They arrived in a vast chamber, its size and featurelessness momentarily reminding Fred of the Angel Grove High gym. The dimensions here were several times greater, however, and the room seemed filled with row after row of standing, silent Quantrons.
Fred had time to register this much before the Blue Psycho Ranger used the chain of his cuffs to virtually fling him into the first row of tin men, two of which caught him by the arms.
"You two take the prisoner to the operating table in the lab and secure him there," the evil Ranger ordered. Reaching out he touched the manacles again and they dissolved in a flare of blue light. "Don't injure him any more than necessary and wait with him until I return."
"Yes, my lord," the two Quantrons responded in unison as they stepped forward, frogmarching Fred between them.
The robots maneuvered Fred toward a metal door that slid aside at their approach while Psycho Blue turned his attention to the other Quantrons.
"The rest of Legion One and Legions Two through Four will teleport with me to the rebel base. It consists of a cave carved into a mountain and the Megaship. One, you'll cover the northern end of the valley, Two the southern end. Three, you'll head for the caves. Four will board the Megaship with me. Do everything you can not to damage the ship, but kill anything human. No other prisoners."
Quantrons possessed greater than human strength, yet these two still almost lost their grip on Fred when the teenager abruptly tried to throw himself backwards. He screamed obscenities at the thing, the monster, but the only reaction he received was the calm ordering of two more Quantrons out of line, to assist those already holding him.
Against all four of them Fred couldn't hope to break free, yet he never stopped trying as they dragged him out of the room and down a corridor of polished metal, through three junctions and at last into a room with two workbenches laden with strange technological devices and pieces thereof.
At the far end of the room was a table almost identical to the ones that finished and repaired Quantrons used, except this one was fitted out with restraining clamps for the hands and feet. The robots wrestled him onto the smooth, cool surface and secured him there. In the process the backwards bill of his cap struck the surface of the table and it was knocked off his head, falling to the ground.
Once he was trapped the Quantrons each took up a position at a corner of the table and simply stood there, not responding to anything he said. Gradually his adrenaline-assisted frenzy faded and he was left to contemplate the full extent of the catastrophe he had caused.
Karen, his best friend and crush for the last year and a half, was dead. He'd only gotten a glimpse of her face before he turned his gaze away, but the horrific image of her staring, empty blue eyes and of the hole burned through her forehead would haunt him for the rest of his days. It was the last way he would've wanted to remember her, but it was the way he would.
T.J., too, was dead. His mentor and the leader of the rebellion, the one who had given them all hope, had been murdered and the only mercy involved was that Fred hadn't had to view his corpse as well.
At this very moment everyone else at camp was fighting and most likely dying. There wasn't even the possibility of evacuating in the ship under cloak as had been planned for an emergency, since the cloaking device had been disabled.
In his mind's eye he saw the faces of all those who had fought by his side, laughed with him, and lived with him. All of the heroes, young and old, who were willing to risk their lives to try to free Earth from Dark Specter's domination.
He'd killed them.
It had been his decision to approach Justin. He was the one who had argued, against Karen's recommendation, that they should bring the teen to T.J.. All of this, ALL OF IT, was his fault!
When they had been poised on the very edge of victory he had destroyed the rebellion and with it perhaps humanity's last hope.
The reality of what he had done was almost too much for him to bear. He wept. He screamed. He strained against the clamps until his wrists ached and beyond.
Whatever tortures this sick freak had in mind for him . . . he deserved them, and worse.
An eternity dragged by before the four Quantrons abruptly turned as one to face the front of the room.
"Go out in the hall and wait there," a human voice commanded. The Quantrons immediately complied and another figure moved into Fred's field of view.
Justin Stewart no longer wore his Psycho Ranger armor. He had changed into shorts and a muscle shirt, both garments so dark blue they were almost black. He was smiling, his eyes sparkling and his movements exuberant as he strode up to the side of the table. He looked like an ordinary, athletic teenager, one who had perhaps just scored the winning touchdown in a vigorous pick-up game of football.
Except what he'd really been doing was slaughtering Fred's friends.
