"This, is way too difficult!" Rodney was starting to complain about the midwinter exam he just had to sit through. He was reviewing his answers, like him and his friend Kelz usually do, and they still couldn't get around the answers they chose.
"We have to figure out the answers! If we figure out them correctly, we can do a resit if we fail!" Kelz hugged the table in the Sixth Form Study room. She was as undetermined as Rodney was.
"It's only General Studies! It's not like it's gonna be a hard subject! I heard that someone didn't go to one lesson, and then to the exam at the end of the year, and got a C!" Rodney rubbed his forehead, and rested his head on his hands.
"Are you not done yet?" Riley came into the room. She had taken Extended Project, which doesn't reside in taking a voluntary exam at the end of the year. She sat down in a seat next to Rodney, and they both kissed to show that they she had entered the room. "You said you would be done within a half hour after the end of the exam!"
"Kelz won't let me finish!" Rodney gestured to Kelz, and rested his head back on his hands.
"C'mon, Kelz! The exam's over! The resit will have different answers, and it's only General Studies! It's not a mandatory subject in year 13, so..." Riley finished her sentence with a shrug.
Banging from the door leading to the main hallway began. This dragged the three's attention to behind Rodney and Riley. It was their friend, Eric. He was standing behind the window beside the door. He was miming actions, telling them that they were late for getting home.
Rodney turned back around the Kelz, "I'm sure we'll get our expected grade boundary!" he and Riley stood up. "We've gotta get home! Their gonna lock up the school before long!" Rodney and Riley put their arms on each others shoulder's and left the room. Rodney gestured to Kelz to come out. She sighed, but obliged.
A few minutes later, the group were walking through the War Memorial Park. Rodney came up with the subject of the Temples of Yore. Though the remainder of the group knew about the Temples, and had seen each of the Temples for themselves, they had no interest in them. So they all groaned.
"Well, I found another Temple in the War Memorial Cemetery. The Shadow Temple! And look what I found!" Rodney took a key out of his back pocket, and flashed it to his friends.
"A key?" Kelz asked, peering over at it.
"What's it for?" Eric also looked over at it.
"I don't know. But the inscription above it said, 'For the right of passage'. Whatever that means." Rodney poked his finger through the ring of the top of the large key, and swirled it in it.
"If you took it from the Temple, doesn't that mean it's stealing?" Riley raised a good point, but Rodney had a good comeback.
"Not really. Is an archaeologist goes into a pyramid, and takes the hidden treasure past all the booby-traps, a thief?" Rodney held his comeback well, and it left Riley stunned, trying to search for an answer. "No. It makes them a treasure hunter! Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to find this?" the key slipped out of the sixth formers hand, and into a dent in the War Memorial far in front of them. The four of them stopped when they noticed that the key had rocketed near 100 yards, without Rodney even throwing it.
"Rodney, please tell me that you did not do that..." Kelz looked at the key from afar. Rodney, Eric and Riley ran up to it while Kelz was frozen in shock.
Rodney reached for it, but Eric stopped him. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Oh come on, Eric! It's not like anything is gonna happen!" Rodney quickly reached for the key and turned it. Rumbling started occurring, and with that, a stairway opened up beside them. Kelz ran up and looked down the stairway into darkness. "You know. I did read in a book in the library, that there are four element temples, and three force dungeons. Fire, Water, Wind and Forest. Element temples. Shadow, Light and Time. Force dungeons." Rodney began heading down, but Riley stopped him.
"What are you doing? You don't know where that thing goes!" Riley ran up beside him, pulling his arm.
"Well, if anything goes bad, I'll just run back up. Trust me, Riley! I do stuff like this all the time! I'll be fine!" Rodney held Riley's hand, as she let for and heading down.
"W-wait!" Kelz ran past Riley and into the dungeon with Rodney. Eric followed with Kelz.
Eric turned around just before he went into the dark. "C'mon Riley!" he held his hand out, and Riley grabbed it. Eric pulled her down into the dungeon.
