Los Diablos, 2019
"What do you mean you're planning to give this up?", Mitch said with shock.
"You heard me.", Dave replied, in an uncharacteristic serious tone. "In order to bring the Ninja Rangers back, we're gonna have to take away all the other Ranger teams to do it. What if that leads to one of the aliens or robots or demons that they should stopped ends up conquering the Earth?"
"Well like you said, the Ninja Rangers are gone, and I don't see giant statues of Galvanax or Madame Odious all over the place." Mitch countered.
"How do we know that will happen for all of them? I'm better off just giving up on this whole thing. Hopefully, the craziness will just go away then."
But as he said this, the Principal entered. "Good morning, class. I'm sorry to tell you that your teacher has left at short notice to care for a distant relative. Luckily, we managed to get a willing replacement who was easily available. I'd like you to meet your new teacher, Mr. Gray."
Mitch and Dave were shocked by this announcement. Sure enough, Gray was the new teacher being introduced. "Thank you, Principal.", he said cordially, subtly urging the man to get out. "Good morning, everyone. Now I know that my predecessor probably spent time yesterday going over the lesson plan for the semester. However, owing to the difficulties involved in bringing in a new teacher with a different schedule, a new one will have to be drafted. So for now, I'm going to be spending the time trying to get to know all of you wonderful students, such as you(indicating Mitch), you(indicating Dave) and -". He tried pointing to Britney, only to see an empty chair. "I see we have a missing person today?"
It was Mitch who decided to field that one. "Britney told me to tell you, well not you, but you get what I mean, that she had to go and see a friend at the train station. She's coming in from Panorama City."
Outside Panorama City, 2011
Stoica had just left Vanger back in 2017 to see to his failed scheme. Now she would proceed to win over her acquired target in this period. Finding him didn't take long. Her target, a young man named Lee, was standing outside someone's farm, about to smash the fence in a rage. He was dressed in an overcoat and a Stetson hat. "What's the matter, darling?", she asked in a faux-sweet tone.
"Nothing seems to be going my way at all.", was the answer she received. "I drop out of school, I get kicked off the swim team, and I get turned down at a kindergarten. Now the old coot who runs this place says that he doesn't want help any more. Everyone calls me a loser, with no chance of going anywhere in life." He smashed his clenched fist against the fence. "I'll show them what I can do. I'll show them ALL!"
"Well said.", was Stoica's reply. "I can help you go somewhere you can succeed, with everyone who ever belittled you crushed beneath your heel." She pulled out a Dark Power Cog. "And all you have to do is accept the power I give you. The Power of a Samurai."
Lee, his eyes clenched shut with anguish, stood up and turned around towards her general direction. "Okay, I'll do it. Just give me the power already."
"Ok then." Stoica put the Cog inside him. "And if you see people matching these profiles,(she transmitted images of Mitch, Dave and Britney into his brain through telepathy) I want you to destroy them."
Elsewhere, a red ranger had finished saving a child from a group of red, tentacled creatures in yellow tunics. Then he felt strange, with his powers vanishing. Then he simply dismissed the whole experience as a headache and walked home.
Britney was standing outside the ticket office, where she and her pen pal had agreed to meet. She had no way to announce her presence other than a sign with the name of the person who she was waiting for. Admittedly that made her seem more like a cab driver than a waiting friend, but she hadn't sent any photos of herself in any of the letters. None of them had looked good at all. Luckily when the pen pal came out of the terminal, Britney was able to recognise her from her pictures and shouted to point out the sign. "Hey, Emily. Over here."
Emily heard the call and replied. "Oh, So YOU'RE Britney. It's so nice to finally see you. Sorry I'm late out, but this station didn't have any warning signs."
Britney was confused by this statement. "I thought there was a sign saying "Danger: No Pushing"." But then she dismissed it. "They probably just took it down since I was last here."
Emily was concerned. "Now that you mention it, a couple of signs have been going missing in Panorama City lately, mainly stop signs."
"Never mind that now.", Britney interjected. "So tell me, how's Serena doing?"
But as the two continued to speak, Lee walked out of the terminal. In the 8 years since he had received his powers, he had been learning to use them to their fullest potential. He needed to steal words from signs and books to use his powers adequately. But having moved on to Diablo Grove, he had discovered one of the 3 targets that he had been told to destroy was right there in front of him. "Well now, little lady. If you're not gonna bother being discreet, then neither will I." He transformed into his Altranger form, a red-skinned creature with five horns on his face; three pointing upwards, two pointing downwards. He also had a permanent growl expression on his face. He pulled a pistol from his tattered belt and loaded the word "danger" into it. He then fired it at one of the pillars.
Suddenly, the whole building started to shake. "Is that an earthquake? In this part of the country?", Emily asked, frightened.
"I don't think so.", Britney responded. Then she noticed several red-tendriled creatures in yellow robes and brown armour, seemingly emerging from the walls. "I think those guys might have something to do with this. I'd better see where they're going."
