Disclaimer: I don't own Power Rangers
Author's note: Once again, I apologize for the long delay in between chapters. It's the same reason that the last chapter was so long in being posted up that this one was delayed. I've had writer's block, and school. This chapter isn't really that great in my opinion, especially with some scenes in there, right towards the end.
Chapter 12: The Forgotten Dimension- Part III
Sunlight streamed down through the trees that surrounded the clearing.
A veil of pale green light hung over the clearing, making the area seem as if it were in an eternal Spring-time.
A young woman stood in the middle of this clearing, looking at all the small plants that were starting to bloom around her.
She felt a gentle hand on her shoulder as she looked at a nearby flower-bud.
"This is what you wanted to show me?" She asked as she turned to the man who stood behind her.
The man nodded, as he ran his fingers through his short brown hair.
She didn't understand why this place was so special that she had been dragged from the base to see. All it was a clearing in the middle of the forest.
After waiting several more seconds, expecting for something to happen in order to give them reason for being out there in the middle of the forest, however after several seconds nothing happened, and the area remained the same.
"You know, you still haven't answered my question. Why are we here? What is it about this place that this place is so special to you, but I find nothing extraordinary about it? All that is here is plants..." she asked turning to the man behind her, her impatience with his silence beginning to grow.
The man laughed slightly at the girl's irritation.
"You don't understand do you?" The man stated as he walked to the center of the clearing and motioned with his hands around the area.
"This is it. This is exactly why we're here."
With a brief flash, the entire scene changed. The woman was now sitting on the ground looking over at the man who sat by her side. His arm around her waist as they sat in a brief silence enjoying the peace. He appeared to be laughing, but no audible sound could be heard.
With another flash, the scene changed once more, the couple remained where they had been, but now the man wore a serious look upon his face.
"Sometimes I wonder if this battle is even worth it. Every time we go out to the battle field, every friend and family member that gets killed, every enemy we kill, and every innocent life that is taken in the war, you and I both know what it means. It means the chaos has become stronger, every soul that it absorbs, every power that it collects; it makes our enemy stronger....and in turn stirs changes and irregularities in our minds."
"Because of this, we're starting to lose focus of what we originally sought out. We lost sight of our goal; and we're all starting to lose sight of who we really are, and who we were. Is that what you are talking about? The chaos of battle starting to influence our minds." The girl stated.
The man looked ahead, not nodding or even giving the slightest signal that the girl had guessed what he was speaking of correctly.
"But why is this place special?"
The scene immediately changed once more, the whole area had changed. Smoke filled the clearing, hanging in the air like a thick blanket, almost as if it were trying to conceal the horrid scene from view.
The orange-red glow of fire could be seen shining through the black smoke.
The girl, another man, and the man from before were standing back-to back with their weapons drawn. They were surrounded by several monsters, completely outnumbered.
Another flash occurred and the fires were out, but the beauty and serenity was no longer there. Instead, the charred remains of trees and grass littered the area. The area's peaceful greenish tint had now been replaced with a cold and harsh gray light, from the overcast sky.
Beelazalea's eyes opened slowly. She was back in her room in the servant's quarters of the castle. A sigh escaped her lips as she looked at the dark, cold stone wall near her bed.
As she sat up slowly, she looked around her surroundings. Her head hurt terribly, she was sore, and felt drained of her energy.
How had she gotten here? The last thing that she remembered was having snuck into the Ranger's Command Center, to visit the Red Ranger, to see about his condition.
Trying to recall this, she was only brought back to brief, blurry flashes of the whole fight between her and the Ape-Ninjetti Spirit, and her attempt at trying to kill Rocky.
She remembered it, however vaguely.
It had all felt very dream-like to her, like she had been there only not entirely. With the feeling that she had, it was hard to be certain whether or not the events that she was recalling were real or not.
As she sat up, she felt a slight twinge of pain hit her. Looking at her arm, she gasped. There was a bruise upon her forearm, from where she had fallen and knocked over some of the equipment at the Red Ranger's bedside.
So, it hadn't been a dream. She thought as she looked down at the bruise upon her arm.
She had actually attacked the Red Ranger.
Looking into the shadows of the dimly lit room, she frowned, as if there was someone standing there in the darkness.
"I should have known..." She stated.
Getting to her feet she approached the door, as she reached the door she gave one last glace back to the shadows of the room.
Adam stumbled forward nearly falling down, as he blasted through another set of oncoming enemies.
They had run into a slight problem with their escape route, even on the MPVG, there wasn't exactly a clear route for them to travel.
As they had figured, this place was a maze, and having started out in the middle of it, they were getting lost easily.
On top of that it seemed like every time they turned around, a new enemy was popping up. It almost seemed as if these guys were just teleporting here at random, as if they had some sort of sense telling them exactly where the escaping rangers were at.
He and Aisha had a difficult time trying to make sure none of the Ranger's parents ended up injured.
The monsters were showing up at least three or more at a time, so it was difficult to make sure that none of the monsters got past the two of them.
Being lost in this maze, and battling monsters, all while trying to keep their parents safe, was starting to take their toll on them.
Everyone's nerves were starting to wear thin, especially Adam and Aisha's.
The both of them knew that they had to get out of this whole dimension soon. They were sure that they didn't have much time left as that it had already been well over five hours since they had started on this mission.
If they didn't get out soon, they both knew that they would lose their parents forever, or at least be killed by them.
It really didn't help that everyone was counting on the two of them to get everyone out of there in time. This whole mission, had started out in the hands of six rangers, and now with half an hour left, it had fallen onto the shoulders of just two.
Adam felt that if he hadn't been too concerned and focused on this mission, he probably would have snapped by this point with the frustration of the mission building up on him.
In their escape, which had led them to this maze of hallways, he actually had to keep himself from shouting at his own father whenever he had asked if they had known where they were going.
Luckily he had been able to keep his frustration to a minimum.
