Serene Relations

A.N: Well, here it is. The sequel to 'Serene Reflections'. First up, I want to start by making something clear: this is a Kat/Bridge story. If you cannot bear to see Bridge with anyone other than Z, Syd or whatever, don't read. If you can't get past Kat with Cruger, or whatever, don't read either (not that it's going to be a problem: Kat is too damned underused). If you can, and happen to be insulted from before, then I apologise. I just needed to make that clear.

Don't flame. If you're going to make a crappy remark just because of the pairing, don't even bother.

Now that the nasty stuff is gone and done, here is the sequel. This picks up just before the epilogue for Serene Reflections ended. Note, you don't really need to read Serene Reflections to get the hang of things. Still, it might clear up how some things happened, and it's only nine thousand words.

Disclaimer: I don't own Power Rangers.


Bridge Carson, S.P.D. Green-now-Blue Ranger tried to still his thumping heart as he walked through the corridor to the doorway to Kat Manx's lab. Funny how he had faced so many things, whole armies of Krybots, or even faced with imminent death through being crushed by walls, and he was more nervous confronting somebody else.

Sure, he was a nervous person at heart. He generally fitted in better with the people who knew him, or more accurately, people who understood his eccentric nature. Strangers normally had a difficulty understanding him, or even bearing to be in the immediate vicinity of him. Girls made him even more nervous- he was too nervous around Syd when she entered their squad first, and then Z when she entered with Jack.

But they were his teammates. Now he was trying to talk with Kat, who was a superior, and made him just as nervous.

Entering the lab, the first thing that greeted his sight was the mass of devices and gadgets lying around, scattered on various desks. A robotic arm sat on a circular desk, inert and deactivated.

The reason Bridge had came in here sat at her desk, typing at a keyboard, occasionally glancing over at a report or two next to her. Kat looked busy as usual. Bridge himself had a whole seven days off- what would be considered a luxury around the Base.

"Hello Bridge. What can I do for you?" Kat asked, looking up at him.

Kat had expected Bridge to want to talk to her, especially since last night. Knowing this, she stopped working for awhile to give Bridge her full attention, as it was most likely going to be needed, if her actions were to be understood by the somewhat naïve Blue Ranger.

"Yeah, hey Kat, about last night…" Bridge started uncomfortably. "Not that I didn't enjoy last night. I really liked it, you know, spending time talking to you, learning something else, and all those things we did, but it was more like later last night, not earlier last night, you get what I'm saying?"

"Sure Bridge, sure," Kat said, nodding.

"Well, I was kind of, well, shocked that you, well, you…"

"That I kissed you?" Kat interrupted, a small grin finding its home on her face. "Is that what you were going to say?"

Bridge nodded weakly. "Not that I didn't like it or anything," he hastily added. "Just kind of…took me by surprise."

"Hmmm, where to begin?" Kat asked aloud. "I suppose first thing to begin with is why I kissed you."

"That's a good place to start," Bridge agreed. "Because I was wondering if you actually, well, that you liked me, so you kissed me, or was it because you were kind of feeling sorry for me."

This was the moment Bridge had been dreading. He wondered how well he would take the news if Kat said she didn't like him or if she did like him. Sure, he liked Kat. So did the dozens or even hundreds of other cadets who met her. But he wasn't sure if he liked her as a friend, or as something closer.

"Feeling sorry?" Kat asked, taken back.

Bridge sighed. "Well, thanks for telling me anyway."

He started to walk out, when Kat called out to him again. "Bridge, wait!"

He turned around and faced her. "Yeah?"

"What do you mean by me feeling sorry for you?"

"Wait, you mean that you were confused?" Bridge asked.

"I was wondering what you meant. I didn't answer your question yet," Kat said, sitting back down as Bridge walked back to her desk.

"Oh. That's a relief," he said.

"What is?"

Bridge stopped thinking for a moment. Why was he relieved that Kat had been merely confused?

"Oh, umm, nothing."

Kat looked at him sceptically, before asking, "What did you mean by feeling sorry?"

"Well, I did kind of open up with everything, like what I said. I once told Sky, Syd, Z and even Jack how I felt sometimes, being pushed back a little with everything, and while Jack and Sky somewhat understood, Z and Syd just felt really sorry and tried to make up for it. I was just wondering if it was the same for you."

"There's not a direct answer to that, Bridge," Kat said. "In one way, I do feel sorry for you- you're tricking yourself into thinking that you aren't as good as you already are. You're already good now."

"Umm, thanks? But still, do you, umm, like me?" Bridge hesitatingly asked, hoping that this wouldn't break the friendship between the two.

