I hope you guys had a great Christmas and a great ending to 2015 as well! I have been hinting at what Roger will be distracted by though I'm not sure if you guys caught on. Keep in mind that I'm not a doctor or anything close, so sorry if I get some stuff wrong. All information is based off of google searches, so... Anyway, here it is!

In what looked like the ruins of Welch County, a large machine stood in front of a large group of 50 stories tall Chimera. Inside the machine sat Geo, Roger, and Cal in front of three individual consoles of various buttons and a wheel of sorts that resembled joysticks.

"Okay guys, just remember what Alicia said," Geo told them, looking at them. "We need to focus to properly pilot the megazord."

"You know," Roger started. "She didn't exactly tell us what would happen if we couldn't focus."

Geo rolled his eyes. "So you're just gonna go against what she said and mess us up, then?"

The black ranger chuckled. "Please, I could focus on this in my sleep."

He pushed the one of the buttons to fire lasers at a few of the Chimera and smirked at Geo.

"This isn't a game, Roger." Geo growled. "And this isn't a test of who's better than who. We're fighting against deadly monsters, so be serious."

"I'm completely serious." Roger responded. "You haven't even done anything yet, Mr. Perfect."

Geo clenched his fists hard around his wheel. He rammed the wheel forward, causing the megazord to walk quickly towards the Chimera. He pressed a few buttons, causing a massive attack on the majority of them.

Suddenly, a sound was heard from the inside of the megazord. Cal and Geo looked to Roger who pulled out his phone. The two looked at him as if he was crazy and he shrugged.

"I forgot I had it on me." He looked at the screen and then smirked up at Geo. "Just watch this."

He answered the cal and put the phone up to his ear as he pressed multiple commands for attacks against the remaining Chimera. Suddenly, he stopped without finished the commands.

"What?" He asked, sounding worried. Suddenly, the megazord collapsed and due to the force of the fall, the rangers were knocked straight out and onto the floor.

SIMULATION OVER flashed in bright red in front of their eyes. Geo and Cal ripped off their simulation goggles and saw Roger scrambling to grab his things.

"Oh, I watched," Geo sneered. "What the hell was that, Roger?"

Roger turned to him, his glare burning holes into the red ranger. "That was a call from the hospital. My brother just collapsed at school."

Geo was silenced, but Cal spoke up. "Oh my god, is he okay?"

Roger shrugged as he put his jacket on. "I don't know, they didn't say."

"Do you want us to go with you?" Cal asked, putting a hand on his shoulder. "We could ask Alicia to borrow her truck."

Roger seemed to contemplate this for a moment before nodded. "Please."

"Alright." Cal nodded. She turned to Geo and gestured for him to come. "Come on, we're going to the hospital."

~PRAG~

When the rangers arrived, Roger immediately went to the desk in front while Cal and Geo stood a bit back.

"Geo?" A woman's voice came from off to the side. Both Geo and Cal turned to see Ashley Costello, Geo's mother. She had tan skin, and brown hair and eyes like Geo. She was a lot shorter than him, though, standing at about 5'4. She was dressed her her nurse scrubs and had her long hair tied up in a ponytail. She walked quickly towards them. "What are you doing here?" She asked worriedly.

"I'm fine, mom, don't worry." He assured her. "Our.. friend, Roger's, brother is here."

Ashley looked over at Cal and smiled. "Hello, again, Callie. I didn't know you two knew each other."

Geo raised an eyebrow. "I didn't know you two knew each other."

"Of course!" Ashley nodded. "You obviously know, Rebecca, right?" Geo nodded, a bit uncomfortable at this question. "That's Callie's mom."

Geo turned to Cal in shock. "Your mom?"

Cal nodded, suddenly very uncomfortable. "Yeah. Why?"

"No reason." Geo said quickly. "She's really nice."

"You would think so since she's a therapist," Cal nodded in agreement. "She has to be."

Ashley opened her mouth to speak when Roger came back over to them. "They said he's upstairs."

"Do you want us to come?" Cal asked.

"You can walk with me, but I think I need to go in alone." Roger replied.

Cal nodded. "Of course. Geo, do you want to come?"

Geo looked awkwardly at his mom, and she chuckled and waved him off. "Go. Don't worry, I'll still be here when you leave."