"There's got to be some sort of signal interference in this area." Aisha stated as she looked down at the MPVG screen. It had suddenly started picking up nothing but static, much to their annoyance.
Adam frowned from beneath his helmet as he shouldered the power Ax temporarily. That had to have been Ivan and Beelzalea's doing.
Those two, Beelzalea and Ivan, with what they were putting the Rangers through in the short time that they had teamed up, Adam could swear that those two were a match made for each other.
Ivan was a manipulative, malevolent, annoyance. (Adam couldn't call Ivan a pain, in the fact that aside from having been the first to destroy the Command Center, destroy their power, forcing them to go in search of a temporary power, Ivan had actually been one of their most easily defeated opponents.)
And Beelzalea? Well, she too was manipulative, and a pain in the butt, and they hadn't even had to face her in battle at all. Adam could make this judgment from her schemes.
Heaving a sigh as he finished taking down two monsters, he looked around at the hallway.
Adam couldn't help but draw the comparisons to the stereotypical science experiment often done by high School students on television shows; the whole experiment training a mouse to run through a maze.
In the experiment, the mouse would direct itself through the maze to get to the food that had been placed at the end of the maze.
However, in the case of the mouse, it had a sense of smell to direct it to the food. On top of that, the mouse was really directing itself through a small maze.
They were trying to direct more than just themselves to the exit.
The mouse didn't have to put up with monsters on the way to the other end of the maze, they did.
Actually, Adam thought, the comparison of this situation being like the experiment with the mouse was a bad comparison. This situation was hardly anything like that.
The situation was more like a blind-folded Chicken carrying a ticking time-bomb, being chased through a maze by several angry butchers, all intent on killing it, with the bomb slowly counting down to zero before exploding, and beating the butchers to the goal, and the only thing to help the chicken get out of danger is to get out of the maze.
Adam shook his head as that analogy came to mind. That was the craziest analogy that he had ever come up with.....a blind-folded chicken with a time-bomb? Exactly how many cartoons had he been watching lately?
That almost sounded like a analogy that Rocky would have come up with, to try to reduce the stress and tension of the situation by making them all laugh as that awkward image came through their minds.
The whole thought made Adam smile a bit, and feel considerably less stressed, as if Rocky had actually just made the weird comparison.
But this relaxation was only temporary. It only took a few seconds for the stress, tension and irritation of the mission to come falling onto that relaxed feeling, crushing it and causing Adam to crash back into the current situation.
"Any idea on which way we should be going?" Aisha asked as she looked around the corner of the hallway, to see if the coast was clear.
Shaking his head, Adam looked over his shoulder towards his parents. He was sure that they hadn't been brought to this place going through the hallways; if they had been they probably would have already made a suggestion on how to get out of here.
The two of them usually could give directions to others on how to get to a place that they had been before.
"Either way we turn, we're gonna end up in another battle, even if the hallway is clear." Adam stated as he looked down the other hallway.
Mr. Oliver clenched his fist as he looked at the two Rangers. He felt kind of bad for the two of them.
They were the only ones who could help them out of there, and help them get back to their children.
Even though quite a few of the adults here had skills in various martial arts fighting styles, they knew it wouldn't really be much help, seeing that the two Rangers were already having a hard enough time fending off the monsters with their weapons.
Mr. Oliver just wished that there was a way for them to be of some use to the Rangers, and make the process of getting out of here easier, and quicker for them all.
Jason crossed his arms as he looked towards the approaching island. Almost everyone else was down below deck talking and catching up on what was happening
He would have been there down there with the others but he, really just didn't feel like it.
Was it really a good idea to have Adam and Aisha go ahead and try to get all of the parents out of there by themselves?
Had he made a mistake in giving that order?
If anything happened to them, or their parents it would his fault.
He had told them that he could trust them with this mission, but, even he had his doubts when he actually started to think about it.
Why did he do that? He would put his trust in people, believing that they could handle the situation by themselves, without even considering the difficulty of the situation.
It wouldn't be until later, that he would realize exactly what he had just asked them do, and regret that he had even done so.
With a sigh, Jason looked down at his gloved hands.
"Maybe that's why Zordon made Tommy the leader." He muttered to himself.
For a while, Jason had gone with the belief that the reason why Zordon had made Tommy the leader was because he had some suspicion that the former Red Ranger was going to be chosen to go to the peace-conference in Switzerland.
But, since he had time sit back and think about the dangerous task that he had just put two of his fellow rangers into, and all the times in the past when he had given orders to the team....well....he had started to change his belief on why Tommy was made the leader.
Tommy would never just place a huge task on someone's hands, without much thought of the consequence; he didn't just immediately give a plan of action to his teammates and reassure them that they could do it, because he had placed his trust in them. He actually thought out what order he was giving, in consideration of his teammates well being. Just like a true leader should do.
Jason frowned as he looked down at the golden-diamond pattern on his Ranger gloves. Zordon has seen how irresponsible he had been with the lives of his friends, and knew he had to put a stop to it, and that is why Tommy had been made leader.
It was a wonder to him how Zordon had even let him keep his Ranger powers after all the times he had come up with a dangerous plan for his friends to carry out, and it was even more of a wonder to him, why Zordon had even let him return, if he knew how unqualified to be a Ranger he was.
He sighed as he looked over. He just hoped that they could get there to help Adam and Aisha in enough time.
The fog that usually covered the floor of the castle, lazily drifted around, drifting up in small swirls at it hit the throne in the center of the room.
A dull, clunking noise echoed around the chamber as Zedd tapped his fingers against the throne.
He has his eyes set upon the hourglass that had been placed on a table in the middle of the throne-room,
Every once in awhile his eyes would dart over to Ivan Ooze, who sat opposite him across the room, in a throne that he had conjured up for himself.
The man is here for only a day and he already begun to act as though he lived there and was the king of this place!
Beelzalea had brought him here, but for what purpose?