Knowing it was useless Fred strained against his metal restraints anyway, his sole desire to close his hands around that tanned throat. Once that happened he would not let go until one of them was dead.
"You're not going to break them, Fred. You're only hurting yourself," the teen observed with a sympathy Fred could only consider grotesque.
"You worthless traitor! How could you do this?!" Fred screamed.
"Through the miracles of technology!" Justin answered snarkily. "Do you want to hear the story, or do you want to try to snap steel some more?"
What Fred wanted was to kill this abomination. The utter loathing he felt for himself paled in comparison to the seething hatred he had for Justin.
As he glared at his captor, though, he remembered something T.J. had told him during his first week at the rebel camp.
"Gather all the information you can before acting, Fred. The more knowledge you have, the greater your chances of success."
It had been good advice then, and it was good advice now. If this gloating SOB wanted to chat, then he'd be a fool to turn down the opportunity. Even knowing this, what came out of his mouth was, "Why should I listen to you? Everything you've told me was a lie!"
"It was not!" Justin protested. "I told you the truth as much as I could. Always stick as close as you can to the truth when you're lying, Fred. It makes it a lot harder for anybody to prove what you're saying is false, you don't risk messing up your story by forgetting the lies you've already told, and you've got a lot better chance at fooling people who're good at sensing deception."
A sly smile slipped across the adolescent's face. "And annoying as it is to have to wait to kill your enemies, it's a whole lot of fun to trick them that way. You should try it sometime."
"Is that why you did all this? For fun?!" Fred spat out.
"In a way," Justin conceded, his tone light with amusement. "Remember how T.J said I'd saved the Astros? I could only do that because a sentient jeep named Storm Blaster brought me there. I met him when I was a Turbo Ranger and somehow he could track me, no matter where I was. The Astro Rangers got captured trying to protect him, but he got away and came for me. I saved the Astro Rangers' lives, and I told them before I left that I'd always be there when they needed me."
"They never tried to get in touch with me again," Justin declared flatly. Now the amusement was gone from his voice. "But one person didn't forget about me: Astronema. Turns out she was the sister of Andros, the Red Ranger. When she found that out she went over to the Astros, but she got captured and her mind was cybernetically altered. That was while they were moving Zordon around to keep him away from the Astros. At one point they even had his tube sitting in Dark Specter's massive throne room on Eltar."
The names Zordon and Eltar meant nothing to Fred, but he didn't want to interrupt to ask for a clarification.
"After Dark Specter's army took Eltar and built his palace they set up some special trophies of their conquest: the remains of the Robot Rangers, androids modeled on the second Turbo team. When Astronema saw them on display there she noticed they still had their morphers and that's when she came up with the idea of creating a group of Rangers for the UAE."
"The power source for the Turbo Morphers was already on Eltar to begin with, but Astronmea wanted to go beyond just Turbo level warriors. She wanted to make sure the UAE's Rangers were the strongest in the galaxy! So she took the morphers to Dark Specter, Zedd, Finster, Klank and a few others. Together they modified and enhanced these beauties, using both magic and science. When that was done the only thing left was getting the right people to wear the morphers, people who had the skills needed to be Rangers."
"Like I said, she remembered me and how I rode to the rescue on Storm Blaster. She devoted a lot of resources to locating and recapturing Storm Blaster. Once she did they extracted my location from his data banks. He didn't survive the process."
Was that actually sorrow he heard in the bastard's voice?! Over some kind of souped-up vehicle?!
"Darkonda handled the next part, because it was something he had experience in. He was waiting for me when I got home from school. I didn't even have a chance to morph. He brought me to the Dark Fortress and they cybernetically altered me, too."
Come on! He couldn't seriously expect Fred to believe this, could he?
"You're telling me you're being mind-controlled?"
"Not the way you probably think. The device doesn't dictate my actions, but it has altered my emotions and it keeps them in that changed state. For example, I don't have a conscience anymore; I haven't felt guilty about a single thing I've done since the day they kidnapped me."
"And I just don't give a damn about humanity or other people, not the way I used to. I care a lot more about ME now! And of course the initial alteration put my aggression and bloodlust through the roof. There's a reason they named us the Psycho Rangers, Fred," Justin finished with self-satisfied smirk.
