There was a list of things Wes wanted to accomplish today.
There was refined list of things of things he had to accomplish today, unless apocalypse itself walked through the door.
But, there was also a list of things that Wes had no idea would happen today.
And, truthfully, that's the way the day went.
Wes started his day as normal as can be expected from a Silver Guardian/Time Force Power Ranger. He woke up, ran through a dozen training routines to keep his body in shape, and had breakfast with his dad and best friend, Eric Myers.
The breakfast was mostly business related, but Wes didn't mind as much as he used too... mostly because the "business" part concerned the Silver Guardians, which was now considered a charitable organization for the public.
After breakfast, Eric confessed that he had plans for the afternoon and had the intent to take the day off. Which was weird in and of itself; Eric Myers NEVER took a day off.
But it didn't bother Wes, the guy worked himself practically to death day in and day out. He deserved a vacation more than anybody he knew.
The former Red Ranger was cleaning up his office when he happened across a picture that felt like a blast from the past... or should he say future?
"Jen!" Wes screamed, trying to get up so he could help her. But his body felt like it was being ripped apart, he stumbled... crashing to the ground.
He pulled himself out of the flashback because he knew it only got worse. There were many times where the worst of the battles he'd been involved in forced him to suffer symptoms consistent with victims of PTSD. He'd seen a psychiatrist several times, but no amount of help could undo the damage done.
"And it can't make me forget her." Wes muttered, staring at the picture where he surprised Jen by kissing her cheek.
His ear piece beeped.
"Collins. On my way."
He sped over to the scene of a bright blue light in the sky, on the very edge of the beach.
Wes hopped out of the jeep and looked at the sky, recognizing the time vortex instantly, but not sure whether it would be friendly or hostile.
To be safe, he decided to morph.
"Time for... Time Force!"
His red uniform replaced his Silver Guardian beret and suit instantaneously.
The giant yellow time ship blasted through the vortex, landing softly on the beach.
That's when Wes let his guard down... bad guys don't land softly on beaches.
Saying he was pleased when a girl dressed in pink with dark brown hair came walking out of the ship would be an understatement. But nothing would compare to the small thing she carried.
"Jen... Power down." Wes said, touching his morpher and walking towards her. "What are you doing here?"
Jen's lips curled into a small smile before retreating, and she looked down at the object in her arms.
Wes raised his eyebrow and looked as well, discovering that it was no inanimate object like Wes had originally thought. It was a child... a baby.
"What...?"
"I'll explain everything." She promised, "But we need to get somewhere quiet and private. He can't be out in this heat for long."
Wes nodded and cranked up the air conditioner in his jeep, using the futuristic car seat to seat the baby in the back where Wes normally kept an assortment of weapons.
Wes pulled up to the old clock tower and looked for Jen's approval, who nodded and went back to watching the baby.
When the two got set up in their old headquarters Wes was more than ready for answers.
Jen held the baby and started the story with Wes leaning against a support beam and with her at the picnic table they used to use for research.
"Well, you know how we... uh..."
Uh oh.
"Yeah." Jen said, reading Wes's expression and knowing exactly what he was thinking. "Well, that one time was enough."
"So... he's...?"
"Yours." Jen confirmed.
Wes was almost afraid of the baby at that point. He'd impregnated his great great great great (etc) grandson's ex-fiancee and she bore him a child.
Wes went over and sat next to Jen, studying the baby like it was a nuclear device that might go off at any moment.
"Do you want to hold him?" Jen asked, her voice soft in a way Wes had never heard before.
"Um... yeah... yeah I do." Wes took the baby from Jen's offered gentle grip gingerly.
"Have you ever held a baby before?"
Wes nodded.
"I'm sorry... I didn't tell you." Jen apologized, not meeting his eyes as she stood up and started wandering around the clock tower, circling the giant bell on the ground. "After I got back there was some damage to my womb. They managed to save him and me... but they weren't sure if there was gonna be negative effects."
"Negative effects?"
"Something about your genes was off. Your sperm was... well, radiated. There was some kind of mutation, but they couldn't figure out what."
Wes tried to think about something that would have affected his reproductive material.
"The accident." Wes remembered.
"What?"
"There was this accident a couple months before we... me and a few people I knew were trying to make ranger powers, similar to mine. Something went wrong, but we never found any side effects."
"I bet that's what did it. That and traveling a thousand years through time." Jen pointed out. "Why were you trying to replicate your powers?"
"I wouldn't say 'replicate'... just... make more rangers. We needed to figure out the morphing grid. We had a friend named Kat who helped us along, but we couldn't quite put it together. Kat took it back to her homeworld to work on it some more since we just didn't have the technology to keep the ideas up and running."
