"Am I a good dad?" Tommy asked. He was sitting in the park with the twins. It was the question he'd been wanting to ask since he'd got back from Florida yesterday, but there'd been so much else to talk about with the others. Adam had to be told everything that had happened and the rest of the guys wanted to know if he remembered anything and they all wanted to hear about Kim. Now they'd finally managed a moment to themselves. They were sitting beneath an old tree with a view down a grassy slope to the lake. When he looked at it, Tommy kept seeing the barren wasteland that had been in the tape.

He knew he ought to be asking about the order and whether it was their enemy that the Rangers were fighting in the future. But somehow he was more scared of messing up as a parent than the destruction of the planet.

"You're the best," Will said, "You started teaching us karate practically the minute we could walk. You took us to the park every Saturday and we'd play catch or soccer or basketball. When we were little, you used to tell us bedtime stories about the Power Rangers."

"You did miss a school play once," Trina said with a grin, "but since there was a monster attacking the city at the same time, we forgave you."

"Did you always know I was a Power Ranger?"

"No, but for most of our lives you weren't one," said Trina.

"Yeah, it's only recently you got involved with the Rangers again."

"We shouldn't tell him that. We're not supposed to say too much, remember?"

"Are you allowed to tell me about the enemy?"

"You already know who she is," Trina said. She reached behind her and from underneath the innocent, flowery shirt, she drew a knife. Tommy took it, seeing the engraving of a deer just below the hilt. A hart. As his hand closed around it, he felt the same power that flowed through the fake dragon dagger. He knew that if he held this within the temple, it would look completely different.

He looked at Trina, then at Will sat to the other side of him. There was only one explanation for how Trina would be so open about this.

"You too?" he asked Will. Will produced an identical knife from under his t-shirt.

"How many Sword Bearers are there?" Tommy asked.

"Two weeks ago, our time anyway, there were thirty-seven," Trina said, "the night before we left there were just the three of us. The enemy managed to get into the temple. She destroyed it completely, killed everyone inside."

"How?" Tommy breathed, thinking of the people he'd seen there. Hundreds of them. Including children. "I thought the temple was protected against that."

"She managed to turn one of the order into her agent," Will said. There was a slight strain to his voice. Tommy recognised it as tears he wasn't going to let himself shed.

"I thought that was supposed to be impossible," Tommy said.

"It should have been," Will was staring at the grass as he spoke, but his eyes were clearly seeing into his memories, "but something happened that allowed a seed to get past the gem of Orasella and into the minds of one of the order. It took years, but finally she was able to turn him. And he gave the gem to her."

Tommy wanted to ask who and how. He wanted to ask how he was supposed to stop it happening again. After all, protecting the gem was his task now. He never had the chance. The sound of cracking twigs behind them alerted them to someone's approach. The twins hid their knives with practiced speed and Tommy looked round to see Jason walking towards them.

"Hey, bro," Tommy greeted him, "what's up?"

"Not a lot," Jason answered. But Tommy could tell there was something wrong. Some indefinable thing about Jason's stance was enough for him to know that there was something on Jason's mind.

"What is it?"

"It's…" Jason looked away, shaking his head slightly. Then he looked back. "Have you figured out what to tell Kimberly?" So Jason was just worried about Kim. Hardly surprising, really. Tommy glanced at the twins.

The children Kim was worried about never seeing grow up. She could see them and talk to them. But was it fair? Letting her know all the things she'd miss out on.

"It's your choice," Tommy told the kids.

"We decided," Trina said after a short silence, "that we weren't going to try to go to Florida. We weren't going to go and see her. But we never considered that we'd change things and that she'd come here."

"That's not an answer," Tommy said with a slightly teasing smile.

"I want to tell her," Will said.

"I want to tell her, too," Trina told him, "but that doesn't mean that we should."

"We've already messed up causality, what harm could it possibly do? I want to talk to my mum!"

"You're the one that changed things. We had one simple message to deliver, but you couldn't leave it at that. You had to go and say things you shouldn't and for all we know messed up our whole future." It was amazing how they could turn from being so obviously close and become this feuding pair in a matter of seconds. Tommy wondered what the hell had just happened.