"So you sold out the whole human race and murdered your friends because you felt like it?" the teenage captive sneered.
"They weren't my friends anymore!" Justin snapped. He clenched his fists, his body virtually vibrating with tension. Then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and visibly relaxed. He circled around to Fred's left and rested a hand on the wrist manacle there.
"If I let you go, would you kill me?" he asked in a casually conversational tone.
"Try it and find out," Fred urged in a low voice.
"You would," Justin replied with a chuckle. "Even though I'm an innocent victim. Remember, I was kidnapped and my mind was altered against my will. None of what I've done is my fault, Fred."
"You still killed T.J.! You killed Karen! You deserve to die!"
"Not by the standards of human justice. Anyway, if you could short-circuit the cybernetic neural net in my head I'd be back on your side. We captured the Megaship intact. If I wanted I could go there, get T.J.'s virus, teleport to China and accomplish his Endgame plan in five freaking minutes! I could save the world, Fred. In fact I might be the only one left who could still save it! Knowing that, would you still kill me if you had the chance?"
What the hell was this?! He'd been expecting physical torture, but at the moment his captor seemed more interested in playing mindgames. Did he really expect an answer?
And what was the answer? It was true that as a Psycho Ranger no one would question what Justin did. He really could put T.J.'s plan into action, but even if the circuitry in his head could somehow be disabled, how could Fred ever stand to work with him? How could he even allow Justin to live, after what he'd done, altered mind or not? Didn't all of the people Justin had murdered deserve to be avenged?
"See? I'm your last chance and you still can't bring yourself to say you wouldn't kill me. That's not logic guiding you, Fred; it's pure emotion. Emotion is what makes us get up out of bed in the morning, what drives us, what motivates us! Change someone's feeling and you change the person. That's why the last thing my implant did was modify my feelings toward the Astro Rangers, especially T.J. I've been waiting over two years to kill him, and I can't begin to tell you how good it felt to finally do it!"
He smiled happily and Fred stared up at him in utter loathing.
"Anyway, once I'd had the cybernetics added I steered Astronema to the rest of the team. I knew where Tommy was because we'd been writing to each other-"
"Tommy? Not Tommy Oliver?" Fred interrupted pleadingly.
"Who do you think Psycho Red is, Fred? The Psycho Rangers ARE the first Turbo team. The A-List, not the second string B-Listers they stuck me with when they left. Tommy and the others were more experienced, more skilled and once they got the Psycho Morphers a whole lot more powerful! I knew together we wouldn't have any trouble taking down the Astros."
"Though what happened was actually the Astro Rangers' own fault. If they hadn't been so incompetent that they needed to be saved by a fourteen year-old I never would have gotten on Astronema's radar. If they'd ever bothered to keep in touch with me afterwards they would have realized I'd been kidnapped and maybe they could have done something about it before Darkonda and I were able to abduct the others. They killed themselves, really," he concluded with a shrug.
How could he not want to kill this monster?! Justin's callous words, however, made Fred think back to the exchange between the Psycho Ranger and Karen when they'd first met.
"Like Lt. Stone killed himself?" he threw out.
Justin snorted in response. "Stone killed himself in more ways than one! I had him under long-range surveillance after he recruited me, to cover all my bases. The night before he was supposed to tell me where to go he phoned information, got the number and called my Dad! I don't know what the hell he was thinking, breaking security like that! I know they were friends when Dad lived here, but that's no excuse! Anyway, the instant he mentioned my name of course Dad started breaking down and asking if he'd seen me, saying I'd disappeared years ago. By the time the Quantron on duty let me know what was happening it was too late. I had a squad teleported directly to his house to snatch him, but he put a bullet in his head before they could stop him. Then I had to send a squad to grab Dad because he knew too much."
"You kidnapped your own father?!"
"He wasn't hurt. I'm going to let him go soon, but I couldn't have him coming to Angel Grove and blowing my cover. I'd worked too hard to find you guys!"
