Johnny Daniels was one of those kids who would stand up for anyone he felt was being unfairly treated, but this often got him in trouble. Sometimes standing up for someone involved him getting into fights and then receiving detention or ISS. He hated it when others were bullied, he just didn't know any other way to stop it than with his fists. As he walked through the halls of Cassandra Bridge High School, Johnny ran his long fingers through his black hair and looked around. He was trying to spot unfair treatment. Just a few feet in front of him, Katherine Micheals was taunting a short sophomore girl.
"Hello, freak. Have you seen any monsters lately?" She asked in a joking manner. The sophomore used her finger to push her glasses up her nose. "Actually, yes. I saw a lot of them yesterday and I even got to see the rangers fighting them!" The younger girl replied. "Wow, who knew that Looney Lawrence saw power rangers in that messed up imagination of hers. Isn't that just great?" She laughed meanly. Before she could do anything else to the short girl, Johnny marched up to the scene. "Leave her alone, Katherine, she did nothing to you." He stated. "This is none of your business, Johnny." She scowled at him. "Go away." Johnny glared. "Fine." Katherine scoffed. "I'll deal with you later, freak."
With that, Katherine Micheals walked off with her posse behind her. The bright blue eyed boy smiled and looked down at the sophomore girl. She was easily a foot shorter than him, but he wasn't going to bring that up. "Are you okay?" He inquired. "Oh yeah, she always does this to me. But, thank you for helping me." The girl smiled back. She too left him and he looked around the halls again for signs of injustice. Johnny only saw one person there besides him, Oliver Ziegler, the quiet new kid. He never raised his hand or answered the teachers questions. Oliver didn't speak to anyone. A rumor had even gone around that he was mute, but Johnny didn't believe it. "Hey, man, how you doing?" He wondered. Oliver stopped and stared at him for a moment before continuing to class. Johnny sighed. He should get to class too if he didn't want to be late.
Katherine Micheals sat in Biology class, tapping her pencil on her desk. She hadn't studied for a test since she had missed the week it had been announced. She was unprepared for the test and almost knew she would fail. Biology was her worst subject. Why did she have to be sick last week? Why couldn't she have just faked being healthy so that way she could have at least studied. Katherine knew if she told one of the other students this, they would take no pity on her. After all, she was mean to most of them. She didn't want to be rude or cruel to anyone, but she couldn't stop once she had started.
She looked to her right and noticed the freshman boy who's parents were from Korea. She leaned towards his desk and saw his answers. Considering she'd done this in the past, Katherine knew to change some of the answers so that the teacher wouldn't get suspicious. It wasn't a good thing to do and she knew that. She also knew that if her parents had a doubt in her, they'd be very disappointed in her. Her parents both graduated from Harvard and expected her to do the same. Unfortunately for her, their expectations were too high for their only child.
Sweat was dripping from her forehead and into her dark brown eyes. As much as Katherine tried, she couldn't stop the sweating. She'd never been this nervous about cheating before. What was wrong? She'd done it plenty of times without thinking and without getting caught. Maybe it was that loser, Johnny Daniels who made her worried. Not that there was any reason why he should do that. All Katherine was doing was picking on a crazy kid who still believed in monsters and the power rangers. In her mind she was doing the school a favor. She ticked a strand of her straight dark brown hair behind her ear. Just call yourself, Katherine, she told herself. Nothing can go wrong.
Oliver Ziegler could talk, he just chose not to. It's not like any of the people at Cassandra Bridge even cared and those who did, were probably just pretending. Not many people had bothered to talk to him except to beat him up at his seven previous schools. His mom was in the military and so his family moved frequently. Everywhere they went, Oliver never fit in. He was an outcast and loser. And to the people at Cassandra bridge, a mute. This accusation of being unable to talk was fine with him since most tried not to talk to him. It was nice to have peace and quiet, something Oliver rarely had at home.
Because he was so quiet, he noticed a lot of things. Like the girl in front of him using the boy to her right's paper to cheat. Oliver didn't want to be a tattletale, but he knew what she was doing was wrong. If she didn't get in trouble for her actions, who knows how long her cheating would continue. The light brown hair boy rose his hand and waved it in the air, trying to get the teacher's attention. The teacher quickly noticed Oliver making a fool of himself and saw how fast he pointed at Katherine Micheals. Mrs. Evans got up from her chair and grabbed the eighteen year old by her shoulder and lifted her up. "Why are you looking at Mr. Young's work?" She asked. "Because I was sick and nobody told me about the test." Katherine answered quietly. "I'm sorry to have to do this, but you leave me no choice. Two weeks of detention." Mrs. Evans announced, letting the senior go.
