Betterman EP24 - Departure

Christmas enables the team from Akamatsu Industries to do something they haven't been able to do in a long time -- have fun. While most of them are sleeping off the effects of a hangover from a wild bash the previous night, a masked man who turns out to be Dr. Mamon is taking Hinoki from Keita's house.

The team, thinking the doctor had been killed by Keita while in the form of Brahman, is caught off guard, and can only stand by helplessly as the villain makes off with Hinoki after a confrontation with Betterman. Taking the abduction particularly hard is Keita, who just a short while earlier swore to Hinoki he would never leave her side or let anything happen to her.

Though Brahman disappears into thin air, Sakura is able to determine that Hinoki has been taken to a diamond-shaped island. That island, it turns out, is ModeWarp headquarters, with which Miyako has lost all contact, thanks to the spread of Algernon.

Making matters worse is that ModeWarp's parent company has ordered the destruction of the infected compound, which means the team has only eight hours to find and rescue Hinoki before a United Nations bombing raid commences.

ModeWarp is in shambles and completely deserted by the time the group arrives, save for the 12 battle robots similar to the ones the team recently faced. The team is unfortunately going to be shorthanded regardless of whether it manages to survive this initial assault, because the deadly effects of Algernon have reached one of their own for the first time since Cactus went crazy.