"Depends on what you define like as," Kat said, leaning back in her chair. "I like you as a friend. You have a very likeable personality Bridge, which is probably why I do like you; as a friend. Maybe even more now."

"Even more?"

"I'm not sure myself, Bridge. I know that you are a great friend, but I'm not sure about what I actually want beyond that," Kat sighed.

One of the problems Kat had was that she found it hard to express her own feelings towards people. She was great at helping others with their own emotions and feelings, even having a small hand in pushing Z and Sky together, but when it came to herself, Kat was lacking. She was a capable scientist, one of the smartest on Earth, and maybe beyond. She could reverse engineer technology within weeks of discovering it, and then improving it soon after.

But when it came towards her own emotions, Kat found herself in unknown waters. She was perfectly capable of telling others her own opinions about something: it was her own opinions about her personal and natural desires that she was so confused about.

"I could help find out," Bridge said, waving his right hand around. "Psychic powers, remember? Well, almost psychic."

"No, thank you."

It could work. They could have one. After all, Cruger had turned a proverbial blind eye to some of the rules around, especially the one about relationships within the Academy, with the reappearance of his wife. Sky and Z was a shining example- Cruger had caught them once, but let them off at the behest of his wife.

And with Bridge's psychic abilities, Kat didn't need to try to express herself towards Bridge. He could simply pick it up, and having a girlfriend could bring Bridge back to Earth, and bring his confidence levels up significantly.

'Just go with it' was what her sister would have said in this kind of situation. Kat let out another sigh as memories of their upbringing surfaced again, along with antics, and the fights they had. Her sister had been the adventurous one- she was the one who spent most of her time going out, having fun and mating- to a certain extent. The idea of life partners was totally foreign to Kat, as was the usual human customs of courtships.

"Kat? What's wrong?" Bridge asked, concerned, and slightly worried about the fact that she had been sitting there blankly, doing nothing.

Bridge's voice shook Kat out of her slight remembrance.

"Nothing's wrong Bridge," she assured him, before thinking. "Do you really want to like me as more than a friend? As more girlfriend than friend?"

The question caught Bridge by surprise. He hadn't expected to have Kat ask him if he wanted her as his girlfriend.

"Well, I'm not that sure…" he stalled.

Truthfully, deep down inside, he did know. And he knew it.

Kat sighed. "Bridge, we can't sit here all day and discuss if what we want. You can, with your week off, but I can't. There are several things that I need to get done. It's simple: do you want me as your friend, as we always have been, or do you want me to be something closer?"

Bridge looked down at the floor in deep thought. "What if Cruger sees us?"

"Doggie's been a lot more, well, let's just say that he's a great deal more lax when it comes to those rules. He let Z and Sky off. I think his wife had something to do with that," Kat said with a smirk.

"Will this affect our friendship? Or your work?" Bridge asked.

He had to make sure everything was in the clear.

"Bridge, I wouldn't even think of beginning this relationship if I felt that my work here would be compromised because of it," Kat said, looking straight at Bridge. "And you know that we'll pretty much always be good friends."

"What if something really bad happened, like we had a massive argument over something? Wouldn't that break our friendship?"

"Bridge, we're talking about if you want to get into a relationship beyond friendship, not about how if what would break our friendship," Kat sighed.

"Could it work though? I mean, with us being completely different from each other and all…"

Kat shrugged. "If you want it to work, then we'll try to make it work. It's either that or we just don't go any further."

Sighing, Bridge looked back down at his feet, before looking up at Kat again, who was staring at him.

"…When are you available again?" he asked with a small grin.

Kat smiled.

"We can talk about that later."

She leaned over the desk, and gave Bridge a quick kiss on the cheek.

"Now, don't you have something else to do other than stand around my lab and do nothing? You have a week off Bridge. Use it wisely," Kat said, with a mischievous grin.

"Yeah, thanks Kat," Bridge said before walking out. "I'll see you later?"

"We will, Bridge. We will," Kat assured him, before he walked out. "If only you were here Michelle," she grumbled.

Her sister always had been better with flirting around and seducing people that she was. Michelle had always tried to bring Kat with her on her 'adventures', and constantly gave her slightly older (by a matter of Earth days) sister advice on how do confront these situations.

She had never given advice about a relationship like this.

Heck, Kat never would have thought that she would end up dating (a somewhat familiar concept, if only by years of observation of other humans doing it) a human. She was certain that her sister, mother, father and brother would have a massive shock- if they weren't all dead.