"Alright, mom." He kissed his mom on the cheek and followed the two.

When the rangers eventually got upstairs to the room, Roger turned to them a bit nervously. "I don't know if I can do this."

Cal put a hand on his shoulder. "You'll be fine, I promise."

Roger took a deep breath and nodded, walking into the room and leaving Cal and Geo in the hall. When he walked in, he saw a short woman, only about 4'9, standing in front of his brother, who was awake and alert.

Roger frowned. "Uhh.. hello?"

The woman turned to him and smiled. "You must be his brother," She said, her voice accented from her Asian heritage. She had short dark brown hair, and dark brown eyes. She was wearing a very profession doctor's uniform.

Roger nodded. "I am. The name is Roger," He put his hand out.

She shook his hand. "I'm Dr. Moriko Tachibana, a surgeon," Roger's eyes widened, "And I was called to check on your brother's case, though it seems as though he might not need it." He sighed in relief.

"What happened?" He asked, inching closer to Chris.

"Endocarditis," She responded, and Roger raised an eyebrow at her.

"I have no idea what that is." He told her.

She nodded. "Not many do, it's quite a rare condition. Endocarditis is an infection of the heart." She explained. "This has occurred because the virus that was already in his body, and making him sick, traveled through the blood stream, attaching itself to the damaged areas of his heart."

Chris looked a bit uncomfortable as she said this, and Roger looked at him. "Damaged areas of the heart?" He turned to Moriko. "What do you mean by that?"

"Well," She started, looking a bit uncomfortable herself. "Your brother's condition..."

"Condition?" Roger frowned deeply. "Can someone please explain this to me?"

Chris looked awkwardly out the window, not wanting to look at his brother, while Moriko shifted a bit awkwardly. "Chris has AS, or Aortic Stenosis from your mother, whom I've also treated before. AS is a disease that narrows the valve in the aorta. I'm not sure if this is making much sense to you, but that is one of the main reasons your brother got endocarditis. The other being the fact that he doesn't take his medication for it."

Roger glared towards Chris, who still refused to look at him. He took a deep breath and looked to both of them. "What? How do you know any of this? What is going on?"

"Remember when mom and dad said I was going to volunteer to be a counselor at a science camp last year?" Chris asked. Roger nodded. "Well, that's not true. I got really sick and came here and they found out that mom gave her heart condition to me. After that, we watched you to see if you had any symptoms, but you never have, so you're in the clear."

"But you're not and you never told me?" Roger asked, looking at him as if he was crazy. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Chris shrugged. "Maybe I didn't want you to think that I wasn't the 'perfect one', besides now that it's important, you know."

"It wasn't important before?" Roger crossed his arms.

"It wasn't getting worse before, but now it is." He responded, looking down in what seemed like shame.

Roger sighed and turned back to Moriko, who looked very uncomfortable with their conversation. "What's gonna happen?"

"We're treating Chris with Vancomycin, an antibiotic, and we will release him when his condition becomes more stable and manageable without the antibiotics. As for AS.. well, his condition is getting worse, but not so bad that his heart is failing, nor so bad that he needs to stay here as long as he takes it slow and easy."

Roger nodded. "So, he'll be alright?"

"For now, yes." She gestured to the door. "I have to go see my other patients, if you need anything, press the call button."

The two nodded and watched her leave. Roger then just looked at his brother. He was looking down almost guiltily, which made Roger roll his eyes.

"You can't act like you didn't bring this upon yourself, Chris." He growled. "You could've told me. You could've taken your medication. I don't understand any of this."

Chris took a deep breath and leaned back into his pillow. "Just leave, Roger. The car is out front, my friend drove it here for me. Take it, and leave. Stress is the last thing I want right now."

Roger frowned. "I'm trying to stress you out!"

"Well you are!" He exclaimed, and Roger saw his heart on the monitor become quick and a bit irregular. He took a deep breath and leaned back once more. "Leave."

Roger crossed his arms. "Chris..." He started a bit angrily.

"Go!" His heart monitor spiked again and he had to take a deep breath and calm down to keep it normal.

Roger huffed and stormed out of the room, passing Cal and Geo without a second thought. The two got up to follow him when their morphers beeped. They saw Roger uncaringly walk over to the elevator to take it up, ignoring the call.

