Disclaimer: Buena Vista owns NS and DT.

Author's note: This story takes place in Another Time, Another Place continuity about 2 hours after ATAP and roughly 1 year following Aftershocks.

The Tempest
by Smittysgirl

Everyone had piled into Dino Ops in their usual states of dress for 3 in the morning. This meant a room filled with wifebeaters, long shirts, and Cassidy's immaculately matched silk ensemble. Conner kept trying in vain to pull the oversized hospital gown over his Zeltrax armor closed in the back.

"I'm sorry to call you all here on such short notice," Terrance said by way of apology. "We have some guests that require our undivided attention."

Two people emerged from a side room and took seats next to Terrance and Hayley. The woman nodded to the assembled Rangers. "I'm Tori Hanson, I used to be the Blue Wind Ranger. This is Cam Watanabe, he used to be the Green Samurai Ranger."

"I'm sorry we showed up the way we did, Ethan. You hadn't been responding to my letters, and I was concerned they might have already gotten to you," Cam said.

"How did you even find me?" Ethan asked, dreading the answer that was to come.

"I hacked your account and put all your information in a reverse search directory. I'm sorry for the intrusion, but I suspected you were a Ranger for a while. You asked very pointed questions, questions I myself asked when I signed up."

Trent shook his head. "Isn't there like some brotherhood of Rangers or something? Can't you guys just call on a favor from the Wildstorm guys before you?"

"Wild Force." Cam sighed. "We never met them. We were the first team not to since the Turbo Rangers. Sometimes that troubles me a little. If there's a brotherhood, somebody vetoed our membership."

Ethan smiled. "Still going on that the Space Rangers weren't the original MM-Rangers, huh?"

"You're the only other Rangers we've ever met," Terrance chimed in. "Forgive us if we're being intrusive. We haven't had a lot to go on since getting the powers."

"We were ... pretty much the same way," Tori said. "I mean, Cam looked, but, well ...."

Cam nodded. "I know what it's like to be adrift at sea, believe me. That's why we need your help, we don't have anyone else to turn to."

Conner leaned forward, having finally given up with keeping the robe over his armored body. "What happened, anyway?"

"Lothor," Cam said grimly.
"Excellent job, class!" Shane called to his students as they filtered out of the testing grounds. "We'll be grading you on a variety of factors, not simply your prowess with your elemental abilities. Remember, the highest commitment a ninja can make is to their fellow human being. Class dismissed!"

"Dude, that sounded almost happy," Dustin said, moving beside his fellow instructor.

Shane smiled. "I suppose I am. I think I've found the right teaching methods to motivate them. I'm still rusty on teaching water discipline, of course."

Dustin shrugged. "Hey, it's not like Sensei's going to blame you for Tori being gone."

"It's not about blame, I just want them to have the most rounded education possible. It's like Hunter said, a ninja slaved to one discipline is a vulnerable ninja," Shane observed.

Dustin nodded. "It's a bummer Tori left, though."

"At least she's happy now." Shane snapped his fingers. "Speaking of which, have you heard from her lately?"

"Not really," Dustin said. "It's like ... we might have been friends since preschool, but since I'm here and here is the Ninja Academy ...."

"She's got her own life now, a life away from us. I guess that's to be expected," Shane sighed. Dustin nodded silently.

"Excuse me," said a handsome - and strangely familiar - young Asian man in an earth discipline uniform. "I was sent here by the admissions desk? I'm looking for a Sensei Shane Clark and a Sensei Waldo Brooks." Dustin winced a little at his given name.

"That would be us," Shane said, offering his hand. The young man shook and smiled. "What did you need?"

"I'm in your classes," he explained, producing a couple of enrollment forms. "I think the woman working the desk was new, she claimed she couldn't notorize anything."

Shane looked at Dustin. "We have a new admissions person?"

Dustin shook his head. "That is so Cam's area, dude. Maybe Cam was busy or something."

Shane patted Dustin on the back. "Dustin, bro? Cam's gone."

"Oh, yeah, I keep forgetting," Dustin said sheepishly.

They snapped their fingers in unison. "Marah!"

"Don't tell me Marah got to do admissions," Shane moaned.

The earth trainee smirked. "This is bringing back a lot of memories for me, I'm sorry."

"Sorry, dude, there's been a lot of changes areoud here," Dustin told him.

He held out his hands. "I'm Kia. It's nice to meet both of you."

"Nice to meet you," Shane said, awkwardly taking Kia's left hand in his own. In an instant dark energy flowed through the two instructors, and the young man's eyes flashed black.
He steped back, his smile mutating into something nastier as the two ninjas stood stock still, as if turned to stone. Kira's body shimmed with dark energy, leaving in its place a more familiar form. "We live only to serve you, Master Lothor," Shane intoned.

"Of course you do." The dark ninja laughed. "I have to say, this is the most agreeable I've seen you Rangers! It's a nice change of pace!"

"What must we do?" Dustin asked.

"Return with me to the academy. There is much work ahead of us. Behave normally, arouse no suspicions. I will contact you with further instructions. But first - where has that brother of mine holed himself up?"

"Sensei keeps a private grotto just off academy grounds to commune with his inner ninja," Shane explained. "He should be there now."