As he looked at her from across the room, he saw the white-haired magi sitting there with her head bent, as she looked down into the swirling fog beneath her feet.
She sits like an obedient dog, Zedd thought as he observed the Magi. She sits there with her head bent, and her mind upon other matters, until she is given an order.
Personally, Zedd felt that Beelzalea's current behavior was more how it should be. Maybe Beelzalea had finally begun to realize her place within this castle.
The look that was just visible behind the curtain of snow-white hair, did not escape Zedd's notice. Beelzalea's eyes would dart to him, and then to Ivan Ooze, and then back down the fog, repeating every few seconds.
There was something about that look that she gave, that made Zedd start to wonder.
It was the usual look of hate that she gave to him, but something was different about it. It almost appeared as if she were put off by something. He could tell something was bothering her, and it wasn't him.
Something was bothering her, and Zedd wanted to know what. Any information of what could be bothering Beelzalea would be a joy, since it would allow him to torment her more.
Trini smiled as she looked out the car window. It was such a great feeling to know that soon one of her friends would be reunited with their family.
Everything seemed to be going great; she had a good feeling about everything that was going on around her. She even felt that things were still going good with the other Rangers, despite the fact that they had heard nothing from them since they had left.
With all the optimism that she was feeling she couldn't help but smile. It was a beautiful summer day, (at least what was left of the day, it was pretty late in the afternoon already.) and the weather was great, and the scenery was even better.
The last time she had felt this great was when she was in Switzerland.
She tried not to let her worry get in her way of enjoying today.
Right now, she was slightly exhausted from the fun they had today, and was in a great cheerful mood.
They had gone and done a ton of shopping today, and while Trini knew that Kimberly would have loved to have been there, Trini knew that if Kimberly had gone with them, the whole day might not have been as fun, since Kimberly would have spent the most of the day worrying about her mother.
"We're arriving at the harbor!" One of the ship's crew called from above deck, to the Rangers below deck.
Kimberly gave a sigh as she walked up on deck, stretching. Her nerves were starting to get to her, and were making her back hurt.
She wanted to get this over with as soon as possible, and in enough time.
If Ivan or Beelzalea had even hurt her mother, they were going to pay.
"Jason. Tommy." Silver asked turning towards the both of them as she passed by Kimberly, almost pushing her overboard in her haste to talk to white and Gold Rangers.
The two looked at the co-captain of the ship as she approached them, both giving a hesitant nod as she addressed them.
"I'm to understand that the both of you are the people that Roan and I should speak to about any plans of action as soon as we are close enough to the island." She stated, giving a glance over her shoulder towards where Roan was standing.
Both Tommy and Jason looked over at each other for a brief minute. Neither one of them could really believe that Silver had wanted to speak to both of them.
Although the looks were the same, the thoughts that were behind them were completely different.
Tommy was smiling at Jason from behind his helmet; this was the first time in awhile that Jason had been mentioned as being the leader, right alongside him, and that someone had actually turned to the both of them to get their input on a plan of action.
It had been awhile since Jason had properly been called a leader, Tommy thought, even if he was sharing the title with him.
He knew it had to have been bothering his friend about having been pretty much demoted whenever he had come along.
Sometimes he wondered if Jason felt jealous because of this.
Tommy already knew that Jason had felt pretty bad about the whole incident that had led to him losing his Green Ranger Power, and he was sure he was still upset about it, despite everyone telling Jason it wasn't his fault.
But, he wasn't so sure how Jason felt about Zordon setting the title of "leader of the Power Rangers" upon the new White Ranger, whenever it had been pretty much established in the team way before that point that Red was the leader.
He was sure that Jason had some jealousy about it, even if he never expressed it, and said that Zordon couldn't have made a better choice.
Jason, on the other hand, was thinking exactly what he had been thinking before, and assumed that there had been some mistake in Silver thinking that both he and Tommy could be the leader.
"Sure, you have any plan in mind?" Tommy asked following Silver back over towards Roan.
Silver put one of her hands on her hip, as she laid a map out on the table in front of the two of them.
"The Island used to serve as a prison, so I can assure you that it is littered with traps. It would be unwise of you to go in alone, without some sort of escort."
Roan nodded, as he looked over at his wife, and then to the two Rangers.
"Lucky for you, quiet a number of us here have a good knowledge of the island and its traps." He stated.
Tommy nodded, well, that was one less worry on his mind, if Silver and Roan were going to helping them out on trying to avoid all the traps that they could on this island. The most he had to do, was come up with some sort of plan of attack, and try to get in contact with Aisha and Adam to find their current location and set up a time to meet up, so they could all escape.
"Now, when we get close enough to the harbor, As Roan and I usually do, we will split up. I will take my brigade on shore, and Roan will command the forces on the ship. They'll be providing cover fire against the soldiers that are stationed on the island." Silver continued.
She drew out their path on the map, while explaining to the Rangers what the plan was going to be once they had gotten onto the island.
"This is our plan, If either of you have any other plans on what should be done, as far as your team goes, please tell us, so that Roan and I can adjust our plans accordingly."
Tommy looked over at Jason to see if his friend had any other idea on what should be done.
"Your plan sound good, if the island is as dangerous as you say, we'll be needing some sort of guide to help carry out the remaining part of the mission in enough time." Jason began as he looked at the two pirates, and then down to the map laid out in front of them.
He then looked up and towards Tommy.
"But, first we should contact, Adam and Aisha. See how they're doing, and set up a meeting point." he began as he looked around the group.
Billy, who had joined the other rangers in the group at this point, nodded as he began to explain the calculations that he had made upon the teleportation system capabilities, and his scan of the nearby prison.
"Although, Beelazlea and Ivan were able to create a field to cut off teleportation signals within the prison, and within a mile radius around the prison, it doesn't seem like they were able to cut off any teleportation along the shore." He explained.
Jason nodded as he touched his communicator.
"Black-Frog, Yellow Bear...come in."