"And I had you, before Stone's stupidity! After that the only thing I could think of was to start roving around where I thought you were in the hopes that I'd stumble on you. It was a long shot, but I didn't have any other choice; I knew Dark Specter wasn't going to let me stay here much longer, not given the situation in the rest of the galaxy."
"What situation?" Fred asked. Here at last was something he desperately needed to know. T.J. had been certain that Dark Specter was involved in a war. Now he could find out whether that was true, whether there was any hope of liberation from offworld, since he and Justin had destroyed all hope of humanity freeing itself.
"Dark Specter thought that the death of Zordon and the conquest of Earth would cow the other free planets. He figured he could dominate the most of the rest of the worlds with barely a battle being fought."
"He was wrong."
"Zordon became a martyr and most of the advanced civilizations joined together in an alliance called the Galactic League of Light. A few months after the Conquest their first official action was to retake Eltar, in Zordon's memory, and that was the source of the Turbo portion of our powers!"
"So we were weakened at the very time we needed to be strong. It took months for the UAE to find a new power source which would compensate for what we lost with Eltar, and it wasn't like Dark Specter could simply retake the planet with Quantrons in the meantime; he'd already thrown his entire army at Earth. The rest of the UAE gave it a shot, but they were defeated. Then things got worse."
"Billy," he spat out the name, "was with the initial invading force. He saw the throne room and he took the remains of the Robot Rangers back to Aquitar. Somehow he managed to repair them and get them back on the front lines. And he keeps frigging upgrading them, every time we turn around! Last time Robot Ashley nailed us with her sonic scream, T.J. almost broiled us with his inbuilt plasma guns and my android picked up an entire downed fighter and threw it at me!"
If anything ever could have made Fred smile again, that might have. Quantron fighter craft weighed around four tons.
"I think we could take them if we could just face them one-on-one, but they're never alone! The Aquitan Rangers are always with them. It's ten against five, and when the Phantom Ranger or any of the others join them . . ."
Justin paced around the table, leaving Fred's line of sight momentarily.
"Even calling in and making all the monsters we could hasn't given us enough advantage. We did manage to take out the Blue Senturion and from what I've heard the surprise attack on Triforia got the Gold Ranger, but they've captured Divatox and scrapped Sprocket! When we lost Divatox we lost almost her entire force of Piranhatrons!"
"Why not side with your own people then? You said you can complete Endgame. Do that and you can still be on the winning side as a hero!"
The words sickened Fred even as he spoke them, but there was no choice. T.J. was right. When you made a mistake, even a catastrophic one, you had to try to fix it as soon as possible. You did whatever you needed to, no matter how much it cost you.
Of course he had no intention of letting this traitor escape justice, but Justin didn't have to know that.
The teenager looming over him was actually laughing as he came back into Fred's field of vision.
"Nice try, Fred, but the UAE has a lot more to offer me than the GLL does. As the Blue Psycho Ranger I'm one of the most powerful people in the galaxy and I can get virtually anything I want! We're treated like royalty and we still get to fight. It's like . . . it's like being a warrior prince!" Justin finished triumphantly.
"So you enjoy your role as Dark Specter's lapdog?" Fred jeered in frustration.
Justin's face hardened, and at last the image of an ordinary teen fully faded away, to reveal the stone-cold killer beneath.
"Not lapdog, Fred; war dog. That's what the Psycho Rangers were meant to be. We were made to hunt down the Astro Rangers and then savage whoever else Dark Specter sicced us on. All the bloodlust and hate they gave us made us easy to direct, but I knew those feelings would only get in the way of catching T.J."
"It wasn't easy getting back to Earth," Justin declared, turning his back on Fred as he continued to speak. "I had to call in every chit I had to convince Dark Specter to let me come back and root out the rebellion before you did something really bad, like damaging our supply of Quantrons or hooking up somehow with the League. Eventually, though, he agreed to make me the temporary leader of Earth's counter-insurgency forces. I intensified aerial survelliance, had the likely Californian targets booby-trapped and took half a dozen other counter-measures, but I knew the best shot I had of finding you was through being recruited."