Thinking about it, Kat realised that she and Bridge was going to have a lot of work to do, and a lot of ground to cover in this relationship. Her own culture which she was brought up in would conflict greatly with the culture Bridge was brought up in. The only saving grace of this relationship was that at least they were at least around the same age, if she was to compare her own age by her species standards with Bridge's human age. It would have been hard enough without them being hundreds of years apart (which she was in Earth years), but at least that was one problem taken care of.

A buzzing caught her attention, and Kat focused on it. She was receiving a call, from someone with a very high security clearance.

In fact, it looked like Supreme Commander Birdie's verification code…

Pressing a few buttons, Kat was only partially surprised to see Birdie.

"Morning sir," she greeted.

"Morning Dr. Manx. The reasoning behind this call…"


Bridge walked down the corridors of the Delta Command Base in silence. Anyone taking a quick glance might have thought that the Blue Ranger was either really unhappy, or was just deep in thought. Truthfully, it was the latter. It wasn't every day that you ended up starting up a relationship with a person who was superior in rank to you, but also was not the same species as you.

Walking into the Rec Room, Bridge was mildly surprised to see Sky sitting at one of the couches again, and of all things, dressed in casual clothing.

"Hey Sky," he greeted as he too flopped down on the couch. "Where are you going?"

"Morning Bridge. Just waiting for Z. She said something about going out again, with our week off and such."

"So, how was last night?" Bridge asked.

"It went well. Smoothly, I would say."

"Really? That explains that lack of explosions that I failed to hear last night."

"Oh, ha ha ha, Bridge. Real funny," Sky said in a serious tone, though his face was anything but serious. "What about you? How was your night? Did you do anything…special?"

"What makes you think I did anything other than stay at the Base?" Bridge was somewhat alarmed.

"Well, let's just say I received a quite...interesting phone call from Syd saying you had something to do with Kat," Sky said with a grin. "And I suspect that you just came from her lab."

"Hi Bridge!" Z said as she suddenly dropped into the couch next to Sky. "What's up guys?"

"Bridge had a rather…interesting encounter with Kat last night," Sky said with a grin.

Z had really loosened him up, Bridge thought as he watched Sky. His attitude had changed dramatically from the stuck up cadet to a friendlier and out-going person ever since he and Z had gotten together.

"Really?" Z asked with a grin.

She turned to face Bridge. "So, what happened?"

"Not you too!" Bridge moaned. "Syd was enough to deal with, but you two as well?"

"We just want to know what happened between you and Kat," Z said with a grin.

"Absolutely nothing. We talked, we drank coffee, we walked around the mall together for a while, and that was it. Apart from when she kissed me…" Bridge then stopped abruptly.

That had never meant to come out.

"Ah…so something did happen," Z said.

"Alright, alright. We did get into something!"

Bridge had cracked.

"About time too," Sky said.

"What do you mean?"

"Kat was looking really lonely without some around to give her a little love," Z said. "Boom is just too damned chicken to tell her, and you looked pretty lonely as well. Add to the fact that you're both smart, and that you've been better friends with her than us, and it makes you two the perfect match."

"I didn't know that you played matchmaker Z," Bridge said.

"Only if it's taking too long. Other than that, it's Syd's job."

"Right. We better get going. Have fun with Kat Bridge," Sky said as he stood up.

Z did the same, and patted Bridge on the shoulder.

"Go on, be a man. Have fun," Z said with a twinkle in her eyes. "We look forward to the news after this."

The two left, leaving Bridge alone again. Alone, except for the fact that he was now officially engaged in a relationship with Kat Manx.

And this was something that Syd wasn't going to let drop when she came back, of that Bridge was certain. Less certain was his relationship.

Another thing he was definitely certain about: he was hungry.

Heading out of the room, he walked to the Cafeteria, thankful that it was still open. He felt like some toast. No, scratch that, a croissant. He always ate croissants when he had experienced something romantic.


A.N: Well, what do you think? Is it a worthy follow up to Serene Reflections? Was it good? Or was it bad? Leave your comment in your review! If it wasn't as good, sorry. Give it a little time, after all, Serene Reflections was written quite some time ago, and I need time to get back into it.

Again, sorry to those who I might have offended in my earlier rant. I just needed to make that clear, so yeah, sorry. Don't worry; this is just the first chapter. This probably won't be a very long fic- Serene Reflections itself was somewhat short, given that it was spread out over three chapters, or two and a epilogue, if you want to get really, really specific.

And don't kill me about Kat's sister being named Michelle. It was the first thing to pop into my head, honest! She might make an appearance later on in this story. Who knows. You just have to wait and see.

So, I leave you now. The next chapter may take a week or so. And given that my holidays are virtually over (less than two weeks, or ten days really), I might get half of it done, and then be bogged down in endless and boring yet essential schoolwork.

See ya all next time!