"We read you! What's up?" Aisha asked as she leaned against the wall, trying to catch her breath from the last monster encounter that she had Adam had gone through.
"We're almost at the island. What's your current location?"
Aisha looked over at Adam, almost as if saying; do we really want to tell them that we're in sort of a bind?
"Still in the castle. Beelzalea and Ivan sure picked a good place; it's got tons of traps!! I mean in the last hour we've only been able to cover a few hallways, and still can't find the exit! Monsters keep turning up everywhere we go!" She finally stated.
At this point in the conversation, on Jason's side, Silver grabbed his wrist, and spoke into the communicator.
"Aye, listen well. If you are only a few hallways from your initial destination, keep on a lookout for a wall covered in vines. 10 steps away from it should be a loose brick in the wall, across from a rather awkward crack. If you push the brick into place, the wall should open. While you are holding the brick the wall will remain open. Whoever is holding the brick down has only two seconds to get across the hallway and through the door before it closes. This will lead you to a secret path, follow it straight ahead until you come to a split, take the right path, the left will just lead you right back into the prison. From there, take a left. At the third split, take a right and follow the hallway all the way to the end. You'll find your way out of the prison in no time. Just be wary, there may be monsters lurking here as well."
"Got it." Aisha stated into her communicator, glancing over at Adam to see if he remembered what the directions were, in case she were to forgot along the way.
Adam nodded and gave a thumbs up as he confirmed to Aisha that he had understood perfectly what they were looking for and that he was sure to be keeping an eye out for it.
"We'll meet you at least half a mile out from the exit. Teleportation will still be jammed, but from there we should be able to head down to the shore, by then we should be out of range of the field's greatest effects, since it's still close to the teleportation field, the teleportation signals should still be a little weak, but I think if we link our power together, we should have just enough of an energy boost to teleport, but I'm not sure where our teleportation trajectory will land us up....it could land us up in Angel Grove, another location on earth, or in an entirely different dimension." Billy stated to his two friends through his communicator.
"Isn't there some way that we can control where we are headed in the teleportation?" Aisha asked as she looked around at the Ranger's parents. She knew that after they got them out of this dimension they were going to be free from slowly ending up under Ivan's influence, but they still needed to be returned back to where they should be.
"With the amount of energy that we're going to have to expend in order to do a mass teleportation, no. I'll have to contact Alpha to see what he can do, as far as getting us guided back to Earth, but other than that...." Billy responded with a sigh.
Aisha gave a small grunt of annoyance that there wasn't way that they could teleport to an exact location, but at least it was something. As long as they were able to get away in this place in enough time, it would be good enough.
"I just have one question..." Kimberly asked over the communicator to her two friends, a hint of worry in her voice. "How is everyone?"
Adam gave a look over to the parents of the Rangers. In the light from the hallway that he could see them, they weren't looking too well. It seemed like Ivan's magic was starting to kick in on them, as the time was counting down. Some of them were starting to become pale and even if they didn't act like it, he could see all life and humanity starting to die from their eyes and their faces.
It would only be a matter of time before they would be blood-thirsty Zombies out to mercilessly kill them.
".....They're....doing just fine. I think they'll make it." He lied to the Pink Ranger.
He knew it would have been too painful for his friend to hear that her mother wasn't exactly doing as well as she had hoped, and that things were starting to look pretty bad. So he had to lie, in order to protect her from the truth that her mother, and all of the Ranger's parents were starting to be affected, and it didn't look like they were going to able to make it at all.
Heck, from the looks of things it didn't seem like they were in a good enough condition to make it out of this prison.
"Okay, we've got about an hour to meet up, and get down to the shore...So I guess we'll see you when you get here." Jason concluded as he ended the transmission.
Aisha sighed as she looked over her shoulder to the parents.
"Let's get going."
Nodding in agreement, the Rangers continued on down the hallway looking for the secret passage.
Jin Lain paced around her living room for quite a while after she had received a phone-call from her brother in Turtle Cove saying that he was going to be coming up to Angel Grove for the night.
Her brother hardly ever just spontaneously decided to visit, and never this close to nightfall.
Usually if he was going to be coming up to visit them, wherever they were living, he would have some purpose and make arrangements at least a few days ahead of time, to allow them to prepare to accommodate guests in the house.
There wasn't really any special occasion occurring within the next day. There wasn't going to be a family reunion any time in the near future. Usually if there was, she would have been getting more phone calls from her other siblings and her relatives telling her that they were going to be in town, asking if they wanted to meet up for a while, or if there were any good places to stay the night, if the house was too full at the time.
Hopefully, he wasn't visiting with bad news, like the death of their mother or something.
No, Jin thought as she shook her head, that can't be it. I talked to mother on the phone not but a minute before he called, and I'm sure she just didn't fall over dead like the second that she let go of the phone.
Of course, stranger things have happened.
"Jin, you should relax. Maybe your brother is just coming to see if we need any more help moving things in or unpacking. Also he may have some news that he would want to tell you to your face...like he's finally getting married or something." Mr. Lain stated from the kitchen as he made dinner.
Mrs. Lain laughed briefly after her husband had finished speaking.
"I doubt it. You know settling down for marriage is the last thing on that man's mind right now!"
Mr. Lain frowned as he looked down at the food he was cooking. His wife was starting to get into her nervous habits again. If something occurred that sparked her curiosity about why it was happening, she would start to pace the room, thinking of all the possibilities of what could have been going on.
"It's not going to do you any good worrying. I'm sure it's nothing bad. Your brother would have told you over the phone if it was something really bad."
Jin sighed as she looked out the window; two cars had just pulled into the driveway.
"That's his car, but who's the other car belong to?"
Holding her breath in anticipation as she stood at the door, Jin waited for the group to come up the drive-way and knock on the door.
Almost unable to hold back her curiosities she opened the door, right as soon as the group got to the door, before they had even rung the doorbell.
"Brother, what a surprise! Come in!!!"