Riley and Eric had lost track of Rodney and Kelz, they had gone too far ahead. The temple itself was just a long dark hallway. There were no traps like there were in the other temples. This one was completely safe. Like it had been sealed with nothing inside it. Eventually, a light could be spotted in the far distance. Eric was the first to spot it, and then Riley caught sight of two figures who she guessed was Rodney and Kelz.
Rodney was standing over a podium completely drenched in the light, and Kelz was standing beside him. Rodney had taken a puzzle box off the podium, and was fiddling with it. He had found enough puzzles that were much harder than the one he was holding now. If he remembered correctly, one of them involved avoiding a large spiked donut, while attempting to collect a variety of different colored rings, and then assorting them correctly on a door handle. Compared to that, this was easy.
"Are you sure you should open that?" Riley was always the pessimistic one. Trying to keep Rodney on the ground. Though it rarely worked.
"It couldn't be that bad." Rodney was still fiddling with the box. He heard a click, but the box still wouldn't open.
"This is a temple that has been locked up with a key you found in another temple. Who knows what could be in that!" Riley put her hands on Rodney's. He stopped trying to open the box, and looked up at Riley. "Please stop."
"The shadow temple was locked too." this comment made Kelz and Eric step far back. A long silence lasted afterwards.
"THEN WHY DID YOU GO INTO IT?!" Riley screamed out to Rodney, taking her hands off the box.
"D-don't you wanna know how I got in?" Rodney cowered, slowly unlocking the box further without Riley realizing.
"Fine." Riley calmed down. "How did you get in?"
"Y'know how there's a war memorial pillar in the cemetery and the Burgage?" Rodney perked back up again. But stopped unlocking the puzzle box.
"Yeah." Eric and Kelz stepped up behind Riley to listen to the story.
"Well, they're on a hinge. And if you know how to move them, a stairway opens into the temple." Riley sighed and slammed her face into her hand. Rodney took this as a great opportunity to open the box.
Eric and Kelz looked past Riley, and into the box. The lid was removable so everyone, but Riley, who still had her head in her hand, was able to see the contents. Seven equally shaped crystals. One Silver, one Yellow, one Green, one Red, one Blue, one Black and one White. Riley took her head out of her hand, and looked over into the box.
"Different. I expected something different. Something. A bit bigger." Rodney looked closer into the box. The crystals reacted with the light that shone on the podium and rocketed towards the four. This propelled them out of the temple, as the White and Black crystals rocketed into the sky.
"What the heck was that?!" Kelz sat upright with the Yellow crystal in her lap.
"That was so cool!" Eric pushed himself upright with the Blue crystal in his lap.
"Rodney. Th-that really hurt." Riley sat upright with the Green crystal in her lap, and glared at Rodney.
"How do you think I feel?" he sat up holding the Red crystal and the Silver crystal. "I was directly in the firing line."
Kelz stood up with Eric. "What is with these crystals?" Riley and Rodney followed them by standing up also.
Rodney noticed that the stairway to the temple was no longer there, instead was a man wearing what looked like black spandex, and a black bikers helmet. Rodney stared at him blankly. "Why is there someone dressed as a power ranger standing there."
"You, children's have something that belong to me." he looked up from the grass, and stared at the sixth formers.
"Hide the crystals." Rodney instructed his friends as they simultaneously hid the crystals behind their backs.
"Shadow ranger!" a mysterious tall, muscular looking man was stood behind the group of friends, pointing at the person dressed like a power ranger. He had long brown hair, and was dressed in a beige tunic, and a brown robe. He ran towards the 'shadow ranger' passing the group of confused teens.
"Paul?!" the 'shadow ranger' disappeared upon the sight of the stranger.
"What?" Riley stared at the mystery man.
A student, probably a year older than the four, watched the spectacle not too far away. Completely shocked by the sight. He dropped the multitude of books and folders he was carrying. Rodney looked towards him, and stepped over to help him pick them up.
