a black and silver hand-held switch with a red button on the top. "Three years ago, these object were used by a secret cult in Tokyo that took control of a high school, recruiting students into its ranks with the promise of power, success, revenge, whatever they were reaching for. These devices can be considered both weapons and drugs; they harness a form of radiation known as Cosmic Energy to give the user incredible powers, but they're also dangerously addictive."

A new slide came up, showing blurry images that the agents were familiar with: two security camera stills of two different Unsubs. "Users of the Zodiarts Switches, called Switchers, become creatures like these with just the push of a button. All Zodiarts are based on the constellations; what we have here are Cetus and Auriga."

For further proof, he showed them images of Cygnus and Pegasus. Ryūsei read skepticism on most of their expressions, and so followed up with a video clip of Kimio Nonomura transforming into the Lynx Zodiarts in the café when the Club had confronted him.

"If you still doubt me, and if any of you are at all versed in advanced quantum physics, I have a summary write-up on Cosmic Energy that you can read."

Dr. Spencer Reid raised his hand, and Ryūsei handed him a tablet. The young doctor raised his eyebrows when he saw the name at the top of the first page. "Kengo Utahoshi? Any relation to the late Dr. Rokurō Utahoshi?"

Ryūsei nodded. "His son. Most of the data in that report came from the doctor himself. Kengo's a science prodigy, so he became an expert himself by the age of seventeen and picked up where his father left off. Dr. Utahoshi himself had been killed when he learned what his friend and colleague, who would soon become the founder and leader of this cult, was planning.

"The cult leader had a tremendous amount of influence over the police, and used the power of his Switch to amplify that, so when Kengo was in his first year at that school, an insider within the cult gave him the necessary tools and research data to attempt to take care of the problem. He wound up gathering a small group of schoolmates to help him, calling themselves the Kamen Rider Club."

Ryūsei noted that the agents were still skeptical and probably questioning his sanity, though the younger one (Dr. Reid) was engrossed in reading Kengo's report. He kept going despite their disbelieving stares. "I know what you're thinking: you believe I'm either insane or pulling one over on you and wasting your time. I wouldn't have believed any of this either, until I saw a guy being put into a coma by a malfunctioning Switch right in front of me." He did his best to hide the emotion in his voice as the memory of nearly losing his best friend resurfaced. "The Club would identify a Switcher, figure out their motives and endgame, and bring them down and destroy the Switch. They even managed to reform most of the former Switchers and help them get over the after-effects of using those things.

"Eventually, this brought them into conflict with the cult leader, whom they eventually defeated as well, though he'd been using his Switch for eighteen years, and as a result of what he'd put his body through, he died soon after."

Morgan huffed and began to stand up. "This is crazy. You guys can't be believing this!"

"Actually," Reid interrupted, having already finished reading the report, "As crazy as it sounds, the science here is sound. It's fascinating, really; these Switches project enough of this Cosmic Energy to actually create a solid construct around the user, just like the 'monster costumes' that our Unsubs seem to be wearing."

"You believe him?" Hotch questioned.

"I do, actually, as impossible as it sounds."

Ryūsei decided to not ask how the man was able to read Kengo's 'short' (read: ten pages in tiny font) write-up so quickly, instead choosing to just be grateful that one of the agents believed him. The others seemed to be convinced at varying degrees with this agent vouching for him. He cleared his throat to bring their attention back to him. "As far as we can figure, the creator of the Switches had other associates who managed to bring some to America and distribute them to both of these gangs. We don't know who they are or what their motives are, but one thing is clear: the Switches need to be recovered and destroyed."

"Wouldn't the United States government want to keep some for research?" the slimmer blonde (introduced as Agent Jennifer Jareau) asked, "The DoD would probably kill for the chance to recreate the technology if it's that effective."

Ryūsei frowned deeply. "They probably would. But remember, these things are part weapon and part drug, and they render the Switchers mentally unstable after repeated uses. Experimenting with them has proven to have terrible consequences. It's better for the whole world that the Zodiarts Switches be wiped out of existence." His tone brokered no argument, or at least he hoped so. Interpol had also toyed with the idea of reproducing Zodiarts Switches and Gaia Memories, and it had taken a lot of arguing to talk them out of that insane idea. It simply wouldn't have ended well.

"We can argue about that later," a brunette woman (Agent Kate Callahan) interjected, "Right now, we need to get these things off the streets."

"Kate's right," Agent Hotchner agreed, "Agent Sakuta, how do you propose we deal with these… Switchers? Forensic evidence and security footage show that typical firearms are completely ineffective."

Ryūsei nodded seriously. "I have access to some of the gear that can take a Zodiarts down, and I also brought some modified weapons for the rest of you with me. It doesn't take long to learn how to use them; they are particularly powerful and painfully easy to operate. So obviously we'd rather those not wind up in the wrong hands, either. My gear, however, is strictly reserved for my personal use. I'm the only one trained to use it, and even if I were to give one or more of you a crash-course, you probably wouldn't be able to use it as effectively. I've been using it for more than three years now."

"Would you at least give us some sort of demonstration so that we know what to expect in the field?" Agent David Rossi requested, looking curious.

That made Ryūsei grin like a fiend. The agents of the BAU were likely to be capable of more… flexible thinking thanks to the deviant natures of their targets, but he doubted they'd be prepared to see him go Meteor. And as much as he'd like to pull a surprise move in the middle of a real fight and shock the hell out of them, the distraction would likely do the agents more harm than good. It would be best to get that part over with in a safe environment, without any annoying Zodiarts trying to kill him. Still, even without that added excitement, this promised to be fun.

The comment about Cetus and the Kraken is true; 'Clash of the Titans' and various other modern retellings of the Perseus myth got it WRONG. A lot of movies about Greek Mythology get it wrong, though sometimes it's done intentionally to make a more exciting story. Achilles was not in the Trojan Horse, no matter what 'Troy' says. Hades is not the equivalent of Satan, no matter what MANY movies say (especially the first Percy Jackson movie, which is notable because the BOOK IT'S BASED ON got it right).

Okay, I'm going to stop myself now before I go on a full-blown rant on something you might not even be interested in.

In Chapter Two, Ryūsei shows the BAU a taste of his power, and we determine how the Zodiarts Switches got into America. Here's a preview:

Derek Morgan would never admit it out loud, but this young Interpol investigator had just shocked him in a way no unsub had ever achieved. Telling tales of people turning into monsters with the flip of a switch, of monster cults, and of high school students doing what the police could not and putting them down, now that was one thing. But when the young man – honestly still a kid himself! – was suddenly engulfed in a big ball of blue energy, the likes of which Derek had only seen on TV and in movies, that turned his whole world upside down. Sakuta had been telling the truth: the world was, in fact, even stranger than they'd believed. Which was saying something, considering the nutjobs they chased down for a living.