Chapter 06

"So if you want to go after the orange ranger, why are we wasting so much time watching her?" Zedd demanded, looking over at Rita. She was sitting in front of her telescope, looking down at Earth, a pensive look on her face. "At this point we could have her and would be in the middle of training her to destroy the power rangers."

"You underestimate me, Zeddy," Rita replied. "Why do you think that I've been sending out some of my more…weak monsters?" She stood up and turned away from the telescope. "With their powers to be able to use the Thunderzords, they would be able to destroy them quickly."

"Get to the point!" Zedd snapped. He twisted his 'Z' scepter in his hand, impatiently pacing back and forth as he continued to look down on earth.

Down where all of those happy people lived. Down where they constantly went on with their lives, as if nothing was bothering them and nothing could ever happen to them. It made him sick just to think about it. They needed someone to take them over, to show them how things were supposed to go. Even if he and Rita manage to do just that, there was always going to be something that got in the way. If the new ranger was that something, they needed to get rid of her or brainwash her before it was too late. She was taking too long and a plan was already forming in his head.

"So I'm trying to see what her powers are like, whether or not she will go along with them," Rita said. She turned to face Zedd, a maliciously evil smile on her face. "It seems to me that she doesn't want to do this. She already has her other group of friends to deal with. I predict that having to go back and forth is eventually going to run her down. We can attack her then."

"And what do you propose that we do until that moment in time?" Zedd demanded.

"Continue to gauge her powers," Rita said calmly, though there was an annoyed edge to her tone. She glanced at her husband with a look of slight contempt. He crossed his arms back over his chest, waiting for her to further explain her plan. "But we need to keep the other rangers at bay, if we have to destroy them and keep the orange ranger, so be it. The world will be ours."

"And what sort of monster do you think will work this time?" Zedd continued. Rita hesitated in replying. There were so many objects and ideas that they had for monsters and they continued to be defeated each and every time. They needed to think of something else, something that would keep them busy for a long time. "Get out of my way!" Zedd pushed Rita back and stepped up to the barrier of the balcony.

"May I make a suggestion?" Rita and Zedd turned around to see Goldar standing behind them. He walked over to the balcony, his wings gently fluttering behind him. "I have been watching the rangers as you've asked. They all seem ready to welcome the orange ranger with open arms, but she seems hesitant to do the same in return. It might be best to separate her from the others to gauge her power before you take them on. Let me fight her!"

"What? You?!" Rita let out a loud cackle. "If you fought her, you know that the other rangers would stop you before you even got close."

"Please, allow me the honor!" Goldar continued.

"We'll save you for a last resort," Zedd snapped. "Let me think." He looked down on the earth. He got nauseous just watching all of those happy people walk around. There wasn't much interesting going on there, nothing that would be of importance to him. "Hmmm." Letting out a low humming sound, Zedd watched as a teenage girl and guy talked to each other, looking over a newspaper. Getting a closer look, he saw that they were looking at their horoscopes. "That's what I'll do!"

Zedd lifted his scepter and a red bolt of electricity shot down to earth. It crackled and sizzled for a few moments before it returned to the tower in thirteen bolts of lights. Once the lightning cleared, thirteen monsters stood in front of them, all made out from the signs of the zodiac as well as the idea of horoscopes in general; A ram, a bull, twins, a crab, a lion, a maiden, a set of scales, a scorpion, an archer, a goat, a water bearer, a fish, and a mage.

"These are the monsters that will keep the rangers busy as we take over the earth," Zedd explained. "These are the monsters that will destroy the power rangers once and for all!" He raised his scepter into the air and laughed evilly.

Trini sucked in a deep breath as she spread her arms out in front of her, and then slowly extended them out to her sides. She lifted her right leg, balancing on her left, and extended it out, stretching herself, lowering her body close to the ground. Once she felt that she stretched her legs enough, she brought herself back up into a standing position. Beside her the sound of someone crashing to the ground caught her attention. She looked over and laughed when she saw Billy lying on the ground on his back.

