Notes: Originally written for PockySquirrel for the Power Rangers Universe Building Exchange. Because "Or what happens when a Ranger wants to do therapy but also needs to keep their identity a secret?" was too good to pass up.
Jayden tries to meditate.
It's the only thing that works, that keeps him from feeling like he's going to fall over the edge. It's the only way he can keep straight all the lies he has to tell; telling his team that he's head of the Shiba Clan; telling Antonio that they can't be together; telling Ji he's fine.
Not telling anyone about Lauren.
He breathes in and out, clenches and unclenched his fists.
Other people's lives… they had to be less complicated that his. He wonders what it must be like, worrying about catching the bus, and paying rent, and autocorrected texts. When your biggest problem is not knowing the answer to that weeks math homework. How must it feel to not have the weight of the world on ones shoulders?
Jayden doesn't remember what that was like.
He lifts his head up, eyes still closes, and breathes again, feeling the wind in the open courtyard hit his skin.
He wishes, without really thinking about it, that he had someone, anyone, who he could just tell the truth to. The whole truth, all of it, without leaving out any of his fear or doubt or hatred or shame.
"Oh," a voice startles him, and his eyes shoot open, "Well."
Standing in front of him is a young woman in a uniform, her blond hair tied back into a ponytail, and she's looking around the courtyard curiously. Her eyes land on Jayden, and she smiles.
"Hi there," she says, waving a hand.
"Who are you?" Jayden demands, rising from his meditation, "How did you get in here?"
"Where is here, exactly?" The girl wonders, glancing around again.
Jayden frowns. "This is the Shiba house."
She hums. "Earth?"
Jayden quirks an eyebrow. "Yes," he says, looking at her again, "Panorama City."
She seems to consider that, placing her hands behind her back and looking around. Her uniform is grey and pink, and she's got round metal glasses on. Finally she turns to him, looks him up and down and says, "You can call me Kendrix. So, you wanted to talk?"
Jayden frowns again, puzzled. "I think you should go. This is private property."
Kendrix tilts her head. "But you asked for help," she says, looking at him sadly, "For someone to tell the truth to."
Jayden's eyes widen. "Who-"
"I am the Power," she says, holding out her hands in a motion Jayden recognizes as 'ta-da', "I am every memory, experience, and lesson learned by every person who has ever had a connection to the Morphin' Grid. Only you can see or hear me, and I'm here because the Power heard your plea. You're a Ranger," she finishes, smirking, "And the Power protects its holders, in whatever way they need it."
If this was the powers idea of helping him, he really wasn't sure talking to an invisible manifestation of a former ranger was going to make him look sane.
He'd gone into the house and grabbed Mike, pulled him outside to where Kendrix was still standing, and asked him if he saw anything strange about the courtyard.
Mike had looked at Jayden like this was a test, studied the courtyard dubiously, and said "Ji forgot to pull some weeds this morning?"
So Kendrix, or at least, the manifestation of the Power that called itself Kendrix, appeared to be telling the truth.
"The appearance is random," she tells him, gesturing to herself, "Though I do possess all of Kendrix's individual experiences as well as any other former ranger. I think the Power chooses who it thinks you'll best react to."
Jayden frowns at that… because Kendrix looked a lot like what he had often imagined Lauren might.
"So you're…" Jayden hesitates, "What? My therapist?"
Kendrix grins. "If that's what you need. You're a Red Ranger," she says, grinning like this is amusing, "You can't very well set foot into a conventional therapists office and talk about Nighlocks and how your sister faked her death and you feel conflicted about your identity."
Jayden double takes at her.
"The Power gave me a starting point," she says, shrugging. "Think of it like a referral. There's some history any doctor has to know before they can treat you."
"What is it you're going to help me do?" Jayden wonders, glancing around to make sure no one is watching him talk to thin air. "It's not as though we can fix any of this."
Kendrix purses her lips. "Jayden, have you ever heard the expression 'making mountains out of molehills'?"
Jayden resists the temptation to roll his eyes. "My mountains are real."
"I'm not saying they aren't," she continues, "To you, in this moment. But like you said, you've never been able to tell anyone the whole truth before, right? You've been keeping everything bottled up for so long that problems that might have easy solutions may seem unsolvable. You can't deal with everything all at once," she says placating, "But you can deal with things. That's what I'm here to help you with."
He tells Kendrix everything.
Not at first, and not all at once. She only appears when he's alone, and she doesn't press or pry. He thinks that, if he wanted to, he could wish her away as easily as he'd wished her into existence, but he doesn't want to try.
She does remind him of his sister, and he takes some comfort in that. Maybe that's why he starts opening up to her.
When he tells her the story of his father, he jumps right to the present day, but Kendrix stops him. "Whoa, wait, hold up. You must have practiced that story a lot, huh?"