"Ideas?"
"There was this idea... kind of like Time Force, but for all planets... not just Earth. A kind of space patrol. There are a lot of planets nearby that have something like that. But Earth just doesn't."
"It will... one day." Jen told him.
"What's his name?" Wes asked, not taking his eyes off the beautiful baby boy in his arms.
"He doesn't have one," Jen confessed, "In the year 3000, it's a custom to name children with both parents present. If it's not possible at birth... then you make it possible as soon as possible."
"Was it safe?" Wes asked, looking up at Jen briefly. "Bringing him back here?"
Jen nodded, "I couldn't travel through time when I was pregnant. But the doctors were positive he'd be okay from the trip back."
"Why is that?"
"Because he's supposed to be here." Jen told him, looking him in the eye. "The details are... well, lost to time. As, a lot of things are... but history tells us that you have a son. Despite, never marrying or having any regular relationship."
"History can tell you that but not his name?" Wes asked sarcastically.
Jen laughed, "It's not that bad. He's a good baby... he just... he's stuck. I don't even know how else to put it. He belongs here in the twenty-first century... and he belongs in the year 3000..."
"This is my son..."
"Yeah... it is. After I delivered, I was unconscious for about a week. But when I came too, they put on me on an accelerated recovery course... so that I could come here before he makes it to a month."
"He's not even a month old?" Wes asked, studying the baby once again.
"He will be... tomorrow. Ten months ago tomorrow was when we... well, we had sex." Jen said plainly, deciding the best way to handle this would be as bluntly as possible. "So, I've thought of a couple names but I haven't actually come up with one I like enough."
"Well, what do you have?" Wes asked.
"Jack?"
Wes shook his head, "Good friend of mine just had a boy named Jack."
Jen shrugged, "Bridge?"
Wes shook his head again, "What kind of a name is Bridge?"
Jen put her hands up in a "I give up" type of way.
Wes caught himself looking outside. The sun made the blue sky seem peaceful, as if its history hadn't been plagued by some of the most dangerous beings in the universe.
"You know I was looking at the sky when you came here... I think we should name him Sky."
"Sky?" Jen asked, sitting next to Wes and kissing the baby's head. "I don't know. We can't really dress him in pink or red if his name is Sky."
"Skies are blue, Jen. Boys wear blue." Wes told her.
"Maybe in your millenia."
Wes laughed and was unable to stop himself from kissing her, "I'm sorry..."
She leaned in smiling and kissed him back, "Don't be." She said when it broke.
"So... Sky." Jen said, growing on the name.
"It's what I always look at when I think of you."
"Not anymore..." Jen promised, "Because Sky belongs in this time period... So do I."
"Isn't that like a huge violation of rules?" Wes asked, excited at the prospect of keeping Jen all for himself (and Sky).
Jen laughed again, "We had sex and had a kid. A kid born in the thirty-first century, who belongs in the twenty-first. All things considered, this rule can be bent."
"What about everyone else? What did they say?"
"They said, and I quote 'It's about time.'"
Wes laughed, "Maybe they're right."
"Yeah... they are. Or at least... they will be."
Wes laughed again.
"But... I want him to have my last name." Jen confessed.
Wes tried to remember what it was but couldn't.
"It's Tate. That was my dad's last name. Back home there weren't many Jennifer's, so I never really used it. Some people used my mom's surname, Scotts, but I always just went with Tate."
"Sky Tate." Wes said, looking at the baby in his hands.
Jen lay her head on Wes's shoulder right when their communicators beeped.
"Go ahead Eric." Wes said, handing Jen the baby.
"Hey... uh... Wes. I uh... I need some help."
"Help? You never ask for help."
"Not in battle no. This is about girls..."
"Taylor?"
"I just... Can I come pick you up? I don't even know how to say this."
"Um... I'm at the watch tower. Come by, I got a little something that'll probably trump your something."
"I doubt that Wes. Myers out."
"Ten-four." Wes and Jen looked at each other and agreed that nothing Eric would say could overpower what they had.
...
"She's pregnant?" Wes asked.
Eric nodded, "One night... both a little tipsy. I didn't mean to... to..."
"To have sex with her?" Jen asked.
"No... I meant to... I didn't mean to kiss her. She just... she was there. You know what, this isn't helping."
"Wait Eric... Bet I've got something that'll make you feel a little better."