"You make Kata and all of the Praying Mantis Kun Fu seem a lot easier than it is," Billy said. He pushed his glasses up his nose, trying to catch his breath. Trini giggled and leaned over, grabbing onto his hand, pulling him to his feet. Her feet squished into the mat with the force of pulling him up.

"I should. I've been practicing it for years," Trini said. She patted Billy on the shoulder as he smiled. "It's not so hard, you've been improving. Working with Jason on martial arts has been helping you, too." She took a few steps away from him. "Now there's another move that I want to show you that I think could really help. But it needs a lot of balance and core strength, so don't be discouraged if you don't get it as quickly as you want."

Billy nodded. He pushed his glasses up his nose once more and watched as Trini moved through the poses and kicks of the fight move. He took the time to glance around Ernie's. It was as full as it usually was for a weekend, with smiling, laughing, and happy teenagers. It was a bit strange to be able to go through most of the day without some sort of an interruption from Rita and Zedd and their monsters. It was nice to be able to take a breather sometimes. It was times like these he wondered what it was like to still be a normal teenager, to not have to worry about monsters, and being attacked and the threat of being destroyed on a daily basis. It had been a while since all he thought about was school and his future education, his science experiments for fun, and tinkering with new inventions. Now he was constantly thinking of Rita and Zedd and what new weapons he could make or figure out the power source to their zords and accessories.

Sometimes he wondered if it was all worth it, not being able to live a normal life anymore, knowing that his family would be devastated if something happened to him while he was in battle.

"Billy, are you listening to me?" Trini waved a hand in front of Billy's face, hoping to get his attention. He blinked and looked at her, suddenly smiling. Trini frowned in concern. "Are you ok? You don't really seem like yourself."

"I'm fine," Billy said quickly. "I'm just…confused about a lot of things." Trini continued to gaze at him, silently urging him to continue. Billy waved her over to an empty table and the two sat down across from each other. He took a minute before continuing. "I don't understand why there was a need for another ranger. Not that I'm not glad that Avalon is now part of our team, but what could possibly be coming that she was needed? Would we not have been able to defeat Rita and Zedd on our own?" Trini nodded, understanding his concerns. "Then, of course, what sort of power can she bring to us? We already have Tommy's power of light, being the new white ranger and everything."

"Yeah, I get what you mean," Trini agreed. "What else could Rita and Zedd throw our way? What if they finally figure out a monster that we can't destroy and they do take over the earth?" She pulled her hair out of the yellow scrunchie that was holding it back and re-tied it. "I've been wondering the same things too. But you have to stay positive. With Avalon and Bailey, we can only hope that we can drive away Rita and Zedd for good."

"But there're still a lot of things that we don't know," Billy continued. "And the not knowing is what's bothering me."

"Billy." Trini reached out and grabbed onto his hand. "We're all in this together. You can't forget that we're a team and that we're going to be sure that we can protect earth to the best of our abilities." She squeezed his hand. "We're going to do this together, right?"

Billy smiled and nodded back. "Right."

"Hey guys!" Kimberly was all smiles as she weaved her way through Ernie's, moving around the tables that were close together. Her light pink, flowery sundress billowed around her as she went. She reached their table as Jason, Zack, and Tommy entered the local hang out behind her.

"Hey!" Trini let go of Billy's hand and stood up to give her a hug. "What's going on?"

"We thought that it would be a good idea to go and have a picnic in the park," Kimberly said. She looked at the boys behind her, who nodded in agreement, bright smiles on their faces as well. "Just take some time to relax and to have fun and to just hang out."

"And it'll also be a good time to explain to Avalon and Bailey everything that we've been through since Rita had first come back to earth," Tommy added. "So they can understand what's going on and how important they are to the team."

"It'll be a good time to get to know them as well," Jason agreed.

"And to put off our homework even more," Zack said. He laughed and Kimberly reached out, lightly hitting him on the arm. Trini smiled and pushed her chair in to the table as Billy stood up as well.

