Connor crept slowly down from the loft at a little after seven in the morning. When he'd woken up on the top bunk of the bed that morning, he'd been a bit surprised to find Ethan already gone. Or at least he was until he looked at the time. Kicking himself for sleeping past the 6:30 am wakeup call Tommy had assigned them that morning, he'd quietly jumped out of bed, catching snippets of conversation from down below. He'd horridly gotten dressed, and tried to descend the stairs as silently as possible. A tiny portion of himself hoped it was early enough that his easily forgetful science teacher might not notice that he'd been missing if he slipped into a chair without being caught. Dodging behind his already dressed for the day mentor's back, he managed to seat himself between Ethan and Kira.
"Nice of you to join us, Connor," Tommy told him, not even looking up from the newspaper he was reading, while sipping from a mug of coffee. They'd grabbed a copy of the local paper on their way back to the cabin the evening before.
Connor sighed, and began to fill his bowl from an almost empty cereal box. There was more in the cupboards, but he really didn't feel like getting up. After all, he'd need to in a bit as it was his day to wash the dishes.
"Don't you already know everything that that thing says?" Connor replied. Tommy dropped the paper a bit to peer at him over the top. Connor grumbled and turned his attention back to his breakfast, as the paper resumed its spot blocking the older man's view.
"So, what's the plan for the day, Dr. O?" Trent asked.
"You promised you'd tell us once Connor showed up," Kira added in.
Tommy sighed and folded the paper, setting it off to the side. He picked up his coffee mug and took another sip. "Katas," he told the teenagers. All four groaned. Tommy smirked at them. "I want you three," he said, pointing at Connor, Kira, and Trent, "to start practicing no later than eight am. You can have three fifteen minute breaks, but you practice the ones I've already taught you till one." He paused. "Then you can relax until you need to meet the rangers at four."
"What about Ethan?" Connor protested. "Why does he get the day off?"
"He's coming with me," Tommy told them, going to the sink to rinse out his mug.
"And were exactly are you going?" Trent asked.
"Command Center," Tommy replied. "Billy will be here in a few minutes to teleport us before he goes to school. We're going to get started on the designs for the memory device." Trent and Kira nodded, finishing their breakfast and bringing the bowls to the sink. Connor was grinning a bit while he ate. "And don't get any bright ideas that you don't have to practice without me here," Tommy added in. "I can watch you on the viewing globe."
"Spy master," Connor muttered. Tommy ignored him, hearing the sounds of teleportation on the porch, followed by a knock on the door.
"Ethan, ready to go?" Tommy asked the blue clad teen who nodded, dropping his bowl in the sink.
"Sorry, dude," Ethan told Connor with a grin, as he and Tommy walked out the door to join Billy.
"Stay out of trouble today, alright. And do not leave Kira alone" he told the other three who all nodded. "And remember, by eight am."
He walked out the door and down the steps of the porch to a bit of open grass where Ethan and Billy were waiting on him. A moment later, Billy had teleported them into the Command Center. Ethan wobbled a little and grabbed his head, eyes glazed over a bit as if he wasn't seeing straight. However, he remained on his feet, and none of his breakfast threatened to come back up. After a quick check that he was alright, Tommy turned to Billy and thanked him.
"No problem," Billy told him with a nod. "I'll come back after school," he added in. Tommy and Ethan both nodded and bid the blue ranger goodbye. Billy teleported out of the Command Center, leaving Tommy and Ethan alone with Alpha and Zordon.
"Welcome Tommy! Welcome Ethan!" the small robot stated, coming towards them. Both rangers smiled at him.
"Hey Alpha," Ethan stated, getting used to the site of the android after spending the entire day with him the day before. Tommy just nodded towards him.
Dr. Oliver; Ethan; Welcome back. How did the other rangers take the news of your plan yesterday?
"They seemed pleased, Zordon," Ethan told the alien creature. Tommy had pulled out the notes they'd jotted down the day before.
I thought they might be. Have you given thought to how you will achieve such a task?
"Some," Tommy admitted. "But I'm not sure it will work. Perhaps we should have a backup plan? If we can't lock up the memories, we'll have to erase them."
