Sky's assailant-turned-captor was standing over him when he reawakened. Looming above him, the figure scowled darkly, his face eerily lit by a second light bulb that hung directly over Sky's chair.

"Who... who are you?" Sky asked quietly.

A fist shot out and caught him in the face so unexpectedly that his teeth cracked together, sending spikes of pain up and down his jaw. The chair was hefted onto two legs with the impact and wobbled uncertainly for a second before crashing back onto all fours.

Blood gushed into his mouth from some cut on the inside and Sky almost choked on it before spitting it out on the floor, flashing a defiant glare at his enemy, who merely used the opportunity to strike him again.

"You can't just kidnap SPD Rangers," Sky warned after spitting another mouthful of blood, "There will be people looking for me."

"They won't find you," growled the stranger, the voice deep and without inflection yet the malice behind the words was unmistakable.

The hand raised to strike him again, but was suddenly interrupted by what sounded like a doorbell playing the first few bars of Jingle Bells. The figure grunted, hit Sky into mental oblivion and then shambled up the stairs to answer the door.

As Sky's awareness faded out, he was sure he heard the sound of carolers singing Jingle Bells, perhaps in response to the sound of the custom doorbell.


Jack was not a man whose convictions were rooted in faith of any kind, not even the superficially anti-religious faith in the strength of humanity, the power of love or even justice. He had seen too much of the filth, too much of the worst the world had to offer, to have any sort of conviction about peace, love and harmony, brought by man or God either one.

So it was not surprising that, when Bridge led him and the others up a cobblestone walk to a covered porch where a two-foot tall plastic Santa leered and knocked on the painted blue front door which was then answered by a little old lady about eighty years old with wavy white hair and an eye searing floral patterned dress, Jack's faith in Bridge's powers of perception faltered.

"Oh," she exclaimed, "I thought you were carolers. Well, come in, come in. You'll catch your death of cold out there on the porch. Don't mind Santa, he's always scaring people, but I love him so."

Jack hadn't expected this. Of all the things in the world he might have expected, this was not one of them. With an uneasy glance at the lascivious Santa, he stepped across the threshold of the house into which he'd been invited, his team following behind mutely.

"Would you like some tea, dears?" the little old lady asked brightly, shuffling off through the garishly decorated foyer and towards what Jack could only guess was the living room.

The foyer was saturated with color, flowers of all kinds and colors adorned it. Brown wall paper festooned with pink roses covered the walls, photographs and painting of everything from yellow tulips to bluebonnets covered that. The white tile floor had violets patterned across it, the round oak end tables on either side of the front door had flower doilies of white and yellow, upon which sat vases with flowers both plastic and real of such stunning variety Jack didn't even care to guess what they might be.

The living room wasn't any better, carpeted with an oriental rug featuring more flowers (in gold), floral print sofa and living chairs draped with flowery afghans. More paintings and pictures, more vases on the coffee table, on end tables and over the fire place on the mantel, and more doilies. So many doilies.

Just as Jack started to go a little cross-eyed looking at the stripy (and flower drenched) curtains, Bridge abruptly slipped past their surprised hostess, back out into the foyer and (from the sound of it) upstairs.

"Bridge! Get back here!" Jack started to go after him, but the dainty little lady caught him by the arm and smiled benignly.

"Let him explore, dear," she said, "There's nothing in this house that's more valuable in one piece than it is in several, so he can't do any harm. Now, come and sit and I'll have Penny fetch you some tea. Would you also like scones with it? She makes such wonderful scones," without even pausing for breath, the elderly woman turned towards another doorway, "Penny! Penny, dear, we've got guests. Come and meet them, and bring some tea and scones from the kitchen."

From some distant room, a melodious voice responded.

"In a minute, Granny. I'm just putting the last of the ornaments on the tree in the Study."

It occurred to Jack that, despite the profusion of translucent glass vases, flowers, colorful doilies and embroidered flower throw pillows, he hadn't noticed any Christmas decorations. Now he looked again, and at once spotted the Cedar Christmas tree in the corner.

It was hard to miss, swathed in a garland of white fabric and plastic daisies, practically buried in colorful traditional ornaments and several flower ones as well, a small pile of unopened, floral patterned paper wrapped gifts atop a white skirt with forest green fringe and red roses.

"Come, sit," the elderly lady said, gesturing to the couch, which was fairly crawling with tansy, geranium and hyacinth throw pillows.

Jack looked at Syd and Z helplessly, but neither of them offered him any hope of escaping from this bizarre universe he'd suddenly stumbled on, where perfect strangers are invited in for no reason, allowed to roam freely, and offered tea with scones.