"And what could that be?" Eric asked, unbelieving. Then Eric noticed something. He'd been so focused on the Taylor thing that he missed the part of "how" Jen got there. And the "why"... and why there was a baby stroller...?" "No way."
Wes nodded, "Yeah."
"Always have to one-up me. Don't you, Wes?"
Wes shrugged, "This was not my plan."
"How far along is she?" Jen asked.
"Three months. She didn't know until about a week ago."
"Conveniently, the week you took a vacation."
Eric took a deep breath, "I'll admit we had other plans. Plans that didn't involve having a daughter."
"You're having a girl? Maybe our kids will get married."
Eric just about went up and smacked him upside the head, but he didn't.
"So, how the hell are you pulling this off?" Eric asked, gesturing to Jen.
Wes shrugged, "I have no idea."
Nine months later
"She's beautiful." Taylor said, stroking the baby's short hairy head.
"She's perfect." Eric agreed.
"We're still not naming her Supernova." Taylor told him.
"What about just Nova?"
"I just had a thirteen hour labor, and don't think I won't get out of this bed and smack you."
Eric put his hands up defensively, "I wonder if she'll be a ranger someday."
Taylor smiled, "Maybe... in the future."
...
In the future:
"Wes? Wesley Collins, do you copy?"
"Copy."
"Dad what's going on?" A young Sky asked.
Wes raised a finger to his young son, "Go ahead Commander."
"There's an attack in the city. People need you."
"I'm on my way." Wes replied, closing his communicator. "Sky, I have to go now." Wes signaled for Taylor, who often babysat, to come over from the park bench. She'd been enjoying the sight of Wes and Sky bonding. Something that the two didn't always get to do a lot of because of Wes's hectic schedule. Eric and Jen had both fallen in the line of duty a couple years ago, leaving Eric's daughter fatherless and Sky without a mother. "Thanks."
"Be safe." Taylor reminded him.
Wes started running and waved goodbye.
And we all know what happened next.
The acting commander of the Earth base SPD handed Sky the helmet of his father personally. The suit was beyond salvaging... but the helmet was still something to serve as a reminder of the sacrifice of the ranger that changed history.
Sky would be raised by Taylor until his acceptance into the Space Patrol Delta Academy. There he would meet Bridge Carson and Sydney Drew, who would later become two of his best friends. Taylor didn't tell Sky or her daughter of her past as the Yellow Wild Force Ranger until she donned the power of SPD Nova Ranger. In fact, it made her smile that her daughter's chosen title as a ranger... was the same name her father almost convinced Taylor to give the newborn.
Sky never found out that he born from two timelines, as the only people who knew were Wes, Eric, Taylor, Jen, and Mr. Collins (four of which passed before Sky's rise into manhood). Nor was he told that his mother was the Time Force Pink Ranger and his dad the Time Force Red Ranger. To him... she was a diplomat (far from, in truth) who was killed by an accident. But in a promise to keep Sky's knowledge of the year 3000 a secret, Taylor guarded Jen's secret until the day she died.
Sky would eventually settle down and marry, have a few kids that would have a long lineage, lasting until long after his secondary home-time of 3000.
Space Patrol Delta would one day become Time Force. The Quantum Morpher had been destroyed with Eric, but the Q-Rex would forever exist as a quandary of time. Wes's morpher would be passed down from generation to generation as an heirloom until someone with the right genetic code could unlock it. While waiting, the scientists of the ages developed alternate powers derived off the same power-flow patterns of the original morpher.
Maybe I owe you an explanation.
This fanfic ties together Power rangers Time Force and SPD. It explains and hints at the various things we learned in SPD as well as making sense of Sky's father. It also touches on the early days of Space Patrol Delta when Kat Manx and B-Squad's parents were experimenting on the ranger powers.
Taylor's daughter, left unnamed intentionally, will one day become the SPD Force from the Future, Nova Ranger. (as hinted by her jab at Eric's idea of a name for their daughter)
Sam was obviously too young in SPD 2025 to warrant a cameo/mention in the early 2000's. So, he was not written in. Nova, we never really got any information on her, so this works well for me.
I also threw a few references into the mix to Sky becoming the Blue ranger (the "blue sky") which was actually done halfway through the chapter unintentionally, despite Sky always being the planned child of Jen and Wes.
Taylor is also the blonde lady seen in the Sky flashbacks, which explains why it was not Jen, his mother.
This story was written originally just for Wes/Jen... but as the story progressed, I knew I had to reference the rest of SPD's backstory. I tried to cover up all plot holes, but Might have missed one or two. Oh well, it's meant to be enjoyed! And I hope you liked it and read it to the end!