Ethan frowned at his teacher. Tommy hadn't mentioned anything the day before about thinking they might need a backup plan. "I think we'll come up with something Dr. O," he told him. Tommy looked over at him and nodded, with a slight sigh, as if resigning himself. Ethan wondering if he was second guessing the decision to actually let his friends keep their memories.
"Alright," Tommy stated. "I was thinking, since we want them to keep their memories of us, we're going to need to create a device that will transfer them from short-term, to long-term memory storage. Once that's done, we'll need to incorporate a blocker that will prevent them from accessing their long term memories of us."
"But if they try to recall anything from the time that we were here," Ethan stated, "won't it cause massive blanks in memory?"
"I was thinking about that too," Tommy told him, "but I'm not sure of how to compensate for that."
"What about some type of diversion tactic?" Ethan asked him. Tommy frowned, not understanding what Ethan was suggesting. "What if the device manipulates the memories in long term storage? Replaces us with other people or events that would make sense? At least until the device is deactivated."
"You think it's possible?" Tommy asked him.
Ethan raised his eyebrows. "Dr. O," he said, a laugh in his voice. "We're in 1995. Isn't anything possible at this point?"
Tommy laughed in response. "Ok, so, the device needs to convert short-term to long term memory, alter the long term memory if accessed, and be triggered to deactivate once there is no longer a distortion in the flow of time." Tommy was taking notes down on what they discussed.
"Sounds about right," Ethan told him, laughing. Tommy shook his head and read over the notes a few more times, trying to comprehend exactly what they were suggesting. It was a tall order, even for them. He'd had Haley's help in Reefside. Billy had helped a bit too, via a satellite link he and Haley had set up. And Ethan had even contributed a bit to their technology in 2004. But here, he didn't have Haley. He didn't have his lab. Having Billy was great, but he'd gotten used to a Billy who had access to greater amounts of alien technology than the one in their current time.
Tommy sighed and ran his hand over his face. "Alright computer genius, where do you suggest we start?"
"Everything hurts," Kira muttered, her right arm stretched out on the table, her head turned to the side, resting on top of it. Trent stood behind her, massaging her shoulders slightly. It was nearly two thirty in the afternoon, and the teenagers had showered after their morning workout sessions and had just finished up eating lunch.
Connor nodded agreement. "I think Dr. O is trying to kill us," he stated. Said individual had contacted them via communicator several times over the course of the morning and into the early afternoon, checking in and giving them instruction when he felt that weren't carrying out a particular Kata correctly, or when he wanted a specific pair of them to spar using different combinations of moves.
"I think he's trying to prevent us from going at it with the rangers this afternoon," Trent put in. Connor frowned at him, but didn't move from his seat across from Kira.
"I'm too tired to spar with a mouse," he replied, "let alone those guys."
"Dr. O was pretty good at our age, huh?" Kira asked, sitting up and giving Trent a brief smile of gratitude. Connor and Trent both nodded. In their rematch, Tommy had taken Connor down. The red clad teen had lasted twice as long in that match as in any he'd done with Dr. Oliver, but Tommy had still bested him. The only bit of comfort he had from that match was that Rocky had brought down Trent only a few minutes later, leaving Rocky and Tommy to go at it, since they had taken Trent's suggestion of Red vs. White. Unfortunately for Connor, Tommy had bested Rocky in a greater amount of time than it had taken him to drop Connor.
"How do you think, Dr. O's doing with all this?" Trent asked his two teammates. Connor shrugged.
"Not great," Kira replied. "I think he wants to go home more than any of us do," she added in after a moment's pause of thought. "I don't think he likes being reminded of his past so much."
"What do you mean?" Connor asked her.
"Aside from Billy," Kira told them, "have either of you ever heard him mention any of their names? I mean, other than when he's teaching us Ranger history." The boys paused to think, but ultimately shook their heads, Trent muttering a quiet no. "What do you think it'd be like if ten years down the road, we're no longer friends?" Connor and Trent looked at her in horror for a moment, then at each other, realizing what she was saying.