Obediently, if reluctantly, Jack sat on the couch, wary of the bright chrysanthemum patterning. Syd and Z took the cue and also sat. They crowded together on the couch, as though they were afraid that if they separated the flowers would swallow them whole and they would never see each other again.

"Now, I'll go put some music on. Won't take me a minute."

"Wait, Ma'am, that's really not necessary-" Jack found he was talking only to air, for the spritely lady had practically floated out of the room, humming tunelessly but surely listening to some favorite Christmas song in her mind.

"Have you ever seen so many flowers in your life?" Z asked, once they were safely alone.

"No," Jack replied sullenly, "And I never wanted to, either."

He was feeling worse and worse about letting Bridge drag him into this escapade, whatever it was. If Sky was in trouble, they needed to be finding him, not sitting on a hideous couch waiting to be served tea and biscuits. However, Jack was beginning to seriously doubt that Sky was really in trouble.

Bridge, on the other hand...

"Here we are," Jack twitched towards the voice... and stopped thinking... about anything.

Just entering the room was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. She was petite, with gently waving, waist-length, honey-blond hair which perfectly framed her angelic face. Her captivating sapphire eyes sparkled with mischief and mystery. Jack's breath caught at the mere sight of her.

He had never been raised with any fancy manners and had never before understood why a man must stand when a woman entered the room. Now, at last, he did. He stood, speechless, staring but unable to look away or close his mouth, which had fallen open.

She favored him with a dazzling smile, showing teeth perfect and white enough for a toothpaste commercial and continued into the room carrying her tray as though Jack's stunned bunny look was completely ordinary. She moved so gracefully the cream in the creamer on the tray she carried didn't slosh, didn't even ripple as she seemed to dance across the room.

Only after she set the tray down did Jack manage to let his knees turn to melted butter and sit back down on the offensive couch. He still didn't have any control of his jaw, which hung open like he was a fish with a hook in its mouth, except what he felt was neither painful nor even unpleasant.

"Hello," She said, her smile not faltering even as Jack did.

"Jack. My name is Jack. Jack is my name. I'm Jack," he twitched awkwardly, "This is Syd and Z."

"Okay, Jack," she laughed, and her voice was like silver bells when she did, "What do you take in your tea? Cream? Sugar? Lemon?"

"I... uh..." Jack, lost for words, couldn't even stammer out that he hardly ever drank tea.

"I like cream and sugar," Syd said, after it was evident that Jack would only be gaining control over his tongue and open mouth sometime after Christmas.

"Black," Z said, when Penny turned to her, "No sugar."

"I like tea," Jack managed to choke out.

Penny laughed again, but it wasn't a mean laugh. She seemed genuinely amused, like she thought he was funny instead of awkward. Her laugh made the array of flowers suddenly seem pale and dreary, where before they had been too bright, too vibrant. She was so radiant, so alive, that everything else just didn't seem to have any color or substance to it at all.

"Do you also like scones?" Penny asked, flicking her head to toss her hair over her shoulder, "We have blueberry and cranberry. I was going to make raisin, but haven't had the time."

She was beautiful, but the most beautiful when she said 'cranberry'. Jack decided that's what he wanted. If it tasted half as good as it sounded when she said it, he'd want cranberry scones every day for the rest of his life. He was smitten, knew it, and didn't care who else did.

"Granny," Penny looked away from him as her Grandmother entered the room with a CD case in hand, "You can't keep just bringing strangers into the house. These are SPD officers, wherever did you find them?"

Her words suggested irritation, but nothing else did. She actually laughed as she said it, evidently as delighted by the eccentricity of her grandmother as by Jack's stammering.

"Oh I didn't find them, dear," her grandmother said, "they were just standing around on the porch with Pervy Santa."

Penny laughed again, neatly pouring the tea into cups and passing them out, then placing scones on saucers for everyone before serving herself and her grandmother and sitting down.

Jack knew he should ask if they knew Sky Tate or Blue Ranger, knew he should be going to see what trouble Bridge was getting himself into, knew he should take a bite of scone or sip his tea or something, anything. But all he could do was just sit there, mind emptied of every thought it ever had.

He was saved by the bell. Or rather by Bridge, who came in clutching a picture frame in both hands. He scurried over to Jack, who looked up in puzzlement when Bridge turned the picture towards him.

A pretty blond girl in a red dress sat smiling into the camera. For half a second, he thought this must be a picture of Penny when she three or four years younger, but then he saw that it couldn't be. Pretty as the girl was, she wasn't as ravishing as Penny, not even if she'd dyed her hair honey-blond.

"Who is she?" Jack asked of Bridge, looking up from the photo.

"I don't know," Bridge replied, handing the picture to Jack as if it were a priceless gem.

"Then why are you showing me this?" Jack wanted to know.

"Because," Bridge said earnestly, eyes wide, "she's dead."