"That sounds like a great idea," she said. "Let's go!" The group started to walk out of Ernie's. Kimberly caught up with Trini and looped her arm through her best friend's. Trini gave a started laugh when she got a good look at the smile on Kimberly's face. "What? What's so funny?"

"I saw you holding hands with Billy," Kimberly said.

"Oh." Trini blushed. "That wasn't anything. We were just talking about everything with our powers and stuff," she explained. With a dismissive wave of her hand, she hoped to turn Kimberly's attention off of her. "It was nothing."

"I know what hand holding is like, and that was not 'nothing'," Kimberly insisted. She squeezed Trini's arm, leaning into her best friend's side. "You have to tell me everything later, ok?"

"Fine." Trini smiled.

…

..

.

Avalon ran a hand over her face, brushing off sea water. Sitting on a surfboard, she bobbed up and down in the water, watching as the waves rolled into the shower. On the beach, Bailey was sitting on a towel, her face shielded by a pair of large sunglasses. She was watching Avalon's stuff, while her sister was getting some surf practice in. Avalon glanced over her shoulder, watching to make sure that Bailey was still sitting on the towel. Her attention was turned back to the ocean when she heard a low rumbling sound. A wave was coming her way.

Smiling to herself, Avalon got down on her stomach, her coconut scented surf wax filling her nose, and started to power her arms through the water. A light spray came up around her as she continued to paddle her arms, going straight towards the wave. When she was close enough, she stuck her right arm in the water and powered her left one, turning herself around in a circle so that she was facing the shore. Once in position, she started to paddle again. Feeling the wave started to lift her up, she paddled harder and leapt to her feet. Shifting her right foot forward, Avalon moved her weight to the front of the board and went screaming down the face of the wave.

Her momentum picked up and she streaked down the bottom of the wave. Bending her knees, her body undulated along with the curve of the wave. Sticking her left arm into the wall of water, she angled herself up the wave and into the air. Grabbing the board with her right hand, she twisted it to the side, her top half going the other way, and let go, bending her knees as she landed back down. A spray of water hit her in the face, she sputtered a little but continued to ride the wave to the shore.

"Good job, Av!" Bailey cried. She was standing at the shore, hands cupped over her eyes as she waited. She was bouncing up and down on her toes in excitement. "I haven't seen you shred up an ace wave like that in a long time!"

"Thanks!" Avalon beamed, her surfboard tucked under her arm. She walked over to her towel and shoved the nose of the surfboard into the sand. Grabbing her long braid, she pulled it over her shoulder and wrung it out, purposefully getting Avalon wet. Bailey squealed and jumped back away from her, her cheeks sunburnt, standing red behind the blue tinted sunglasses. "You're such a wimp, Bay."

"Rack off, Av!" Bailey shoved her.

Avalon's laughter was cut short at the sound of her communicator going off. A chill went down her spine and she fell to her knees, digging through her bag for it. She pulled it out of the front pocket, glancing briefly at her pager and cell phone, hoping she didn't get any other messages from Chase or the others. Seeing that she didn't, she picked up her communicator and brought it up to her mouth.

"What's up?" She asked breathlessly.

"Avalon, can you come meet us in the park?" Zack's voice came over the communicator. "We need to talk to you and Bailey about some stuff."

"Alright, we'll be there soon," Avalon said. She turned to Bailey and started to pack up their things. "C'mon, the guys need us at the park. It might be a monster or something." Bailey hurriedly packed up their things beside her.

"But if it were a monster, wouldn't Zordon have contacted you?" Bailey brought up a good point. So far, whenever it was a monster attack, Zordon or Alpha would have let them know what was going on and where to go. But for all they knew, the command center could have been attacked by something.

"We won't know until we get there." Avalon pulled on a pair of jean shorts and a tie-front orange crop top over her bikini before grabbing her bag and towel, tucking her surfboard under her arm. "This way." She motioned over to the abandoned lifeguard stand that was further down the beach and the two hurried over. Once they were safely behind it, Avalon instructed Bailey to grab onto her arm and she used her communicator to teleport themselves to the park.