"Dude," Connor stated, "I don't want to lose contact with any of you; not even Trent," he laughed.
"Likewise," Trent replied with a grin.
Kira nodded to them. "Thought not. Dr. Oliver doesn't know where all of his best friends, his teammates, are. Look at how close Tommy and Kimberly are. Dr. O, doesn't know where she is." Kira stressed the word she. Connor and Trent sat in silence, listening to Kira and taking in her words. "He's putting on a brave face," she told them, "but he wants to get the hell out of here."
"What do you think happened?" Trent finally spoke. "Between all of them?"
"I don't know," Kira said. "Dr. O said ranger powers changed, but not for all of them. I guess, it's possible, bouncing from team to team, different teammates coming and going; trying to keep up with friends who are no longer rangers just becomes too difficult."
"But he had a break," Connor told them. "Couldn't he have reached out then?"
"Maybe," Trent offered. "But maybe he felt like too much time had passed. Maybe he's afraid they'd be mad. Sometimes people grow up and move on."
"I don't care how much we grow up," Connor argued. "I'm not moving on."
"Connor," Trent stated with a smile, "You'll never grow up."
"Hey!" Connor laughed in response, and glanced down at the watch on his wrist. "I suppose it's time to get going, at least if we don't want to have to jog. I don't want them thinking we're late like Dr. O." Trent and Kira agreed, standing and following Connor out the door of the Cabin, Trent locking it with the key Tommy had left them earlier that morning.
Halfway through their walk in the woods, their light conversation was interrupted by strange voices. They'd been there for nearly five and a half days, coming and going from the cabin through the woods multiple times a day, and they had never once encountered anyone else nearby. Frowning, Connor cast a look at both Trent and Kira who shrugged. The voices sounded like they were arguing over something. Motioning for his teammates to be quiet, Connor led the way off the trail and towards the heated discussion, keeping low as they picked their way through undergrowth.
"Dude!" Connor whispered, surprise in his tone, when the three teenagers reached a small clearing. What they saw was nothing like what they had expected. Three small oak trees formed the center portion of the area, surrounded only by grass. Nearby, was a group of tengas, squawking amongst themselves. However, that actually wasn't the surprising part. What did surprise them was that several yards away from the tengas, was a group of even stranger looking creatures. These two were humanoid in the sense that they had a head on top of shoulders, two arms, and two legs. But that's where the comparison to humans stopped. In exchange on one hand, the creatures had a long reptilian like claw. Their legs were black, ending in greyish brown metallic like boots. Their upper legs were covered with thick armor and spikes. Their chests were covered in the same metallic like armor, with an S shaped design over the breast plate and spikes protruding from the shoulder pads. The strangest part about the creatures were their heads which vaguely resembled dried out pieces of coral, with three massive spike protruding from the crowns. The heads had no distinctive places for eyes, ears, or mouths, however, the teenagers knew from experience that the creatures could see, hear, and communicate with each other just fine. "What are tyrannodrones doing here?" Connor hissed, in complete shock. Trent just shrugged, but Kira was pointing towards the center of the clearing, near the oak trees.
The boys followed her finger, taking in what they saw. Two massive creatures stood arguing back and forth. They had been the source of the commotion that had gotten the teenagers' attention. One was the skeletal creature that Kira had encountered the day before with Aisha and Kimberly. The second was a dinosaur like creature with the head and forearms of a raptor, legs of a brontosaurus, and a clock in its chest. The teenagers had only seen it once before and briefly, but it was not something they were soon to forget. At long last, they had confirmed what Tommy had suspected. Chronosaurus had gone back in time as well.
"Well, that explains the tyrannodrones," Trent stated. "But what's the thing he's talking to?"
"That's Rito," Kira informed the two boys. "Dr. O must have been right. Chronosaurus is working with the aliens of this time. But why?"