"We have to go." Geo nudged Cal.

Cal looked towards the elevator. "But Geo, what about..."

"We don't have time to wait for him," Geo said more forcefully. "We have to go."

Cal sighed and nodded. "Alright." She took one last look towards the elevator that was already going up, carrying Roger in it, and then followed Geo down the stairs and out of the hospital.

~PRAG~

Roger took the elevator as high as he could go, then took stairs up to the roof. He knew he wasn't allowed to be up there, and if he got caught, he could potentially get into a lot of trouble, but he didn't care.

As far as he was concerned, his brother was getting worse from a problem Roger didn't even know he had, yet everyone else did seem to know about. Not only that, but his mind was racing, and he knew from the simulation, he couldn't help control the megazord like this.

He let out a yell and punched the ground angrily. "I hate this! I hate this! I HATE THIS!" He yelled, continually punching the ground.

Roger heard a rumbling sound and looked up to see a large monster, almost as tall as the building, laughing at the city. This monster was modeled after a Sloth and, despite moving slowly, had menacingly long, sharp claws.

He watched as Geo and Cal moved forward in their individual zords, Geo flying above Cal in his red Eagle Zord and Cal moving below in her blue Gorilla Zord.

Then, he turned away. He didn't want to watch something he couldn't help with. Suddenly, he heard something behind him, and turned to see Maya standing behind him after teleporting herself in.

"Who are you?" He asked, looking her over with a frown.

"The name is Maya Stone - I'm Ben's.. assistant of sorts." She told him, crossing her arms. "I was hanging out with Vi in the viewing room, when I saw you here and decided to come and have a little chat."

"A little chat?" Roger rolled his eyes. "I don't need a pep talk from you."

Maya scoffed. "It's a bit early for the insults, don't you think? You literally just met me."

"I don't need one from anyone!" Roger retorted. "How about that?"

She then rolled her eyes. "Ah, the greatness of manhood. Why don't you let go of that facade for five seconds and actually get the root of the problem."

"You wanna know the root of the problem?" Roger sneered. "The root of the problem is that my brother has been keeping a HUGE secret from me for a little over a year, and I know I'll never be able to help them if I can't focus!" He let out a yell. "I just can't do this! I've been a ranger for what? Like a month? And already, I'm having problems! I got Cal hurt a week or so ago, and now I can't even help in our first zord battle!"

"If it helps any, zord battles aren't often for Animali. They generally believe that if you fail once, you deserve a second chance." Maya told him.

He sat down on a sturdy pipe. "It doesn't."

Maya sighed. "Look, Roger, I get that sometimes, things get complicated, believe me, I know first hand, but you can't just give up because of that. The key thing for me about focus is just realizing what's more important in that moment. I get that your brother is probably really important to you, and the fact that he lied must really hurt, but if you don't help, not only will Geo and Cal's lives be at stake, but you, your brother's, and everybody in the whole world's lives will be too. In this moment right now, what's more important to you? The fact that your brother lied? Or the everyone's lives?"

Meanwhile in the zords, Cal and Geo were struggling hard against the monster. Cal used her zord to swing across a few buildings and launch herself at the monster, but Sloth, even being as slow as he was, had it claws up waiting for her, and she hit the claws and was thrown back.

"Cal, you alright?" Vi questioned through her helmet.

Cal resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Not really." She reported.

"Geo, what about you?" Vi asked to the red ranger.

He shot a few lasers at Sloth, though as he attempted to avoid the claws, his zord was grazed and was sent spinning out of control.

"I'm getting dizzy!" He cried fearfully as he could see himself spinning towards a fairly tall building. He squeezed his eyes shut as he got close.

Suddenly, something stopped him from hitting it at the last moment. He opened his eyes one by one, a bit worried about what had happened. He turned however, and a large black Bear Zord standing on it's hind legs with his wing in its grasp.

"Roger?" Geo asked.

"The one and only." He responded. "Why don't we combine these bad boys and destroy this son of a bitch?"

Geo smirked. "Definitely."

The three pushed a button in their zords at the same time and then their zords joined together in front of Sloth. The Bear Zord's head came off and made into chest armor while the rest of the body remained standing. Cal's Gorilla Zord came apart completely and molded into armor for the legs and arms. Finally, the Eagle Zord's wings detached and became wings for the back of the megazord with the rest of the body becoming a head.