"Astronema wouldn't let us reveal ourselves to the Astros the way we wanted to. She ordered us to show them our identities only if they had us on the ropes and we needed to make them hesitate. She was being way over-cautious! You haven't experienced real power, Fred, until you've morphed into a Psycho Ranger! They never had a chance."
"Because we'd never shown them who we were, though, I figured I could work my way into the rebellion. The only catch was that I had machinery sticking out all over my face! You've seen Astronema on TV, right? That's what we all looked like under our helmets. So I got to work with the Machine Empire and we miniaturized everything so that it could be implanted in my skull. For the new neural net I also knew I'd have to seriously downgrade my bloodlust and aggression and up the empathy a bit or I never could have passed for a normal person."
"After the surgery Rita used magic to heal me and regrow my hair. Magic might not be worth much for changing someone mentally, not on a permanent basis, but I gotta admit it's great for speeding up biological processes."
"I was all set to have my old alterations reinstalled and these new ones removed afterward, but I've changed my mind. I'm thinking so much more clearly now without all of that rage clouding my mind. That's how I had the idea about you, Fred," Justin said, turning around to look down at Fred again.
"What idea about me?" Fred asked. He wouldn't have thought he could feel any worse than he did, but there was something about the way Justin was looking at him . . .
"If things had been a little different you could have been the one standing here in my place, Fred. Do you realize that?"
Of course he did! He'd realized it almost from the moment Justin had told him the story of becoming a Turbo Ranger. But whereas yesterday that thought had provoked wistful envy, now it brought nothing more than nausea.
"You're more than qualified to be a Ranger! You're great at the martial arts, you're brave, you're mentally and emotionally tough, and I've seen for myself that you never stop fighting. You deserved to be a Ranger, but they abandoned you, even more than they did me. I won't make the same mistake."
"What are you talking about?" Fred whispered, a terrible presentiment of doom stealing over him.
"Why do you think I told you what was going on? We're outmatched right now. We need help. We need a sixth Ranger, and that's you, Fred."
"No. NO! I'll never join you!" Fred screamed at the top of his lungs.
"You will, you know," Justin contradicted him gently. "I just finished talking with Dark Specter before I came in here and he approved it. And when the process is over, you'll thank me for it."
"I'll kill myself first!" Fred fervently swore.
That got more of a reaction than anything Fred had said so far. A genuine look of alarm appeared on Justin's face and turning his head he shouted for the Quantrons.
"Yes, my lord?" an electronic voice questioned.
"Retake your positions around the table," Justin instructed. "Keep the prisoner from injuring himself in any way. That is your task until I say differently."
Bending over, Justin scooped up Fred's cap and set it on the table beside his head.
"Sorry, Fred. I was going to bring you dinner, but it looks like we can't risk turning you loose until after the operation. I'll make sure you get intravenous feeding within the next hour. It should only be a couple of days before your neural net and morpher will both be ready."
As Justin departed Fred made a promise to himself. He would spend however long he had left focusing every ounce of his energy on feeling the way he did now, on holding onto his soul. He knew what was coming and forewarned was forearmed. This was his last chance to redeem himself, to keep from becoming a monster like Justin. He wasn't about to waste it.
ΩΩΩΩΩ
Still complaining about being used as a healer/hair regrower Rita exited the room and headed toward the teleporter, leaving Fred and Justin alone. The dark-haired teen should be waking up any- ah!
Fred's eyes fluttered open. He sat up, no longer restrained by the manacles. His eyes immediately focused on the Blue Psycho Ranger.
"How do you feel?" Justin asked.
"Like I want my morpher," Fred said bluntly. "Is it in there?" he asked, pointing to the long metal case Justin had taken from the nearby work bench.
"This is your morphing device," the teenage genius confirmed, opening the lid a little reluctantly. He had thought they would use the spare Blue Turbo morpher for Fred, the one from his android duplicate. That had been his idea, but Dark Specter had a different plan. He had instead modified the recently captured staff of the Gold Ranger, adding greatly to the energy within and at the same time making it more compatible for a human wielder. Given what Justin had seen of the Gold Ranger in action, there was no question whatsoever that Fred was going to be by far the strongest Psycho Ranger in existence. Which was a little worrying, and made Justin glad he'd added the extra emotional alteration to Fred's neural net.