"Wait, this could be dangerous.", Emily tried to warn. But Britney had already started running and Morphing. "Looks like it's the day I've been waiting for."
Across town, in Mitch and Dave's class, one of the students in the back heard his phone get an alert. Gray was annoyed at this. "Mr. Higgins, we are supposed to put our phones on silent during lesson time."
"Sorry, Mr. Gray." The boy replied. "But I just got a news update. Apparently, some kind of horned freak and a load of spaghetti-headed monsters are attacking the train station."
Gray took this in. Curse that Brotherhood of Chronos. They couldn't even wait until these dumb kids got had recess to stage an attempt to put an Altranger in charge. He'd have to get his Liege and his dumb friend out of class so they could investigate. "Mr. Withers, you and your friend have to go to the Storage Closet to mop up this mess I made." To prevent anyone's from discovering the truth, he dropped the glass jug of water on the floor… along with several exam papers leftover from the previous semester. "And please take as much time as you need. I wouldn't want your task to go off the rails."
Mitch nodded in understanding and dragged Dave out of class with him. "What was that about?", Dave said, confused. "He told us to clear that mess up before he actually made it."
"You really aren't too bright, are you?", Mitch sighed. "We have to help Britney at the station, your reservations be damned."
At the station, Britney had followed the red creatures to their master, who she figured (correctly) was an Altranger. She heard him talking. "Now then, you Moogers work for me now. Any of you bubs want to walk out, y'all welcome to." Apparently this guy fancied himself as a bit of cowboy. One of the "Moogers" tried to walk away, only for the Altranger to shoot him in the back. Only instead of killing him, it seemed to freeze him solid. "Any more of you punks feel lucky?" Apparently, none of them did, as they quickly fell into line. Britney was so startled that she didn't realised that there was a misplaced bar nearby until she'd accidentally touched it, making an audible noise that alerted the enemy. "Someone's nearby. Go get 'em boys."
Britney pulled out her Tiger Bo and proceeded to fight off the Moogers. "These guys are tough, but I'm the only thing keeping Emily and all these other people safe.", she said to no-one in particular. As she finished talking, Emily came up to the battle, but before Britney could tell her to get to safety, Emily picked up the discarded pipe and began fighting off Moogers with it. "Emily, how did you get so good with a pipe?", Britney asked, surprised.
"I'm one-sixteenth Japanese, on my mother's side.", was the answer Emily explained. "She always made sure that me and my sister trained for some threat that supposedly appeared every 25 years. But then one day, 20 years ago, a man came to our door. He told me that she and her team had succeeded in locking them away forever, but most of them wouldn't be coming back, including her. I didn't believe it, but I kept up my training, in case the evil that took my mother away came back."
It was then that Mitch and Dave, now Morphed as well, showed up. "Sorry we're late. We had to wait for an excuse to come here.", Mitch said, before he noticed Emily. "I assume this is the friend you were going to meet."
It was then that Ignaroma seemed to realise she wasn't involved in this story yet, so she butted in over the comms. "Oh sure, just go and blow the fact that Britney is a Power Ranger to a total stranger, why don't you?"
"She already knew, Ignaroma.", Britney interjected. "I kinda morphed in front of her eyes. Come to think of it, I'm surprised she didn't show more of a reaction."
"That's because I already saw it happen.", Emily replied, calmly pulling out a Power Cog. "Back in 2011, when you gave me this to hold on to and told me who you were. That's why I became your friend: because I already knew I would."
"Can we cut the chit-chat and get back to the battle?", the Altranger growled. "I don't have all day."
"Ignaroma, take us to 2011.", Britney requested over the comms, before turning to Emily. "What day did we meet again?"
"January 24th"
"Roger that.", Ignaroma responded, beaming them up to the Nexus Hub. "By the way, Dave and Britney, your Zords are now up and running in case you need them." With that information imparted, they set off.
Outside Panorama City, 2011
Stoica had just finished converting her darling little victim into an Altranger, when she saw the Rangers' Nexus Hub appeared in the sky. "Drat, and I hadn't even come up with a name for you yet. Oh well, Giga-Drones!" She threw a set of figures into the air, hitting them with her growth disc.
"I'll need a few more cattle to wrangle those Rangers, missy.", the new Altranger grunted. He loaded a "help wanted" sign into his pistol, firing it at the ground. This opened up a crack through which a group of Moogers appeared. "This should even the odds."
"That's not evening the odds.", Mitch commented. He pulled out the Ninja Steel Cog and inserted it into his QuartzMorpher. A pair of clock hands appeared, with the minute hand pointed towards 7 o'clocK and the hour hand pointed at one. Then a seconds hand appeared, pointing towards eleven. "It's Morphin' Time! Ninja Steel!" Ninja Star patterns appeared on the left side of his body and the sides of his helmet, with his belt and gloves beings swapped out. "THIS is evening the odds."