"Excellent." Lothor's body shimmered, returning to its more youthful form. "I believe we're long overdue for a proper family reunion!"
"Lothor slipped in under everyone's radar," Cam explained. "He turned the entire student body into his footsoldiers, and then he started to hack away at the other academies. In the space of just a few months he'd enthralled almost every ninja on the planet."

"Hunter barely got a message out to us from the Thunder academy before Lothor got to him, too," Tori continued. "The schools themselves are abandoned. We don't know where he set up shop."

"The only reason Lothor didn't find us is because we've been moving around a lot. We just got back from 4 months in Sedona." The two shared a warm look, obviously remembering fonder times before all of this came crashing down on them.

Ethan nodded. "The only place you'd have a regular point of correspondance would be your email account."

"What about your father?" Conner asked. "Eric used to talk about Sensei Watanabe a lot after ninja training, he said the guy never took guff from anyone."

Cam looked uneasy. "Lothor, ah, 'dealt' with my father."

Hayley winced. "Oh, Cam, I'm so sorry. We didn't know -"

"He's not dead or anything!" Tori quickly supplied. "Lothor just has this, um, modus operandi with Sensei?"

"He turned him into a parrot," Cam said defeatedly.

Ethan gaped. "He turned him into a what?"

"A parrot!" Cam grunted. "We found him flapping around what was left of the wind academy, making dire predictions and asking for crackers. He's not himself."

"You can say that again," Conner said, rolling his eyes somewhat.

"What can we do to help?" Terrance asked, trying to steer the conversation back on track.

Cam and Tori looked at each other. "How about help us get our students and friends back to normal?" Tori asked.

"Why don't you just ask us to steal the crown jewels while you're at it?" Conner rumbled.

"I was kind of hoping you had a more clear cut plan," Terrance explained. "Do you have any idea where Lothor might be operating from? Do you know what his evil plan is?"

Ethan snapped his fingers. "There's been a rash of burgleries and assaults involving the Ninja Storm Rangers, I saw it a couple hours ago. I didn't have a chance to check it in depth before you guys showed up."

They looked at the two ninjas expectantly. Cam slid smoothly into the extra chair in front of the computer and started typing too rapidly for the eye to see. The extras leaned forward.

"I think that Lothor is using our teammates to gain supplies needed to put a new vessel together," Cam said, still typing.

"Vessel?" Trent asked.

"You mean like a spacecraft?" Hayley said.

Cam nodded briefly. Tori leaned into the explanation. "So, basically, he's looking to build a mobile space base to attack the earth, using the captured Ninjas as cheap labor... or food."

"Or to pack them up and move on to other planets. We decimated Lothor's army, Tor, and most of them he stole from Zurgane in the first place. He'd replenish his stores in one fell swoop and move right on to the next world."

"Then we have to stop them," Terrance said grimly.

Cam opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by Terrance's pager. The Black Ranger quickly checked the message and grimaced. "I have to take this, I'm sorry. I need to deliver a package to Elsa."

"Elsa?" the younger Rangers chorused.

Conner hopped down from his perch. "Let me help, Dr. T. It's my brother's body. I have a right to."

"No, Conner. Elsa thinks you're laid out or worse, and I don't want anyone seeing Zeltrax on the side of the angels just yet."

"Could you, like, not say that, Dr. T?" Kira asked. "We came this close to losing Conner this time around, and he's still not himself."

"Well, Dr. T hasn't tossed me or Conner in an insane asylum either," Trent half-joked.

Kira and Ethan both grimaced at that, but Trent and Conner seemed to pay them no notice.
"Excuse me?" Tori said. "You mean Elsa like on the news?"

"The one and only," Terrance said, trying to keep his tone light.

Tori whistled. "I don't suppose you'd care to enlighten me as to why you're doing this."

"Um ... well ..." he stuttered.

"My brother and I are identical twins," Conner said. "This was his body, then Trent made the lab explode and it was mine."

Tori looked uneasy. "Ah."

Cam nodded, the story not having phased him in the slightest. "That's where I recognize you from. You're a McKnight."
"You think Cous is going to find us soon?" Marah pleaded to her sister.

Kapri grimaced. They'd taken to ground ever since Uncle descended on the academy like a firestorm, terrified to death what he'd do to them after their final betrayal. "Marah, I think there's a good chance Cam isn't even looking for us."

"You sure?" Marah thought. "Cam, is, like, smart and everything. I mean he's a dork, but he's a smart dork."

"We can't keep relying on others, Marah. We have to start pulling our own weight if we want to survive."

Marah sighed, looking wide-eyed in the vague direction of the Academy they'd once called home.

"But what are we going to DO?" she pleaded to her big sister. "Who'll take us in?"

"We'll take ourselves in," Kapri said, straightening up and pulling a spider out of her hair.

"How does that work? We don't have any money or a place to live or food. I wouldn't want to take in a couple of freeloaders like us!"

Kapri brushed another yellowish spider off her uniform. There seemed to be a lot of them about. "Hey, didn't that instructor of Uncle Kanoi's teach you anything about survival?"

"I missed it because my hair got dirty in Sensei Dustin's class!"

Kapri sighed. "Come on. We'll find someplace to live."

"OK," Marah aid tenatively, getting up to follow her sister out into a thankless, hopeless world.

To be continued.