The teenagers watched the two creatures in the center move toward the trees. Chronosaurus maneuvered himself so that it was opposite the trees, facing them, while Rito stood off to the side, just behind him. Chronosaurus lifted a device into the space in front of him. It vaguely resembled a gas lantern. The air in between the trees and the mutation distorted, almost as if it was swirling and there was a flash of light, which caused the teenagers to look away. When they looked back, Rito and Chronosaurus were laughing, although they could barely be heard over the din coming from the tengas and tyrannodrones who appeared to be celebrating. The three trees were gone. The teenagers cast looks at one another, until another flash of light forced them to shut their eyes. When the spots cleared, the trees were back. "Do it again," they heard Rito shout, and the three teens looked away before the light forced them to again. When they could safely gaze out into the clearing again, the trees once again were gone.
"What the hell was that?" Kira hissed.
"I don't know," Connor stated, "but I don't like it," he added, flicking his wrist. Tommy had told them that they couldn't interfere with the events of the current time. However, since Chronosaurus and the tyrannodrones were from their time, it was definitely clear that this had never happened before. Kira and Trent copied his movement, and a shout later, three fully morphed power rangers raced out into the clearing, the red ranger in the lead.
"Hold it right there, Chronosaurus," Connor shouted. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Rangers," the creature hissed, turning itself to face them. "You're not supposed to be here."
"You brought us here, ding bat," Kira growled.
"Tut tut tut," Chronosaurus laughed. "You misunderstand." He stepped back, the tyrannodrones surrounding him. However, they didn't attack. "Oh well," he added. "What's done is done. See you later rangers," he laughed, and suddenly an invisiportal opened. Chronosaurus and the tyrannodrones jumped in and it closed, leaving the rangers stunned.
"He just ran away?" Trent stated, confused.
"Aww," the remaining skeletal creature laughed, turning its attention to the rangers. "I'll play with you, rangers. Tengas! Attack!"
Suddenly the three rangers found themselves surrounded by the group of tengas. They dropped into defensive stances.
"Not these feather heads again," Connor grumbled, as one leaped toward him. Connor fell into a familiar kick and punch combo that he and his teammates were running through that morning. Kira and Trent followed suit.
During the battle, Kira found herself landing out of a back flip directly in front of Rito.
"I remember you," Rito hissed at her. "You're the one with the lungs," he added, as two tengas grabbed hold of either of Kira's arms.
"You want it again, bone bag?" Kira growled back, fighting to free herself.
"Uh uh uh, no you don't" Rito stated, placing his boned hand over the yellow ranger's mouth.
"Leave her alone," Connor shouted, breaking free of the tengas surrounding him. He charged at Rito at top speed, slamming the creature away from her. Startled, the tengas released Kira, who dropped down, and used a round house kick to bring them both down. "You alright?" Connor asked her.
"I'm fine."
"Trent?" Connor called to the white ranger who dropped five tengas in one series of kicks. The white ranger looked over at him and nodded affirmative.
"Had enough Rito?" Connor asked, looking back at the skeletal creature who was glaring at him.
"You're not worth it," the alien retorted, and suddenly he and the remaining tengas were gone.
"What did he mean by that?" Trent asked, jogging over to Kira and Connor. Both rangers shrugged. They were all standing in the center of the clearing where the trees had been.
"What were they doing?" Connor asked, though he knew it was more of a rhetorical question as his teammates had as much information as he did. Kira gazed around, eyes falling on the only thing that was slightly unusual. She knelt down and picked up three acorns off the ground, holding them out to Connor and Trent.
"Power down," Connor shouted after a moment of studying the acorns, and the three rangers demorphed, and Kira pocketed the acorns, as a few tones rang out through the area, indicating someone contacting them on their communicators. "Go ahead," Connor spoke into his wrist.
"Connor?" Tommy's voice came through. "I've been trying to reach you for last few minutes. What's going on? The Command Center's sensors picked up a large spike in the morphing grid."
"We had to take care of a little business," Connor replied.
"Where are you?"
"In the woods outside the park. We'll meet up with the other rangers and meet you back at the cabin to explain," Connor answered him. "You're going to want to hear this one."
"Alright, we'll meet you there," Tommy's voice replied and the connection dropped.