Reaching in Fred took out the staff and in an instant he was wearing the black and gold armor of the Gold Psycho Ranger. For a handful of seconds he stood still, undoubtedly overwhelmed by the sheer ecstasy of the vast power he now possessed. Then he turned to Justin and punched the seventeen year-old in the stomach.
All the breath went out of him in a whoosh as he doubled over, the sudden pain paralyzing him. He felt himself fly into the wall, his back smacking up against it and he dropped wheezing to the floor.
What had gone wrong?! How could this be happening, especially with the program he'd added? He tried to reach for his morpher, but Fred's shadow was already falling over him. He raised his eyes to take in his attacker, who stood looming over him.
"That was for sucker punching me back at the ship," Fred sneered proudly down at Justin. "No one fucking does that to Fred Kelman, the Gold Psycho Ranger!"
Though still having trouble catching his breath, Justin laughed as Fred extended a white-gloved hand downward and he grasped it in his own.
ΩΩΩΩΩ
Something had gone wrong.
That was the only conclusion Cassie could draw. According to the schedule they'd worked out T.J. and the Megaship should have landed in the field yesterday. If everything was still going as planned he would have been there.
So she knew a problem had come up but she didn't know what it was or how bad it was and the uncertainty was almost driving her out of her mind. For once she was glad that it took so much concentration to properly assemble Quantrons, as it at least gave her a distraction from her omnipresent worry.
Her first instinct was to find transport back to Angel Grove and then head to camp, but then there was every chance she would miss them in transit. She had to give them a least a couple more days.
It didn't help that this was the longest she and T.J. had been apart since they got together. He had been her friend since they became Rangers, but now he was so much more. She didn't know how she had managed to go so long without seeing him. If anything had happened to him . . .
Focus, Cassie chided herself. Focus on the task at hand. There were harsh penalties for everyone if any factory worker was found "sabotaging" the Quantrons and it was all too easy for the overseers to deem a simple error to be an act of sabotage.
When the shift change bell rang Cassie actually jumped. Quickly finishing the installation of the microprocessor she rose to join the human throng exiting the factory.
Maybe whatever had gone wrong had been worked out, she told herself as the trudged toward the exit. Maybe when she went by the field tonight she would find T.J., the Megaship and the entire resistance waiting for her.
Cassie stumbled as the short, stout woman to her left abruptly swerved into her, throwing her off balance. She realized that everyone was veering right as they reached the door, shying away from the figure standing just to the left of the entrance.
A figure wearing the gold and black armor of a Psycho Ranger.
No! The Psycho Rangers hadn't been seen on Earth for over a year! They couldn't be back, not now, not here! And this wasn't one of those the Astros had fought. Had new Psycho Rangers been created?!
His helmet was moving slowly as he looked over every face in the crowd. Cassie froze as the helmet turned toward her and stopped.
Then the Ranger was moving, pushing his way through a crowd which melted before him, opening a path to his target. Cassie grabbed for her morpher, but he was already on top of her, seizing her wrist in a painful grip of iron.
"Cassie, it's me!" he hissed and she paused in total confusion. The words weren't spoken in the machine-like tones of a Psycho Ranger; it was a real, human voice. More than that, it was a voice she knew.
"F-Fred?" she asked in utter disbelief.
"Don't ask any questions! Just tell me, is there anyplace we can go to talk? One where the guards won't be watching?"
There were a thousand questions Cassie wanted to ask, but instead of posing them she answered Fred's question.
"The southern loading bay should be empty right now."
He virtually dragged her all the way there, his punishingly tight hold never loosening. When they arrived at the closed doors he finally released her.
"Fred! Why are you dressed like that? What the hell is going on?" she demanded, gently cradling the wrist she was certain was bruised right down to the bone. "Where's T.J.?"
"T.J.'s dead, Cassie, and so is everyone else. You and I are all that's left of the resistance," Fred asserted, and just like that Cassandra Chan's entire world shattered.