The entire group followed Jin into the living room. All of them were a little curious about her sudden cheerfulness, which almost seemed a little forced through concern.
"I guess you should make yourselves comfortable. Try to find any place to sit, and if there is a box in your way, just move it. Sorry for the mess, we're still trying to get everything situated."
Mr. Kuriyo turned leaned over and whispered towards the group, as Jin ran around the room trying to straighten things out.
"It's okay, she always does this when she has unexpected company."
Eventually everyone found a place to sit down in the room. Things were already starting to become a little awkward to them all. They just weren't sure how to begin this whole conversation.
Earlier in the car, they had managed to get permission from Zordon to tell Kylie's parents that they were the Power Rangers, if it was going to make things easier for her parents to understand, but they weren't even sure how to begin to tell anyone this.
"Obviously, for you to be making a surprise visit up here to Angel Grove, especially with other guests, something must be very important." Jin stated, trying to begin the conversation.
"....But perhaps this would be best discussed over dinner?" Mr. Lain stated as he entered the room with a cheerful smile on his face. "How about you all have dinner with us, we've got plenty and we don't mind sharing a bit."
Agreeing, the Rangers and Mr. Kuriyo followed Mr. and Mrs. Lain into the kitchen for dinner.
Although the kitchen was cramped, everyone was eating pretty much elbow to elbow, and chairs had to be brought in from other rooms just to fit around the small table, the atmosphere was rather lively, and the food was good.
"You know, you kids look familiar. I have met you before, haven't I?" Jin asked as she looked around at the Rangers, her eyes bright and seeming more relaxed than they had been moments before this dinner had started.
Zack nodded, with a smile. He remembered this woman, but it didn't strike him who this woman was until just then. He had met her a few days back, when they had gone to Adam's house, to check up on his parents after receiving news of Adam's supposed death. She had been with Mrs. Park whenever the attack at the Cafe had happened, and had stayed with Adam's parents for awhile after returning home.
Jin's eyes turned towards Kylie at this point. A slight curious expression began to appear across her face. She had seen all the other kids that had accompanied her brother to her house before, but she had not seen this girl before.
She looked familiar, and it was starting to creep Jin out a little bit. This girl just wouldn't stop staring and smiling at her through the whole entire dinner.
"Hm. Jin....There is something that I needed to discuss with both you and Kouji. That's why I've come here without much warning. I have to talk to you about something that happened about fourteen years ago." Mr. Kuriyo stated, clearing his throat, as he noticed his sister's curious eyes upon Kylie.
At this moment, with this mention, Jin's face became pale, and her eyes began to become watery. She had to excuse herself from the table, as horrible memories had begun to come back into her mind of the incident.
Mr. Lain stood up, his eyes were narrowed, anger was starting to build up in him at the mention of this. He knew exactly where his brother-in-law was going with this, and he thought that he had made it clear a long time ago, that he didn't want to ever speak of that incident ever again.
He tried to remain calm about it in front of his guests, but he couldn't help but strike a harsh tone as he spoke to his brother in law.
"I've buried that all with the past; I think it would be good if you did the same." He stated stiffly as he looked down at his brother in-law. His eyes burning with anger.
Mr. Kuriyo bit his lip before opening his mouth to protest.
"But...Kouji...Ky--"
The other rangers were beginning to feel the tension building in the room. Even if Mr. Lain and Mr. Kuriyo were being very calm and dignified about it, they could tell it was just a mask to disguise a heated argument in their presence so that they wouldn't make themselves seem like terrible people for arguing in front of company.
"That's enough."
With this Mr. Lain turned and stepped outside, he needed some cold fresh air, as a relief from the stale heated air of a lingering debate that hung over the crowded kitchen.
Mr. Kuriyo sighed as he looked over at the other Rangers. Things had not gone well at all with this.
Zack crossed his arms and looked over at the others. This was going to be just about as difficult as they had figured it would be. It might have been fourteen years since the incident had occurred, but apparently the apparent loss of their daughter had not exactly something that they had gotten over.
"I'm thinking maybe that wasn't the best way to start out that conversation." Kat stated as she looked down the hall to the room where Mrs. Lain had gone. She could still hear her sobbing through the closed door.
"I think...I might know something that will make this easier..." Kylie stated as she got up from her chair and stepped out into the living room.
Finally the Rangers had landed on the island.
They found the whole island to be eerily quiet, despite the fact that there had been several monsters on their scanners not but a few minutes earlier. It almost seemed if the whole island had suddenly become deserted.
Something had to be up.
"....Keep your eyes peeled. I know they've got to be hiding around here somewhere, waiting for the opportunity to strike." Tommy stated as he drew out Saba.
The others nodded as they drew out their weapons ready to attack at a moment's notice.
It was always a bad sign if the place they were going to was silent. Usually it was signs of the enemy forces being focused elsewhere, or something worse.
"You don't suppose this is just a set up for an ambush do you?" Kimberly asked as she pushed some of the leaves of the over-grown trees that had fallen in front of her face out of the way.
From the moon, Ivan laughed as he watched the Ranger going through the forest.
"Well, at least she's smarter than she looks...."
Minerva smirked as she walked up beside Ivan. She crossed her arms and watched the scene of the Rangers wandering through the forest.
"Something tells me that you and Beelzalea have more than just an ambush planned." She stated as a mischievous smile began to cross her face as she put her hands on her hips.
If she knew her Magi, then whatever the other plan was, it had to be just evil.
Rita turned to Beelzalea, Her eyes bright with an eagerness to know what her Mother's Magi and Ivan had in store for the rangers.
Although she was eager to know the plan, she was a bit jealous that she wasn't getting to help in this plan at all. She was the queen of this castle after all, she was the one who had originally been after the Rangers, and therefore if the Rangers were possibly to be defeated, she had to be involved!