"Guardian Megazord Part 1!" They cried together.

Sloth laughed. "You'll never beat me, even with that hunk of junk!"

Maya watched them from the roof of the hospital. They moved forward and punched Sloth before it could make a move on them. With the alien knocked down, the three all pressed the button for a final blow. All of a sudden, the wings rose up over the shoulders and revealed blasters. Sloth stood up and the rangers blasted him with everything they had, destroying him.

Maya smirked. "I knew they could do it."

She heard someone opening the door to the roof from behind her and immediately teleported back before anyone could see her.

~PRAG~

Later, the rangers sat on a bench in front of the hospital.

"Hey, man, great timing." Geo told Roger. "If you were any later that building, and I, would be toast."

Roger nodded with a small smile. "No problem. That's what your teammates are for, right?"

Geo smirked and nodded. "Right."

Cal put a hand on Roger's shoulder. "Are you alright, Roger? I mean, we didn't get to talk to you after you walked out of your brother's room."

"Yeah, I guess." He sighed. "I just feel kinda betrayed. I mean, my brother and I rarely truly get along, but I didn't think that he would hide something like that from me for so long."

"What did he hide from you, if you don't mind me asking." Geo said.

"He has a heart problem; he got it from our mom." Roger replied. "He's known about it for almost a year, and didn't tell me. Not only that, but now its getting worse."

Cal gasped. "Oh my god. Is he gonna be okay?"

Roger shrugged. "The doctor said he'd be alright for now, but I don't know what to take from that. His heart could fail, and he could die."

"That probably won't happen, at least not for a while. Especially not if the doctor said he would at least be alright for now." Geo said. "I mean, I know doctor's can be wrong, and sometimes aren't good at predicting, but you just gotta realize that they have a lot more control over the situation than you do."

"I guess." Roger nodded. "I'm just worried."

"Anyone would be." Cal wrapped her arm around him. "There's nothing wrong with worrying."

They were all silent for a moment before Geo gave them a small smile. "Hey, I have a few extra bucks in my wallet. How about the three of us go to Carlyle's?"

Cal gave him a smile back. "I think I might have some too. How about you let us treat you to an early dinner, Roger? It would get your mind off of things, and help since I doubt your parents will be wanting to make dinner with your brother in the hospital."

Roger scoffed. "My parents are away on business, as usual. It's just me."

"Just you?" Cal asked. "Are you gonna be alright alone? I bet you could stay at Ranger Ops if you wanted."

Roger shook his head. "It's fine, I'm used to it." He shrugged. "That doesn't matter, though. I would love to join you guys, thanks. It means a lot."

"Room for two more?" They heard a voice off to the side and saw Vi and Maya holding hands and walking towards them. "We have money too, don't worry." Maya smirked.

The rangers smiled. Roger nodded. "That would be great."

The three stood up and all five of them began walking in the direction of Carlyle's Diner.

~PRAG~

Terra looked down from her ship at them and groaned loudly. "They defeated another one of my monsters!"

She stormed back towards the throne room, where Jamie was waiting for her. "Mistress, I was..."

"Shut it!" She exclaimed, sitting down angrily in her throne. "Jamie, you are going to do something for me. Something very, very important."

Next time on Power Rangers Animal Guardians: Cal's struggle with fighting comes to a point when she meets Gorilla, an alien that not only represents her power, but also claims to want to be good.

I know this chapter was probably a bit confusing with all of the medical terms, but I wanted it to have an authentic feel (even if I got all of the info off of google).

Also, I updated the character page with Maya's bio. I was originally going to introduce her last chapter and then make her more recurring in a few chapters, and I was going to have the scene with Roger on the rooftop have Vi in it, but I wanted to use Maya to show that the rangers have two strong allies on their side that can help when needed, and I've already shown Vi in that role a ton, so I thought this was the perfect time for her to show up!

I really hope you guys like Maya, because she's going to become similar to Vi towards the rangers, and you're going to be seeing her often. Maya was created by an awesome author, ICrzy, who I might add, has some great original Power Ranger stories! I highly recommend!

See you guys soon!

© Copyrighted by Charlotte 'Charlie' Hartley