Katherine glared at Oliver as she sat back down in her seat. He gulped. Had he known that the girl who was cheating was Katherine Micheals, he might not have been so eager to get her in trouble. Now he had one of the meanest people in school mad at him. Oliver sunk down in his chair. Why didn't he just let her get away with it? Why did he have to try to be fair and get her punished? Now, he was going to end up paying for it. When biology was over, Katherine grabbed him and slammed him into his locker. "I have two weeks of detention because of you, so for two weeks you're going to receive the majority of my anger. Got it?" She growled in his face, even though he was taller than her by three inches.
Johnny Daniels came up to the two and pulled Katherine off of Oliver."What's your problem? Do you always have to pick on people?" At this moment one of the teachers found the three and yelled at them. The discussion ended when the teacher thought they were fighting and sentenced them to ISS all of next week. The same thought occurred in the three's minds, 'How could this day get any worse?'
_ _ _ _
Five young adults dressed in colored spandex touched the bracelet on their left wrist. Upon pressing on of the buttons on the bracelet, the spandex disappeared and they all went down on their knees. Captain Derrick's army wore them out more than usual. Battles were longer and harder and sometimes they got hurt. "We need someone to take our place, someone young and able to fight." Andre Wilde, the red defender ranger, mentioned to his fellow rangers. "We didn't need help when we were chosen and we don't need help now. We can defeat this army if we work harder on our battle skills." Alice Borghi, the pink defender ranger, snapped. "Look at us! We can't even battle with the Bightlies without being exhausted!" The blue ranger, Isabelle Anderson, exclaimed. "What if one day we're defeated and there's no one to take our place?"
Alice snarled, but knew that what the two other rangers spoke of was true. If Captain Derrick only got stronger as they got weaker, they could easily be defeated. Not only that, but he knew their identity and it was dangerous to be out in public now. The rest of earth knew nothing of who they are and that needed to remain that way. If they became mentors to the new rangers, he'd still think it was them and use their weaknesses against them. It could end up benefiting them. "Alright, I see your point. But we choose our own successors." Alice suggested. "Deal." Andre agreed, shaking her hand.
"Now that we have that settled, we should probably find the new rangers." The yellow ranger, Landon Logan, announced. "Cassandra Bridge High School is probably our best bet for this since they have the most students in the area." Keagan Henders, the green ranger, continued. The five rangers nodded and made their way over to Cassandra Bridge, where the teens were just getting out of school. They watched carefully for someone who could take their place and whispered to each other when they thought they found someone. "Do you think he could take over for me?" Andre asked, pointing towards a senior boy. Isabelle shook her head. "Look at the way he walks, like he's overconfident in his abilities. Do we really want a cocky leader?" Andre agreed, having a cocky red ranger wouldn't be the best for the team.
The rangers continued waiting until detention had been let out. Many kids came out of the school building, but three caught the eyes of the rangers. Katherine Micheals, Oliver Ziegler, and Johnny Daniels. Isabelle saw the look on Johnny's face, how he was very observant of his surroundings. It looked like if he saw something he didn't approve of, he would jump at the chance to stop it. A trait like that was something a ranger would have. Katherine stood out to Landon in the way she held herself, confident but not cocky. He also noticed that there was somewhat of a sad look in her dark eyes and he was curious about it. Oliver kept quiet this entire time, you could just barely hear his footsteps. Keagan knew that someone as quiet as him must be good at keeping secrets and he wouldn't dare speak about being a power ranger.
The blue, green, and yellow rangers stopped the three before they could get out of sight. They tore of the bracelets on their wrists and quickly slapped them on the teens. The teens tried to get the bracelets of their wrists, but it was no use. The bracelets wouldn't budge. "What's your problem?!" Katherine shouted. "Sorry, but we had to do this. We knew if we just asked you to be the new rangers, you wouldn't believe use. Forcing you to be the defender rangers seemed like the only option." Landon apologized. "Rangers, as in the power rangers?" Johnny inquired. "That's correct." Isabelle smiled. "Great, so Looney Lawrence was right about power rangers. Now I owe Jakob twenty bucks." The new yellow ranger sighed. The previous rangers looked at each other skeptically. Who was Looney Lawrence and why did Katherine owe some boy twenty dollars?
They had no time to ask though, because a bomb was thrown in front of them. Each of the previous rangers grabbed their successors and brought them to safety right before it exploded. "This is very important. In order to morph hold the middle button on the bracelet and shout 'Power Rangers Defenders, ready to rescue!'." Keagan explained before the three young adults ran off. The new rangers were confused, but knew better than to disobey someone older than them. "Power Rangers Defenders, ready to rescue!" The three shouted at the top of their lungs as another bomb landed in front of them.