Jayden opens his mouth, then closes it. He chews on the inside of his cheek.
"Five sentences about that night and then onto something else, right? You don't have to do that with me. You're father died protecting you, and the world, Jayden. Let's talk about that," Kendrix says, "If you're up for it."
Jayden takes a deep breath. "You have his memories," Jayden says, and Kendrix gently nods. "Did he think it was worth it? Leaving me? Leaving my sister? Protecting the world?"
Kendrix hesitates. "Why do you think knowing that will make this easier for you?"
"Because if he thought that… if he believed he was doing the right thing then he didn't die for nothing," and Jayden has to bite back tears at the worlds.
"Jayden," Kendrix says, reaching out and placing her hand on his shoulder, even though he can't feel it, "Lots of people die for nothing. That doesn't make their deaths any more or less awful than all the others."
"Tell me about Antonio," Kendrix demands one night when he's getting ready for bed. She's sitting on his head with her legs crossed, in pajamas of her own.
Jayden's lips quirk up fondly. "He's my best friend."
Kendrix lifts her eyebrows. "Go on," she insists.
Jayden sighs. "I can't tell him," he says, shaking his head, "And it's not fair to him to ask him to just… trust me blindly, not knowing how much I've lied to him."
"Why can't you tell him?" Kendrix wonders, "Do you not trust him?"
"No!" Jayden exclaims, and then adds, "I trust him with my life."
"But not with your sisters?" Kendrix continues.
"It-" Jayden starts, then hesitates. "Knowing would… put him in danger."
"So you keep yourself away from him to keep him safe," Kendrix concludes, and Jayden nods. "Have you ever given him the choice?"
Jayden scoffs. "I know what he'd say. He'd say that it doesn't matter, that he doesn't care about the danger as long as he gets to be with me."
"So…" Kendrix tilts her head curiously, "His choice is to be with you, regardless of the danger, but what? His choices don't matter? You think you know better?"
"No, I," Jayden stammers, drops down next to her on the bed. "What good am I if I can't even protect the people I love?"
"Maybe Antonio feels the same way about protecting you," Kendrix says gently. "Safe but unhappy isn't any way to live your life."
"Getting him killed won't be any way to live his life, either," Jayden says morosely.
So over the course of a few weeks, Jayden tells Kendrix everything.
He tells her about Dekker and his battles with him and his fears of failing. He talks to her about his relationship with Ji, and how scared he is of letting him down. He talks about his team, about how he feels they'll dessert him when they find out the truth. He talks about his past, and his father and his sister, Antonio and the others, the Nighlocks, and even his recurring dreams about losing his teeth.
He never talks about the future, though. Kendrix wonders why.
"If I'm honest?" Jayden says from his spot on their grassy hill, the afternoon sun hitting his face, "I don't expect to make it out of this alive. My father died fighting Xandred, like his father before him and his mother before him. Even if Lauren masters the sealing symbol, I'll probably fall defending her in the final battle in order to seal Xandred away."
Kendrix is quite a long moment, and Jayden absently wonders how many red rangers have expressed this before. "I hate to tell you," she says, her voice light, "But that sounds a bit suicidal."
Jayden actually laughs. "I guess it does, huh?"
"Do you ever think about a world where you win? Where you and your whole team make it out alive and you save the world?" Kendrix wonders.
Jayden feels a pang in his chest. "It hurts too much," he says quickly, willing the ache away, "I care about all of them too much."
"Do you have any idea how many ranger teams have faced impossible odds and come out on top?" Kendrix asks, her voice hard. "Yes, some teams have failed. A lot of rangers have died. I even died once. But the Power is an amazing thing, Jayden. It brings people together in a way nothing else can, and it brings out the best in those people. Out there across the universe are hundred of teams who have felt exactly as you do now, who have been just as scared of their destiny's. But they faced them, and they survived.
"Don't give up on the future, Jayden. Don't give up on yourself or your team. If there's one thing I know to be true, it is that the impossible can be done by those chosen by the Power."
Jayden opens his eyes to tease her about her fierceness, but when he does Kendrix is nowhere to be found. He sits up from where he was laying and looks around for her. "Kendrix?"
But that's the last time he sees Kendrix.
To his amazement, Kendrix ends up being right about doing the impossible.
They defeat Xandred for good, sealing away the Nighlocks and saving the world, all of them making it through.
Jayden wonders about the Power and its methods. There are things he'll never get to ask Kendrix, now that he's laid down his morpher. Why didn't she appear earlier, when he was alone and needed a friend? Why did she leave so suddenly? Did the Power protect its holder forever, regardless of whether or not they were still rangers?
And with a smile, Jayden wonders if he'll ever appear to some young ranger whose asked for guidance, someone who needs a helping hand and would find him the easier to listen to.
He wonders if his experiences with the Power will have as big of an effect on future rangers as Kendrix's had on him.