"You two head back to the cabin," Connor told his two teammates as they reached the trail. "I'll go to the park and get the other rangers." His two teammates nodded, knowing they were closer to the cabin than they were to the park. It was nearing the designated meet up time. The yellow and white rangers turned to head back the way they had come. "Trent," Connor called after him. "Do not let her out of your sight," he added, referring to Kira.
"Never," Trent confirmed, Kira ignoring both of them. Connor nodded and took off towards the park.
About five minutes later, Connor was seated on a park table, feet on the bench in front of him. He had his elbows perched on his knees, head clasped in his hands when Tommy, Kimberly, Adam, Rocky, and Aisha reached him, book bags and school books with them.
"Hey Connor, where are the others?" Aisha called, her greeting smile fading when she saw the worry on his face.
"What's wrong?" Adam asked him.
"We're not sure," Connor replied. "Everyone's waiting on us at the cabin. You guys mind giving me a lift?"
"Not at all," Tommy told him, before checking that no one else was around. Confirming that they were alone, the six teenagers teleported out, Rocky's hand on Connor's shoulder.
"Connor," Dr. Oliver shouted, when they arrived in the open area outside the cabin. Connor swayed on his feet, his face turning slightly green.
"Gimme a minute, Dr. O, please," the teenager asked, allowing his legs to collapse underneath him as he sank to the ground. He peered around him, spotting Ethan seated on the cabin porch steps, and head leaned against one of the columns. It made Connor feel better that he wasn't the only one struggling to get used to teleportation.
"What happened?" Dr. Oliver began again, ignoring Connor's request. His nerves were shot at that point. He'd been pacing back and forth, having had Zordon teleport him and Ethan to the clearing as soon as they'd cut communication with the rest of the team. Billy had arrived only a few minutes before Kira and Trent had entered the clearing, refusing to tell Dr. Oliver what had happened until everyone was present.
Connor waved at Trent, head in his hands, indicating that the white clad teenager could explain.
Trent sighed, and made eye contact with Dr. Oliver. "We heard an argument in the woods not far from here, and went to investigate," he began, his eyes not breaking contact with his mentor. "We didn't expect what we found. Tengas," he added in. "That thing, Rito that Kira faced yesterday, but they weren't alone. Dr. O, tyrannodrones and Chronosaurus were there. You were right." Dr. Oliver's face had drained of color at the mention of the mutations from Reefside. He'd hoped that Chronosaurus had been knocked back in time, but the presence of tyrannodrones worried him. Either the mutation brought them with him or he brought them back in time after the initial travel. Either way, both options pointed to only one possibility.
"This was planned," Dr. Oliver breathed, barely louder than a whisper, but Trent heard him.
"What?" the teenager stated, not really believing what he was hearing.
"Our trip here was planned. We were sent back to 1995 on purpose. There's no way else to explain the tyrannodrones being here," Dr. Oliver told the teenagers all who looked sick and distressed at his revelation. "Alright, so what next?"
"We morphed," Kira told him, snapping out of the stupor he'd temporarily induced. "We weren't interfering. It was Chronosaurus," she defended, as Dr. Oliver nodded, indicating she should continue. "We confronted him, but he and the tyrannodrones bailed out via invisiportal. We ended up in a short battle with Rito and the tengas."
"He tried to take Kira, I think," Connor stated.
"No," Kira said. "If I was the target, he'd have grabbed and gone. He was taunting me," she told everyone, who'd jumped at Connor's assumption. "Dr. O, how come you knew we morphed today, but not when Kim, Aisha, and I did yesterday?"
"There appears to only be a spike in the morphing grid when we use our powers," Dr. Oliver explained. "I think it has something to do with the misplaced time. You on your own yesterday wasn't enough to set off alarms. It would have been noticed, if we'd been paying attention" Kira nodded in understanding. "Was there anything else? You make is sound like they didn't initiate the confrontation."
"They didn't," Connor told him. "They did something strange to a group of trees. One minute the trees were there, and the next they were gone. But then they were back again, and then they were gone."
"Huh?" Adam, Rocky, and Kimberly all stated. Connor just nodded.
"I don't get it myself. Kira?" he offered. Kira nodded and reached into her pocket, pulling out three acorns. She passed them to Dr. Oliver who looked them over and then gave them to Billy. "We found those where the trees were."