Zedd on the other hand, was not interested in this plan at all. If it had been up to him, he'd rather that Beelzalea and Ivan had nothing to do with this plan, other than having set up the traps on the island, after that they would have handed over control to him.
"This, looks like the entrance to the secret passage..."Aisha stated as the group looked at the vine covered wall beside them.
Adam nodded trying to feel calm about it; although he couldn't help but think that they might have just walked into another trap.
Mr. Cranston was looking at the wall in front of them with a little bit of skepticism, as he made calculations in his head.
The Rangers and the other parents watched him as he analyzed the mechanism that was supposed to open the secret passageway, and the opening of the passageway itself.
Finally he shook his head.
"....What's the matter Sir?" Adam asked as he approached the Blue Ranger's father.
Mr. Cranston looked over to the Black Ranger, it was obvious that he didn't have some good news about this secret passageway, since he was giving the black-ranger one of those looks as if to say, "I don't think you really want to know."
"Well, your friend, the one who told you about this passage, said that the passage door was only going to stay open for as long as someone was holding the brick back in place...and would only stay open for a few short seconds after the person let go....right?"
Adam nodded. That's what had been said alright.
Mr. Cranston nodded and continued on, adjusting his glasses as he spoke.
"Unfortunately, according to my calculations, it is almost impossible for any of us to make it across this hallway to the passage in enough time, and from the structure of this hallway, the whole hallway is prone to collapse in on itself at any minute."
"Someone's going to have to stay behind?" Aisha asked. It wasn't that she didn't understand what Billy's father was saying; it was more in the fact that she didn't like what Mr. Cranston was saying at all. There was no way that any of the parents were going to be left behind to either die, or become Ivan Ooze's slave.
"I'll stay..."
With this all eyes turned towards Mrs. Park, who had just spoken. Every expression, whether visible or not, was showing shock. This place had to be getting to her; she couldn't just be willing to just go through with something like this could she?
".....I-I mean, someone's going to have to stay behind right? It's impossible to get across this hallway in enough time, and if me staying behind and giving up my life can help you all save yours and help you all return to your kids...then I don't mind doing it." She stated, although her voice trembled with uncertainty.
Adam stepped towards his mother; his eyes were wide and terrified behind his helmet. He understood that part of her was being honest about risking her own life to help them all, but he could tell that part of her reason for wanting to do this, was because of him. She had already given up hope on ever seeing him again. She had accepted the rumor of his death as a fact and knew she couldn't face what she believed to be the horrible reality of it.
"Mo---I mean Ma'am! You can't do that! I won't let you!"
Mr. Park looked at his wife with a nod, as he put his hands on her shoulders, a serious look upon his face.
"I'm not going to just leave my wife here alone. So, if she stays so do I."
Adam turned toward his father, right now things were pretty much crashing in around him with his parents decisions. He knew partially why they were doing this, and he knew how to stop them, but doing so would mean for him to give up his ranger power, for having broken a rule of the Ranger Code. If he didn't do something he knew his parents would just go through with this, and he might as well have just given up his ranger power, for failing to protect the lives of those he cared about.
"We made a promise to all of you guys' children that we'd bring you all back safely....and that means that for no matter what reason we can't let you stay behind." Aisha stated crossing her arms and looking around the group.
"It is alright if we stay behind. You never made a promise to our son, about getting us out of here safely." Mrs. Park stated gently looking at the Yellow Ranger.
Looking up Adam stepped forward and looked at both his parents. Right now, his eyes were burning with a mixture of tears, anger, and fear, and his heart was pounding in his chest.
He let out a roar of frustration, grasping his helmet briefly. He couldn't just sit by helplessly and watch his parents throw their lives away like that.
Taking a couple of breaths to calm himself he paced the hallway for a couple of steps.
"The Yellow Ranger is right. No one is getting left behind. If one of us goes somewhere, we all go, regardless of impossibilities." Mr. Oliver stated looking around the group.
"How exactly long did you estimate for it to take someone to clear this hallway?" Mrs. Desantos asked, interrupting the conversation.
Mr. Cranston turned towards her, and adjusted his glasses. He could see a curious expression on her face as if she too were making an evaluation of the hallway.
"It should take approximately three-point-five seconds at a run in order to clear this hallway, but, it only takes 2 seconds for the passage to close."
"You calculated that at a normal run right?" Mrs. Desantos asked crossing her arms.
Mr. Cranston nodded.
"I think I can make it..." She stated turning towards the Blue Ranger's father.
"You do realize exactly how great the time that I calculated is from the closing of the passage way right?" Mr. Cranston asked.
Mrs. Desantos nodded and cracked her knuckles as she looked towards the other side of the large hallway.
Adam bit his lip, he wasn't so sure if Rocky's mother knew exactly what she was getting into. Sure, she currently held an unbroken record, which she had set while on the Track and field team at Stone Canyon High, but that had been set almost 20 years ago, and he wasn't exactly sure that she was still capable of running quiet as fast as she used to.
"Are you sure you can make it?" Mr. Desantos asked as he looked at his wife.
With a laugh, Mrs. Desantos put her hands on her hips, "I'm a fire-fighter honey! I've had to get out of buildings twice the size of this hallway, in less time, with a 200 pound person over my shoulders; wearing a heavy oxygen tank on my back....I'm sure I can make it."
With a slight smirk hiding behind their helmets, Adam and Aisha looked towards each other. There was something in the way that Mrs. Desantos spoke trying to reassure her husband that she was going to be okay, that made the both of them start to remember Rocky.
"Are you sure you can make it?" Aisha asked putting her hand on Mrs. Desantos's shoulder. Although she herself was certain that Mrs. Desantos could actually make it across the hall before the passage closed in enough time, she couldn't help but have her doubts.
Mrs. Desantos nodded, although there was a slight hesitation in this nod, showing clearly that she even had her own doubts, but was willing to at least try.