"You! You have that crystal! And you was rocketed out of that stairway! And that guy in black! And-And him!" he pointed at the mystery man, who had been called Paul, by the 'shadow ranger'.
Rodney stared at him blankly, while handing him his books. "Nice to meet you too! I'm Rodney!" he smiled and waved.
"Y-yes! I'm Peter! It's really great to meet you!" Peter dropped his books again, and violently shook Rodney's hand. Peter let go of Rodney's hand in mid shake, and it went flying behind him. Rodney was thankful it was attached to a strong ligament. Peter's attention went to the mystery 'Paul' man. "Y-You! You're the Time Ranger. Right?"
"Yes. I am. It is very nice to meet you Peter. I'm Paul." Paul placed his hand out in front of him, and Peter also shook it violently. Peter let go of Paul's hand, and turned around to the four confused 17 year olds. "You ALL have to come with me! To my secret base!" Peter ran to Rodney, who was again holding his books.
Strangely enough, Rodney, Eric and Kelz followed Peter and Paul to Peter's base. Riley had second thoughts, but Rodney convinced her to go. Saying, "We've come this far. We might as well!" Peter leaded them into the middle of the Potwell Dyke forest, on the side of the school. Peter opened up a panel in a tree, typed in a code, and closed the panel.
In the middle of the tree hut, an elevator shaft looking thing opened up underneath them, and they began to get lowered. They oddly thought it relatively normal, and went along with being lowered into a half a kilometer deep underground base.
"So, where did you come from, Paul?" Rodney turned around to him. He was curious to find out how Paul knew the 'shadow ranger'.
"I come from the year 1014. I am the Time Ranger. I was locked away in the Time Temple with the crystals. The other rangers in the Light, Forest, Fire, Water, Wind and Shadow rangers were all locked away in their corresponding temples. But were all killed once the Shadow ranger was released." Paul kept a grim expression on his face.
"How did the Shadow ranger get out?" Riley butted into the conversation between Rodney and Paul.
"Once the one holding the Time and Fire crystals opened the crystal box inside the Time Temple." Paul looked down his nose at Rodney with disgust.
"Oops." Rodney cowered, fearing what Riley may do.
"Grr... Argh! Why do I bother? You'll never learn!" Riley patted Rodney on his head, and stared a giant green gorilla in the face. She dived backwards towards Peter, who fell backwards onto Kelz. "Peas and Rice!"
The elevator came to a stop at the bottom of the base, and Peter walked to a massive super computer, with nearly a hundred screens. He began typing on the main keyboard, opening up a video showing a slide-show of parchments of the legend of the Power Rangers of Yore. It showed the beginning, the Shadow Ranger and the end.
"So, what now?" Eric asked, looking blankly at Peter, wondering what the slide-show was supposed to mean.
"Paul said earlier, that there was seven Power Rangers, and there is also seven Temples of Yore, with the same symbol, and the same title. You guys, are the new Power Rangers!" this statement shocked everyone.
"No, way." Rodney looked at the Time Crystal.
"We're the..." Kelz looked down at the Light Crystal.
"The... The..." Eric raised the Water Crystal, and stared into it.
"P-pow... No! No I can't do that!" Riley backed away from Peter, dropping the Forest Crystal in the progress. "I can't be a Power Ranger! I've got too much to live for! My life is completely normal in every single way! There's no need for me to change it!"
"I'm sorry, Riley. But you've got no choice. The crystal chose you." Peter pointed to seven water filled chambers. "Guys, if you can put your crystals into them, that would be cool."
Rodney, Eric and Kelz placed the crystals they were holding into a shoot that transported the crystals safely into the water filled chamber in front of it. Rodney turned around, and saw that Riley was ascending in the elevator. Rodney ran to the elevator, and grabbed onto the edge of the elevator as it ascended. "RILEY!" he yelled to her as it continued to rise back to the surface.