"Billy, what do you think?" Tommy asked the current times blue clad teenager. He was studying the nuts.
"There doesn't seem to be anything unusual about them," Billy replied. "But I'll take them back to the Command Center and see run some tests."
"I'll go with you," Ethan offered. Dr. Oliver looked at the dark skinned teenager for a moment, debating about stopping him. Knowing that they'd been sent backwards in time on purpose was making him very reluctant to letting any of the teenagers out of his sight, but after a moment he nodded and waved Ethan off. The two blue rangers disappeared.
"Dr. O," Kira stated. "Chronosaurus said something about us not supposing to be there."
"That's odd," Dr. Oliver replied, taking the seat on the porch that Ethan had just vacated. "I don't like this."
"I don't either," Tommy agreed. "You said the mutant just ran from battle?"
"Didn't even engage us," Trent confirmed. "Rito turned tail when the tide of battle went in our favor."
"Sounds like Rito," Rocky stated. "Well, there's nothing we can do about it now. We don't know where they've all gone."
"Yeah," Dr. Oliver replied, "I just wish I knew what they wanted."
"Maybe Billy and Ethan will find something," Adam suggested, watching the older man rub his thumb and index finger against his eyes. He looked up at the black clad teenager and nodded.
"You three ok?" Dr. Oliver asked the trio from his own time. Connor gave him a grin, while Kira and Trent nodded.
"No trouble Dr. O," Connor laughed. "Those things wished they'd never took us on."
"Oh really?" Dr. Oliver asked him, a smirk on his face.
"Barely broke a sweat," Connor confirmed. Kira and Trent smiled.
"So you've still got some energy left for Katas till Ethan gets back?"
"Uh…." Connor trailed off, running his hand behind his head, before sighing. If he boasted that the tengas had been a piece of cake, Dr. Oliver would make him run through more of the exercises for however long it took the blue rangers to return. If he said no, his pride would be greatly damaged. Eventually pride won out of exhaustion, and the rangers broke off into small murmuring groups, while Connor was forced to run through multiple exercises under the watchful eye of Dr. Oliver.
Connor was pretty sure he was going to pass out when the sounds of the returning rangers drew Dr. Oliver's attention away. Connor instantly fell out of the proper stance for the Chinte kata he'd missed out on the day Chronosaurus had sent them back in time. Trent gave his friend a sympathetic look as all the teenagers and Dr. Oliver walked towards the two blue rangers.
"Well?" Tommy asked Billy, who shook his head, handing the acorns back to Kira.
"Nothing," he told them all. "We ran every test we could think of, and they're nothing but acorns. There's only one slight anomaly. They're nine years old, but they could have been frozen and dormant until now."
"Well, back to square one," Aisha stated, sighing. Her teammates and the dino thunder teenagers nodded.
"Thanks for checking Billy," Dr. Oliver told the teenager. He sighed and looked over his own team. "I really don't like this you guys. I want all four of you to come with me to the Command Center tomorrow."
"Dr. O," Trent complained. "Connor, Kira, and I will be useless there."
"I don't want any of you out of my sight. There's a reason Chronosaurus brought us here."
"Dr. Oliver," Tommy called out, watching the exchange between himself and the dino thunder teenagers. "They are rangers," he stated. Dr. Oliver looked at him.
"You should be on my side," he stated.
The teenager shook his head, smirking slightly. "I'm not. They know how to handle themselves. I'm all for not leaving Kira, Aisha, and Kimberly alone, but Connor and Trent made it evident nothing is going to happen to their teammate. You fretting over them isn't going to do any good."
"I agree with Tommy," Connor stated. "And since he's technically you," he trailed off, silenced by the glare from his science teacher. "Shutting up now."
"Dr. O," Kira stated. "Even if they do show themselves again, hiding out from them isn't going to solve anything."
