Who Will Control Deadheat?

Who Will Control DeadHeat? (デッドヒートを制するのはだれか) is the seventeenth episode of Kamen Rider Drive. This episode not only features the debut of both Mach Arabull and DeadHeat Mach, but it also delves into the background of Rinna Sawagami.

Synopsis
While Shinnosuke and Go deal with the out-of-control Drive Type Dead Heat, Rinna falls into the clutches of the Voice Roidmude. Disappearing together, Shinnosuke must piece together what happened in Rinna's past.

Plot
With Drive Type Dead Heat gone haywire, he remembers how his previous battle with Heart ended, so he requests Mach to use a finisher to stop him. Mach inserts Signal Tomarle into Zenrin Shooter and performs a Full Throttle to put an end to it. Kiriko removes Shift DeadHeat from the Shift Brace, cancelling Drive's transformation, with Shinnosuke lying on the ground, laughing. Elsewhere, Heart is also lying on the ground, with Chase offering to call Medic. As Go and Kiriko escorted an exhausted Shinnosuke, they spotted Rinna with an unknown man, whom turned out to be Voice Roidmude and escaped.

Under the assumption that she had fallen under Voice's trance, Rinna was chained to a chair at the Special Investigation Unit's office for a while. Rinna protested to this, while asking Kiriko to free her from the chains. Shinnosuke found it odd that Voice appeared as a someone other than Shu Amagi to him, Kiriko and Go when his illusion should only work on women, hence he deduced that Voice had copied a second human form. Shinnosuke proceeded to ask Rinna, but she had escaped.

At the Roidmude's base, while healing Heart, Medic revealed that instead of erasing/resetting Proto-Zero's memory like Brain, she altered his main programming code to defend Roidmudes rather than humans, given that Proto-Zero's memory code is hard to be erased. The only downside was that Chase could no longer perform his original duty of eliminating unruly Roidmudes whilst preserving their cores. Brain, who silently eavesdropped on them, becomes jealous of Medic for performing a better job than him, and gets awkwardly nervous, biting on his handkerchief.

In the Drive Pit, with Rinna still on the run, Mr. Belt is worried about the development of Shift Deadheat. He also can't contact Prof. Harley in America either. Shinnosuke let Go, the Signal Bikes and Shift Cars to find Rinna while the rest of the unit focused to search the mysterious man which Voice impersonated. While Rinna meets Voice at a landfill area, Mach ambushes Voice until Chase interferes, allowing the two to escape. Both Mach Arabull and Chaser Bat clashed their Rider Kicks, ending their battle with a tie. At the same time, an old man riding a sidecar motorcycle enters the Drive Pit.

After gathering information from the public, the mystery man was revealed to be Kisaburo Sasamoto, a physicist and former college mate of Rinna, as well as her boyfriend back in America. However, his whereabouts were unknown after he graduated. Genpachiro stated that it was possible that Rinna was not under Voice's control, but acted on her own accord. Sasamoto was researching on controlling organisms with soundwaves, which Voice made use of in his dating scam incidents. Trying to find his relationship with the Roidmude, Shinnosuke took out Go's photo and finally figured it out. At the same time, his Shift Brace received a message from Rinna.

Bringing Rinna to a secret laboratory, Voice reunites her with the real Sasamoto. In the past, Sasamoto was forced to end his relationship with Rinna over his research, which deeply affected her. Not letting Voice misuse Sasamoto's research anymore, Rinna took out Shift Rolling Gravity and trapped Voice in a small gravitational field for Sasamoto to escape but instead, he betrays her, knocking the Shift Car off her hand. It wasn't until Shinnosuke, Kiriko and the Shift Cars arrive and turn the tables that Rinna was freed from Sasamoto's clutches. Based on Go's picture, which Sasamoto and Amagi both appear in, he concluded that Sasamoto was guilty of aiding and abetting a Roidmude. Voice revealed that prior to his arrival, Amagi was originally funding Sasamoto's research, thinking that it would be useful for the matchmaking business. Later, Amagi was disposed of by Voice who then copied his identity. Sasamoto then asked to join Voice in his plans, hence Voice copied him as well.

As Shinnosuke, Kiriko, Rinna and Sasamoto escape from the lab from Voice, two other Roidmudes ambushed them until Tridoron and Go appeared as Drive and Mach transform to battle them and Voice. As Drive was about to deliver a blow to Voice, female victims under Voice's control came in and held them off. Voice was about to take advantage of this to eliminate the Riders and all the female victims when the previous old man riding a sidecar motorcycle appeared, revealing himself as Harley Hendrickson and handed over to Mach the completed Shift DeadHeat. As DeadHeat Mach, he quickly overpowers all three Roidmudes and finished the two combatmen. Just as Drive Type Wild Wrecker tied all of the female slaves, Voice revealed their hidden bombs until Mach destroys him, freeing the female victims from Voice's control. But their victory was cut short when Mach's Rider System entered its berserker state, nearly attacking Drive Type Technic who was disarming the bombs until Kiriko stopped him with a kick.

While Genpachiro arrests Kisaburo, he finally realises that Rinna is important to him, however it was too late, as Rinna chooses not to forgive him, with Chase watching from afar. After cheering up a heartbroken Rinna, Harley gave a present for Rinna and Krim to share before departing in his sidecar motorcycle.

Cast

 * Shinnosuke Tomari (泊 進ノ介): Ryoma Takeuchi (竹内 涼真)
 * Kiriko Shijima (詩島 霧子): Rio Uchida (内田 理央)
 * Chase (チェイス): Taiko Katono (上遠野 太洸)
 * Go Shijima (詩島 剛): Yuu Inaba (稲葉 友)
 * Rinna Sawagami (沢神 りんな): Rei Yoshii (吉井 怜)
 * Kyu Saijo (西城 究): Kenta Hamano (浜野 謙太)
 * Genpachiro Otta (追田 現八郎): Taira Imata (井俣 太良)
 * Narration (ナレーション), Drive Driver's voice (ドライブドライバーの声): Chris Peppler (クリス・ペプラー)
 * Brain (ブレン): Shota Matsushima (松島 庄汰)
 * Heart (ハート): Tomoya Warabino (蕨野 友也)
 * Medic (メディック): Fumika Baba (馬場ふみか)
 * Harley Hendrickson (ハーレー・ヘンドリクソン): Ulf Ōtsuki (大月 ウルフ)

Guest cast

 * Shu Amagi (甘城 秀)/Roidmude 030: Hiroshi Matsunaga (松永 博史)
 * Junko Misato (岬 順子): Misato Tate (建 みさと)
 * Kisaburo Sasamoto (笹本 喜三郎)/Roidmude 030: Yoshihiko Narimatsu (成松 慶彦)

Shift Cars & Signal Bikes

 * Car Used:
 * Type Change: Shift DeadHeat, Shift Wild, Shift Technic
 * Tire Exchange: Rumble Dump (by Mach), Hooking Wrecker
 * Type Used:
 * Type Dead Heat, Type Wild, Type Wild Wrecker, Type Technic
 * Bike Used:
 * Form Change: Signal Mach, Shift DeadHeat
 * Signal Exchange: Signal Tomarle (in Zenrin Shooter)
 * Tire Exchange: Arabull
 * Form Used:
 * Mach, Mach Arabull, DeadHeat Mach
 * Viral Core Used:
 * Chaser Bat
 * Tune Form Used:
 * Tune Chaser Bat

Errors

 * to be added