"Even though it's completely against my better judgment...and if anything happens, I'm never going to forgive myself...but for lack of better plan, I'm going to ignore the sane part of my mind right now, and allow you to do this.......Normally, I would never allow someone to do something this dangerous...but we have no choice..." Adam stated as he took a deep breath.
Aisha nodded, and looked over. It was against her better judgment to allow Mrs. Desantos to be about as reckless as her son, by throwing herself into danger, but they had no choice, no one could be left behind, and so they had to trust her.
"Alright, the brick seems to be about here. So, just keep it pushed down until we're all through...you know what to do after that." Aisha stated, as she led Mrs. Desantos over to where she was supposed to be.
The brick was sticking out of the wall about an inch, and was partially covered in loose vines. From the looks of it, this secret passage hadn't been opened in quiet awhile.
It was the only way that they were going to be getting out of here, so they would have to take their chances.
Taking a deep inhale of breath, Mrs. Desantos placed her hands upon the brick, and pushed it back into the wall.
The reaction of the secret passageway was almost instantaneous. No sooner had Mrs. Desantos pushed the brick into place did a rumble echo through the hallway, and the wall opposite of them began to separate.
"Alright, let's go." Aisha stated, as she started to lead the Ranger's parents through the passage.
As each one of the Ranger's parents headed into the passage way they gave a glance back to Mrs. Desantos, silently wishing her luck, hoping that she would get across the hall in enough time.
As Adam followed the rest of them into the passage, he gave one last glance back to Mrs. Desantos.
Had it really been right, not to allow your own parents to stay, but allow the mother of your best friend stay behind? He just didn't know.
Part of him wanted to say, no; that was a very stupid thing that had just been done.
But, part of him was set on relying on saying it wasn't stupid, and that she was going to just fine. Things couldn't go terribly wrong, not as long as they were around.
No matter what the situation had been before, the Rangers and whoever they were protecting would be alright. The Rangers had never officially lost anyone that they had been protecting yet, nor had they lost their own lives in battle, although many times they should have. It almost seemed as if the Rangers had an aura of luck hanging around them, and as long as anyone was around them, the luck would protect them, and they'd be safe.
Adam had come believe in this idea, an idea that many of his team-mates referred to as "Ranger Luck." Whoever they were near, had a certain amount of Ranger luck with them, and it would help get them through.
"Alright, that's the last of us here....."Aisha stated as she finished counting all of the adults.
Mrs. Cranston bit her lip as she strained her ears to hear down the hallway, she could have sworn that she had heard something coming towards them.
Apparently everyone else heard it too, because the group had fallen deathly quiet as they all tried to strain their ears to listen to what was coming.
Aisha hoped that the sound that they were hearing was nothing more than a lingering echo of the passage way opening.
Unfortunately, it wasn't.
After a few seconds, they saw the hulking forms of several monsters starting to come their way from both sides of the hallway.
To make matters worse, the vines that had been around the brick seemed to have come to life, and was trying to wrap themselves around Mrs. Desantos's hands and feet.
"RUN!!!" Adam found himself shouting from across the hall to Mrs. Desantos as the monsters began to swarm the hallway.
Panic had begun to fill Mrs. Desantos as she saw the monsters swarming the hallway, and took notice of the vines trying to wrap themselves around her arms.
'Okay, treat this like any other fire', she thought as she looked down both sides of the hallways towards the monsters that were rushing at her, 'stay calm'.
With a sharp intake of breath, Mrs. Desantos released the brick, and quickly wrenched her hands free from the vines around her wrists.
Quickly she ran away from the wall, her heart was pounding inside her chest. She could see the passageway starting to close, while the Black and Yellow Rangers were trying to put some force into the passage way's opening to keep it opened for at least a few more seconds, although their attempts seemed to be of no avail.
Rocks were starting to fall from the ceiling, as this place was starting to collapse in on itself.
As Mrs. Desantos ran, one of the falling rocks' sharp edges would occasionally cut at her, as she weaved around the hallway, hurtling over some of the large chunks of debris, that had already fallen in her way and vines that seemed to be growing quickly throughout the hallway grasping hold of anything that remained stationary for more than a few seconds.
Maybe this wasn't going to be as easy as I thought it was going to be, she thought as she looked ahead. With all the weaving around things that she had to do, getting across the hallway was taking longer than it should
As she approached the other side of the hallway, she saw that a huge wall of vines had burst out of the ground, blocking her way to the others.
Oh, God, no!! What am I supposed to do? I can't jump over it, and it looks too thick to just run through! That wall reaches all the way to the ceiling...it would take too long to climb it!
Although this obstacle was close, Mrs. Desantos continued to run at it. The least she could pray was that something miraculous would happen whenever she hit the wall, like she would somehow be able to throw enough force into the wall to allow herself to break a hole in it and just barely come through it.
For a brief second as she ran, Mrs. Desantos swore she heard a whistle, as if someone was trying to get her attention. She could hear it clear as day above the roar of the hallway; it was almost as if she could hear it in her head.
A brief red light darted across the hallway, just in the corner of her vision.
Suddenly, she felt an extra weight in her hands as continued to run.
Giving a brief glance down to the object, she was stunned to see that it was a weapon.
"Oddly convenient, suspicious, But If it can cut through this wall, I'll take it."
With a roar, Mrs. Desantos slashed at the vines as she approached them.
To her surprise, she found that the whole wall was obliterated in a red light right before her eyes. Although she knew that she couldn't stand to watch this stunning display of power, knowing that the building was still collapsing at an alarming pace, (if not quicker because of the attack that she had just launched upon it.), and that the opening to the passageway was starting to close rapidly.
I'm almost there!
She could see the opening, although rather narrow at this point, just right ahead of her a few feet.
"Hurry!!" The yellow ranger shouted, she was just visible behind the gap in the wall, and although her face couldn't be seen from behind the helmet, Mrs. Desantos could imagine that she was looking rather panicked.
Pushing off from the ground, Mrs. Desantos leapt across the remaining few feet of the hallway, just as the door closed.