"Avalon! Over here!"

Avalon and Bailey headed towards the voice and saw Jason waving the two of them over. Avalon let out a sigh of relief when she saw that there wasn't a monster anywhere and they walked over. Once reaching them, she dropped her surfboard to the ground. "What's going on?" Her eyes scanned the food that was spread out on the blankets around them. "We having a picnic or something?"

"Ace!" Bailey cried. She switched out her sunglasses for her glasses and plopped down on a blanket next to Tommy. "I'm starving!" Avalon slowly sat down in the space that was left over between Jason and Billy, crossing her legs. She tilted her head to the side, eyes scanning the food, and lifted her hands, starting to unbraid her hair.

I wonder how much of this stuff we can take home. It'll take up the time it would take to find more money and get to the grocery store. Avalon felt guilt the second the thought crossed her mind. Here she was, invited on a picnic, and she was thinking about how she was going to get most of the food back home for her and Bailey to keep from having to find more money later. It would be selfish if it wasn't a reality they always had to face.

"Help yourselves," Trini offered. "We have plenty. Besides, it's probably one of our few days where we can just hang out instead of having to worry about monster attacks and everything."

Jason handed Avalon a plate before he started to fill up his own with the assortment of food. Bailey got up on her knees and started to pick up everything that was placed in front of her, effectively loading her plate with so much food that it started to bend under the weight. Tommy laughed when he caught sight of it and leaned over, ruffling Bailey's hair. "Looks like you've got a big appetite. Take as much as you want."

"But she might get sick," Kimberly protested. "With all of that food?"

"She can put it away, trust me," Avalon commented lazily. Bailey stuck her tongue out at her and Avalon did the same in reply. The rangers laughed and started to dig into their food. "So…you only wanted us to drop by for some lunch?"

"Well, we wanted to catch you up with everything that's been going on, too," Jason admitted. He crossed his legs, resting the edges of his plate on his knees. He was silent for a moment. "When everything first started, we were just five teenagers that wanted to have fun and do whatever we could to do it. But then there was a earthquake one day and we were teleported to the command center." He smiled a little. "Everything was so strange at first, we didn't know where we were or what happened or why there was a robot that was able to talk to us."

"Billy and Jason seemed to be the only ones that were excited about the whole thing," Trini added. "for different reasons. Billy wanted to know how Alpha worked and really wanted to try and take him apart to figure out how." She laughed to herself, causing Billy to look a little embarrassed. "And after Zordon told us about how we were able to morph into the power rangers, Jason was the one that thought that we should go ahead and do it."

Avalon's eyebrows rose. She looked over Zack, Kimberly, Trini, and Billy with surprise. "You guys didn't want to do it?" When they shook their heads, she nodded slowly. So they weren't the only ones that were worried about the whole thing. "What made you change your minds?"

"When we tried to walk all the way back to Angel Grove, putties attacked us," Jason started the explanation again. Avalon turned to him, picking at her lunch as she listened to the story. "At first, they beat us badly, but when we put our minds to it, we were able to fight them back. Then Rita sent out Goldar and we morphed into the power rangers to be able to defeat him." He shrugged. "Of course that wasn't the way that things were going to stay."

"So she started to send out monsters that could get bigger?" Avalon nodded slowly.

"Affirmative." Billy now grabbed her attention. "Rita got smart and figured that if we could fend of Goldar while we were the power rangers, then it would be harder for us to do so if we were just that and her monsters got stronger."

"Which is where the power of our zords came in," Trini concluded.

"But then where does Tommy come in?" Bailey mumbled. Her cheeks were bulging with food. Her eyes being bigger behind her glasses and her big cheeks made her look like a chipmunk. The rangers all laughed at her when they caught sight of her appearance.