"You always think you know best!" Will snapped, "How do you know I haven't made things better? How do you know we won't get back to find out Dad's a millionaire?"

"How do you know there's even a future to get back to?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Billy's not got the time portal working again to get us back home."

"You don't know anything!"

Will stood up and storm off. There were tears in his eyes the anger wasn't able to hold back completely. Tommy watched him go, wondering if he should go after him. How could he be such a good parent if he didn't even know whether to follow his son or leave him alone to get control of his emotions back? Kim would be arriving in Angel Grove that evening, and he hadn't the faintest idea what to say to her.

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Jason was walking through the park to where he'd been told Tommy was. They'd barely managed to get a minute to talk with everything that had happened recently, and Jason wanted desperately to ask him more questions about the whole business with the ninjas. Especially since the others had finally remembered to tell him he'd said something after they'd found him. There had, admittedly, been a lot going on, but Jason was still annoyed they'd waited this long before telling him.

But what could Orasella mean?

Zordon had no idea, which meant Jason didn't know where to start looking. The library held no answers, but he hadn't really expected it to. It was strange to suddenly realise that Zordon wasn't omniscient. The universe was vast enough that even he couldn't know it all.

So Jason was looking for Tommy, hoping he might have heard something when he was a prisoner that would lead to answers. A part of him was warning the rest that he might want to stop. He remembered the twins' warning, remembered the tape. But he still couldn't help wondering if they were a trick. He didn't need to know everything, just enough. It wasn't like that could really bring about the end of the world.

He saw Tommy, sitting with the twins. So much for his hope to speak to Tommy alone. He really didn't want to be asking questions about the ninjas with those kids there.

Jason was close enough that he could hear what they were saying and he stopped short, recognising the word.

"Something happened," Will was saying, "that allowed a seed to get past the gem of Orasella and into the minds of one of the order. It took years, but finally she was able to turn him. And he gave the gem to her."

The twins were a part of this whole thing. He'd suspected from Tommy and Billy's story that there was more going on than they'd actually said. But this was more than that. Jason had to figure out a way to get Tommy on his own so he could find out what was really happening. He couldn't trust the twins. The tape could have been faked and he had only their word that they really were from the future.

This could all just be a trick to keep him from learning about Orasella.

They must have heard him, because Tommy turned round. He greeted him with a slight wave and a, "Hey, bro." Then he looked concerned. "What's up?"

Jason wondered what he should say. Should he just ask to speak to Tommy alone or wait a bit and think about what he'd heard? Should he demand that the twins come clean?

"Have you figured out what to tell Kimberly?" he asked. It was a reasonable question for him to ask and should hopefully distract Tommy from wondering what was really going on in his head. It worked out better than he'd hoped, because the twins got into a heated argument that ended up with Will storming off.

Jason blinked after the departing figure, wondering quite what had happened. He hadn't noticed anything that should have warranted the much of a display of temper.

Trina sighed, "I'd better go after him. Otherwise, he'll just end up sulking for a month." She stood and walked off, leaving Jason beneath the tree with Tommy.

"I don't know how I'm going to cope," Tommy muttered.

"You've got all of us to help you," Jason said. Tommy managed a smile. There was a pause and Jason judged that enough time had passed for a complete and utter shift in conversation.

"I was wondering about when you were with the ninjas," Jason said.

"Yeah, what about it?"

"Well, the others told me I said something. I don't remember it, but apparently I said, 'Orasella'. I was wondering if maybe you heard anything like that when you were their prisoner."

"No. I didn't hear anything like that," Tommy said.

Jason simply nodded, but his mind was racing. Tommy had just lied to him. He'd just looked him in the eye and lied. Jason would trust Tommy with his life and would believe anything he said under any other circumstances. And he had just lied.

The ninjas had the ability to alter people's minds. They'd done it to him to make him forget. Maybe they'd done something to Tommy, changed the way he thought somehow. Whatever had happened, Jason now knew he couldn't trust Tommy anymore. Not until this was over.

Not until he knew the truth.