Dr. Oliver studied the teenagers, running his hand over the back of his head, he gazed at each of their faces. Tommy and Kira both had points, but at that point, he really didn't care much for points. They were nine years in his past, being attacked by tengas and Rito who seemed bent on kidnapping one of the female rangers, along with an enemy from their current time and an army of minion dinosaur creations. They were making trees appear and disappear. And he had no idea what any of them wanted. He didn't want to let his current team out of his sight. He'd lost one set of friends, and he sure as hell wasn't going to lose a second.
"We vote for freedom," Trent told him, seeing how Dr. Oliver wasn't acknowledging them. Rocky, Connor, Aisha, Kimberly, and Adam all nodded in agreement.
"This is not a democracy," Dr. Oliver replied simply, but he met them square in the eyes. "Fine, but if anything happens tomorrow, I'm locking you all in the cabin and keeping you there until I figure out how to get us back to 2004."
"Happens to us? Or them?" Connor stated, everyone looked at him. "What? Isn't it possible that Rita and Zedd would attack them tomorrow, even if we weren't here? Didn't Saturday prove that some events are still happening in the correct time line?"
"He has a point, Dr. O," Ethan snorted.
"Fine. Anything happens that is not supposed to happen."
"Something's supposed to happen tomorrow?" Rocky asked, frowning, worry on his face. The Angel Grove teens were all casting anxious looks at Dr. Oliver, who threw his hands in the air in frustration.
"Not that I can recall, no; but even if there was, I wouldn't tell you," Dr. Oliver told them. When Rocky began to protest, he held up his hand.
"You look like a teacher when you do that," Aisha told him. He smirked.
"I am a teacher," Dr. Oliver retorted.
The teenagers all blinked at his response. "I don't think I like him," Kimberly laughed, looking at Tommy. "Do me a favor and don't become him."
Tommy grinned at her. "I'll do my best."
"So, since you're not going to the Command Center tomorrow," Aisha asked the teenagers, "what are you going to do?"
"Well," Ethan interjected, "I am going to the Command Center. Dr. O and I started work on the memory device today," he told the yellow clad girl who just glared at him. "Stop that, you already knew that's what we were working on."
"I don't want to think about it," Aisha replied, a little more angrily than she'd meant to. She turned her back on him.
"No idea what we'll do, but at least it won't be forced boredom," Connor told her.
"Well, after school, Aisha, Rocky, and I are going to be at the school gym helping to set up a dance Wednesday night and we're each allowed a guest," Kimberly told him.
"I don't do dances," Ethan stated.
"Aww, why not?" Kimberly teased. Ethan just shook his head.
"Don't worry," Billy told him. "I'm not going either," he added with a laugh.
"You're not?" Aisha pouted at him. Her friend hugged her around the shoulders.
"No," he added in. "I'm going to sit this one out and spend the evening at the Command Center helping Ethan and Dr. Oliver," Billy told her. "And you shouldn't get mad at Ethan. He's the one that's been working on how to not erase our memories." Aisha sighed and nodded, smiling over at Ethan.
"I'm sorry," she told him.
"No worries," Ethan replied back. He completely understood. If someone wanted to take away some of his memories he'd be pretty against it as well.
"Well," Kimberly stated, "that does make things a whole lot simpler, or at least more even." Aisha nodded. "The rest of you want to come?"
"I don't know," Kira stated. "We don't have anything to wear to a dance. That wasn't exactly a priority at the thrift shop."
"We've got stuff you can borrow," Aisha told her.
"What do you think Trent?" Kira asked him. Trent shrugged.
"It could be fun."
"Connor?"
"Sure," he stated. "Why not? Dr. O, this on the list of approved juvenile activities?"
"I don't see why you can't. The device we're working on won't erase the dance from their minds, it'll just alter it as if you weren't there. Sure, as long as nothing dramatic happens tomorrow, you can go."
"Great," Kimberly stated, clapping her hands together once. "Alright, so Aisha and I can go with Connor and Trent," she added, catching an almost hurt look from Tommy. She leaned up and kissed him lightly. "You know you're my official date," she told him, and he nodded. "Besides, you can take Kira."
"What?" Both Trent, Dr. Oliver, and Kira stated at once. The only pink ranger started giggling, ignoring the three dino thunder rangers as she and Aisha started talking excitedly about their plans.