"Good idea.", Britney said, locking her new Power Cog into her QuartzMorpher. "Go! Go! Samurai!" The same clock hands appeared, now positioned for 1:30:55. Japanese symbols, particularly Romaji, with some Katakana gratuitously mixed in. Finally, the kanji for "Earth" appeared on the sides of her helmet. "This is sweet."
And thus the fighting began in earnest. Mitch went after Stoica and the Giga-Drones. "Element Star! Ninja Earth Attack!" He pushed the Star Blade into the ground, causing dirt to spurt out and knock the robots back.
"Ew, you got some in my nails.", Stoica moaned. "Okay, no more Miss Nice Alien." She pulled an axe from her holster and crossed with Mitch. "You're really starting to get on my nerves."
"I guess I just have a thing for dishing out dirt onto people.", Mitch snarked.
Dave went after the Moogers. "Okay, So you were the minions for the Samurai Rangers' enemies. And since they've been erased, you should've taken over the world in my era. But since my memories arent conflicting or anything…." He stopped to call Ignaroma. "Has the present changed, or am I just overthinking this hole thing?"
"You're overthinking it.", Ignaroma yelled. "Since I didn't make it clear to you before, I'll do it now. When the Legendary Rangers are erased by the Brotherhood of Chronos, History corrects itself to erase the sources of conflicts as well. Most of those villains may exist, but in the new version of casualty, they never threatened Earth."
Dave was happy to hear this. "Then, in that case, I don't have to worry about what we're dong in taking the powers of Legendary Rangers. Now I can face down these creeps and beat them." But they had already run off while he was distracted.
Meanwhile, the Altranger was fighting Britney. "You're pretty good at fighting for a girl.", he commented.
"Hey, less of the inappropriate gender discrimination.", Britney yelled at him. She pulled a yellow disc from her belt, inserted it onto the sword she was wielding and set it spinning. "Spin Sword, Earth Slicer!"
Mitch and Dave looked up towards her. "Ok, let's sync up.", they both said as they pressed their sync buttons. Their new appearances matched Britney's, only Mitch's symbols translated to "fire", while Dave's could be deciphered as "water". They then called for their Samurai forms' weapons.
"Fire Smasher!"
"Hydro Bow!"
Mitch folded his Fire Smasher into cannon mode, after which Britney placed her Earth Slicer in the ammo slot and Dave positioned the Hydro Bow behind the latter's weapon. "Let's see him stand up to this." Dave fired, sending the Earth Slicer spinning into the Altranger, blowing him to pieces.
"Well now, that's disappointing.", Stoica commented. She pulled out and locked her growth disc into her gauntlet. "Don't worry, I'll make you all better." She fired her disc at the remains of her servant, restoring him as a giant. "I'll leave the rest to you.", she said as she teleported back to base.
The Rangers, seeng the giant Altranger, decided to call their Zords. "Red Launcher, deploy!"
"Blue Skimmer, deploy!"
"Yellow Roller, deploy!"
In addition to Mitch's falcon-themed jet, a whale-themed hovercraft and a tiger-themed ground vehicle appeared, which were occupied by Dave and Britney respectively. "Ok, I think we should try and combine these bad boys.", Mitch suggested.
"Ok.", thenother two replied. All three depressed a lever on their consoles. Red Launcher once again assumed its warrior mode, only this time the right arm and left legs were still folded back. Blue Skimmer reconfigured itself into a blade and attached itself as an arm. Yellow Roller folded the back half of itself upwards, so that it could connect as the new leg. Then, a circular area on the head turned a pointed area 90 degrees anti-clockwise, deploying a helmet that covered all but its face.
"Battleforce Megazord: Speed-Blade Formation, Assembly Complete!"
"Whoop-de-doo." You got yerselves a fancy robot there. It's cute, but it ain't gonna make a difference.", the Altranger commented. He then started attacking.
"Let's show him why this is called speed mode.", Mitch said to the others, before all of them clutched their joysticks. This allowed the Megazord to easily avoid most of his attacks, while getting a few in of its own. "Now let's finish this guy." The Megazord accelerated towards the Altranger and slashed at him with the sword-arm. "Speed-Blade Slash! Final Attack!"
The slashes hit the Altranger, blowing him up, leaving only a confused Lee and a Power Cog, which Britney left down to pick up. "I'll make sure that this gets to Emily.", she yelled towards the others before heading off.
"Should we tell her that Gray is moonlighting as our teacher now?", Dave asked.
"Nah, let's wait 'til we get back to class to see her face.", Mitch answered, eagerly awaiting THAT expression on her face.
Hi guys, its me again. I just want to say that if you want to submit a chapter to the story, then the rules are up on this story's Ao3 page. There is also a list of characters that i have reserved for my next 3 contributed chapters. I hope you send in any submissions soon.
