They were losing. The alien was mugging people in the park when they got the call, and now the rangers were unmorphed trying to stop him. At first they thought they had the advantage, but then the rangers were picked off one by one losing all their energy. Jack got up from the ground.
"We can do this!"
The others struggled to get up, but followed suit. Bridge charged at the alien with the others, but was thrown into the air, landing hard on the ground. The back of his shoulder felt like it was on fire, but the pain was soon forgotten when Jack was shot in the arm with his own blaster. The rangers hustled to help him when Shadow Ranger swooped in to assist.
Cruger fought the alien, and was able to hold him off long enough for the other rangers to detain him. After he was carded, they all went back to S.P.D. for Jack's arm to get checked out. It would hurt for a couple of days, but he would fully recover soon. The rangers were all worn from their battle. Bridge's head was starting to pound, so he decided despite it being early, he would go to bed.
He was sleeping fine, until the nightmare started.
"He's come a long way." The distant voice belonged to a woman.
"Hmm, yes he's able to read minds now. The possibilities of further progression are endless." This time it was a man.
"I agree, the patient is becoming more of a threat every day."
"He should be taken care of."
"Bridge." Why did these people know his name and about his powers? Who were they?
"Bridge!"
Bridge shot up out of bed to be face first with Sky. He stared at his roommate confused, he thought he was somewhere else just then. "Sky?"
The Blue Ranger nodded. "Get up, you're gonna be late."
Bridge groaned and moseyed out of bed. He felt as if he had just laid down for the night. By late, Sky meant he might not be early to training, which was not for another hour. The Green Ranger went into the bathroom to get ready for the day. The dream became a distant memory.
As Bridge found his way to the cafeteria for a quick breakfast, he found he was groggier than most mornings, despite his longer hours of sleep. He yawned as he said hello to Z and Syd who were sitting at a table eating. He went over to the food machine, grabbed some orange juice and an apple, and sat down with the girls.
"How'd you sleep Bridge?" Z took a bite of her food.
"Oh, alright. Or maybe not alright, I mean I slept, but I don't really feel like I was sleeping, but I was so…"
They began to tune out Bridge's babble and Syd began to talk to Z about weapons training. Bridge continued to talk to no one, until he realized he was hungry and finished his breakfast. Throughout the day everything seemed a little off. His actions were delayed slightly and his headache from that morning was only getting worse. Maybe he just needed rest.
Rest did not seem to help him, in fact it just made everything worse. That night Bridge went to bed early again, but almost as soon as he was asleep the nightmares came.
Bridge was in a lab, but it was not Kat's. He could see the same doctor from his dream the night before. He was holding a tape recorder and looking at Bridge. He could not move.
"The patient's delirium has shown no signs of decreasing. His irrational fear of not touching anything remains the same." The doctor shut off the tape recorder and smiled at Bridge. "Now that's out of the way let's see what your abilities can really do."
The doctor came closer to Bridge and he panicked. He did not want the doctor to touch his hands, he knew what he was going to do.
"No! Get away from me!"
"Bridge!"
Bridge shot up in bed and yelled. He looked around to see he was in his own room with Sky staring at him, again.
"Sorry." Bridge tried to catch his breath.
"Are you okay? That's two nights in a row."
Bridge nodded. "Yeah, yeah I'm fine."
Sky stared for a moment. "You're not having one of those dreams that turns out to be real or whatever, are you?"
Bridge met Sky's eyes. "I hope not."
There was no way Bridge was getting back to sleep now, but if he left, Sky would pry more, so he stared at the ceiling trying to forget his dream. His headache was only getting worse. Sleep did not help, in fact it was making everything hurt more. It was like Bridge could not get a grasp on his powers. The walls he so carefully built up were slipping, and voices were starting to creep in. Faint whispers filled his head. He grabbed his pillow and put it over his ears. He had, had bad nights before, worse even, but this one felt different somehow. Bridge felt like he was changing, and he did not like that.
The whispers had subsided, but the headache was still in full force when the alarms went off. Bridge forced himself out of bed and grabbed his morpher. The rangers all met outside of their dorms and got in morphing position.
"Ready?" Jack held up his morpher.
"Ready! S.P.D. Emergency!" The other rangers replied and morphed.
Downtown there was a group of aliens stealing from a jewelry store. When the rangers showed up the aliens ran, but the rangers chased them. Once they got them cornered the aliens dropped the jewelry they stole and began to fight. It was not that difficult of a fight, but they had to stay on guard since there were two criminals. Bridge kicked one in the chest and he fell on the ground. He got up and pulled out his morpher to decide the alien's sentence when whispers flooded into his head.
Bridge dropped his morpher and grabbed his helmeted head. He could not pinpoint where the voices were coming from. He fell to his knees, distracting the others. The aliens took this as their cue to run away. None of the rangers had a chance to catch up with them before they were gone.
"Bridge, are you okay?" Sydney knelt down next to him.
The voices grew softer. "What? Oh, yeah. One just kicked me really hard. That's all."
The rangers did not say anything at the time, but they could tell Bridge was lying. Jack called Kat on his morpher.
"They got away, can we track them?"
"Negative, we could not get a lock on their signals." Kat answered.
Jack sighed. "Let's get back."
Back at the Command Center the rangers gave Commander Crueger their report. After he left Jack turned to Bridge.
"Okay, what's going on with you Bridge?"
"Nothing, I'm fine." Bridge looked at him like he was crazy.
Sky shook his head. "You're not fine. Something happened out there today, not to mention…" He walked up to Bridge so only he could hear him. "The nightmares."
Bridge sighed. "Look, sometimes it just gets hard to block out all of the negative energy okay."
They dropped it, but still felt like something was off with the Green Ranger.
Bridge left and went to the lab. Boom and Kat were not in there so he had some time to be alone. He hated lying to his friends, but he needed to figure out what was going on. He knew his abilities had been increasing lately, maybe they were getting too much to handle. Ever since he learned mind reading the occasional thought would slip in, but nothing like what he was hearing now. Only when he completely dropped his blocks, did a wave like that come in. Most of the time, Bridge had such good control he did not have to worry about a slight touch, or strong emotion. His body was equipped to handle the power, but this was becoming too much.
Bridge sat down and put his head in his hands. When he looked back up the lab had changed. It was the same one from his dream. Did he fall asleep? He blinked a few times, but the lab stayed the same. The doctor he had been dreaming about walked into the room holding a clipboard. Bridge stared with wide eyes.
"Hey, Bridge."
Bridge closed his eyes and shook his head. The real world came back to him. Boom was standing in front of him.
"You okay?"
"Huh? Oh yeah, I'm fine. Hey I'll see you later Boom." Bridge got up and left. He needed to figure out what was going on.
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AN: This is just another short little story I thought of. Hope you all enjoy, and more is on the way!