Tommy's smile slowly faded. He reached up, scratching at his forehead. Kimberly laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. He placed his free hand on top of hers and smiled back at her before addressing Bailey and Avalon. "I was new at school and Rita figured out that I was a skilled martial arts fighter. She wanted to use me to defeat these guys." He licked his lips. "So she kidnapped me and gave me the powers of the green ranger. For a while, I was able to defeat them and took control of their zords. I destroyed the command center and even gave Alpha a virus." He shook Jason's shoulder. "But he destroyed my sword of darkness and Rita's magic was broken."

"For a while he fought along our side while he was still the green ranger," Zack said. He paused to take a bite of potato salad before continuing. "But Rita used a Green Candle to take his powers away."

Avalon's eyebrows lowered. Whoa. You can get your powers away and your zord taken over? I thought that all of this stuff was pretty much invincible. Her hands slowly curled into fists and she thought about the decision she had made. Was it now worth it? Or did she make a big mistake?

"Rita then kidnapped all of our parents in return for the Dragon Dagger, which Tommy used, and our power zords. But Goldar kept the power coins. But Jason showed that he still held onto the dragon power coin, which was Tommy's. We needed Tommy to use his powers to help us get ours back. Tommy's powers were eventually drained and he couldn't use them anyore. We all thought that it was the last that we would see of Tommy, but Zordon and Alpha were able to create new powers for him, making him the White Ranger."

"Ever since then we've continuously battled Rita, Zedd, and their monsters to be able to save Angel Grove and to keep them from taking over the earth," Kimberly said. She then smiled over at Avalon and Bailey. "And with you guys helping us now, we can be sure to keep that promise. We can defeat Rita and Zedd with you on our side."

Avalon gave a fleeting smile. "But what if we can't do it?"

"Don't think like that, Av!" Bailey cried. "It's been scientifically proven…the law of attraction. If you think negative thoughts, then you'll bring negativity onto you. You have to be positive, you can do it."

"I'm being realistic, not negative," Avalon said. "There's a difference." She placed her plate on the ground and rested her chin in her hands. Briefly closing her eyes, Avalon thought of everything that had been going on lately. This was bigger than her and Bailey, she had to stop being so selfish. If she wasn't needed, she wouldn't have been brought into this whole mess. She needed to stop being so selfish and actually start working with these guys. There were more lives at stake than hers and Bailey's. But then there's what you're doing with Chase and them, to be sure that you have a good life and that no one finds out your secret. Now you put this secret on top of that. You're such a boofhead, Avalon.

"Don't worry if you get stressed or freak out," Zack said kindly. "You have a built in family with us. We have your back." Avalon's smile turned to a frown.

Zack studied her.

He didn't get it.

It seemed that she was warming up to them a little bit, especially since she agreed to join the rangers. Even just when they were talking she seemed to be loosening up a little bit and liked being around them. Now there was a cool air around her. He glanced at the others; they must have felt it too, for there was a bit of an awkward silence. Zack looked over at Tommy and Jason to see what they would do. He always went to them for guidance, Jason had always been a leader to him, and now even though Tommy was the leader for the rangers in general, he saw how well the two of them could work together, in battle and out. What were they thinking of the whole situation? They were just as open and welcoming to Avalon as everyone else was, and they seemed to be making a bit of progress. They were trying their hardest and nothing was working. There was a big brick wall that was keeping Avalon from completely joining their team. She was even cold and standoffish when they were at school. He didn't get what was about Bulk and Skull that had her so willing to hang out with them and even seem happy to hang out with them.

"Just know that we have faith in you," Billy added, placing a hand on her arm. Avalon jerked her arm away, as if she had been burned. Her frown deepened, a million confusing thoughts running through her head. It wasn't making anything easier. Letting out a slight growl, Avalon rubbed her hands over her face.

This is going to be harder than I thought. She looked at her feet and sighed. She worked on her own. She would work with the group if she had to, but knew that when it all came down to it, she would figure out her own ways to deal with everything. At least they were nice enough to invite us to this picnic. She removed her hands from her face, the smile returning.

Picking up her hot dog, she took a bite and listened as the rangers told her stories of their battles. She always told Bailey not to sweat the small stuff and to live life in the moment. And that was exactly what she was going to do.