With a quick forward roll, she managed to squeeze herself in to the passageway with all of the others.
As she knelt there catching her breath, a loud boom was heard throughout the hallway.
Turning back, would no longer be an option.
"Ma'am....are you alright?" Adam asked as he knelt down to Mrs. Desantos.
It was hard to see in this hallway, but the dim light of the torches that lined the hallway provided enough light for Adam to see that Mrs. Desantos nodded in reply to his concern. It was also enough light to see that she had a huge smile across her face.
The smile was one similar to one that Rocky usually had whenever he had just accomplished something difficult, or had just done something completely dangerous.
"Woo, that was a rush!" She stated getting to her feet and brushing some of the sweat from her forehead, with her free hand.
Without much word, Mr. Desantos embraced his wife in a hug, showing that he had concern for her safety, and had been almost sure that she wasn't going to make it for a moment there.
"How did you get past that wall, it just shot up out of nowhere!!?" Mrs. Hart asked curiously as she approached Mrs. Desantos.
At the mention of this, Mrs. Desantos remembered the weapon that had appeared up. Before now, she hadn't even known what weapon had just appeared in her hands, all she had known was that it was useful and that she had needed it.
Now, as she held the weapon out for everyone in the group to see, she managed to get a good look at the weapon herself.
It was a sword....
....and not just any sword....
"That's....!" Aisha stated in shock, bringing a gloved hand to the mouth of her helmet to suppress her shock.
"No Way!! Impossible!" Many of the parents exclaimed in awed tones of voices as their eyes fell upon the weapon.
"...The Red Ranger's Power Weapon...." Adam finally stated as he looked down at the weapon, nodding.
Regardless of the light in the hallway, this weapon was undoubtedly the Power Sword.
Looking back towards the closed passage, Adam gave a brief smile.
Thanks again for the help Rocky.
"Come on, we'd better get moving..." Aisha stated after a few seconds, putting her hand on Adam's shoulder before
Ivan growled angrily as he watched the scene before him.
The two Rangers and all of the parents had managed to find a way around his own trap, and it looked like they were going to be able to get out of the prison without any trouble.
"Face it Ivan, you'll never be able to outsmart the Rangers. All of your uncreative traps are too easily foiled." Zedd stated with an evil laugh.
Personally he enjoyed watching the Rangers escape. It was amusing watching Ivan's plans being foiled by a group of teenagers.
It just proved to him, that Ivan was no better than he was.
"It's not Ivan's fault the plan was foiled." Minerva stated as she flipped open her green-feathered fan, and looked back at her daughter's husband.
"Then whose fault is it? The only other person left to blame for a weak trap is Beelzalea..." Zedd growled as he tapped his fingers against the throne.
As he spoke her name he gave a glance back to the Magi.
"You're blaming Beelzalea? Hmph! A likely story that her traps would be foiled by a bunch of teenagers. If it wasn't for her traps, some of the best warriors in the galaxy would still be alive, and the planets they fought for wouldn't be under my control." Minerva stated crossing her arms.
Rita nodded agreeing with her mother.
"Unless...." Minerva started, her eyes shifting over to the Magi who stood behind the throne, almost hidden in the fog.
Zedd's eyes followed Minerva's, almost joyfully. He wanted to see how Beelzalea was going to work her way out of this one!
Beelzalea was finally being confronted about her sympathy for the Rangers, and it was sure to be written all over her face that she had purposefully made the trap fail.
"My Queen, I am shocked that you would believe that I have purposefully allowed the Rangers to slip past the trap unharmed! Have I not served you loyally in the past?"
Zedd growled as Minerva nodded and turned away from Beelzalea. Minerva seemed to have bought her story without question.
Well, if everyone didn't believe that Beelzalea had caused the trap to fail, then who was to blame?
"If you're looking for anyone to blame Zedd, I suggest you try to blame the Red Ranger....or rather remnants of his power, that are lingering around the Rangers, which are having an reaction to the traps that we have set, allowing anyone that the Rangers are closest to, achieve anything such as making their way past activated traps unscathed, by merely wishing for it."
Rita stamped her foot and began shouting, "Well what are we going to do about it?! We can't let those Rangers just escape!!!"
"Do not worry my Mistress. I had a monster planned for just such an occasion."
It didn't take long for the Monster that Beelzalea was talking about to find the Rangers.
Aisha's shoulders had been tense as they had walked through the passageway; it was to be expected, whenever she was left to the task of keeping a close guard on someone.
Personally, Aisha hated doing this job and was usually lucky enough to have someone else have to keep a watch-out for enemies while they were sneaking around.
As soon as she was assigned with the job of being a guard and keeping a watch out for monsters, that was immediately when she started getting bad feelings about the area that they were in, and her paranoia would kick in.
With an amplified sense of paranoia, came an amplified sense of hearing and observation. Almost every little sound in this hallway echoed ten times louder than it should have, and she started to take note of every little crack and imperfection in the scenery around her, as well as of everyone's actions.
Being paranoid, made her highly less trustful of everyone and everything around her.
As she walked down this hallway, her shoulders started to become more tense than normal. If her shoulders became any more tense, she believed her shoulders would undoubtedly ended up crushed.
"Maybe it's just me...but it feels like something has been following us ever since we made that first turn..."
Adam and the Ranger's parents stopped temporarily and looked towards Aisha to see if there was anything that was following them.
However, all they saw was the torch-lit hallway from where they had just come from, and nothing else.
Shrugging it off, Aisha and the group continued down the pathway, from the directions that they had been given, it seemed like they were getting pretty close to the exit anyhow.
In fact, Aisha swore she could see the faintest spark of sunlight at the end of this path, and if her nose wasn't deceiving her; the air around this area seemed to smell a little fresher than the stale air from earlier.
Surely the exit was directly ahead of them, and if they continued down this path they would get to their destination in enough times.
As soon as she thought this, her breath suddenly caught in her throat as she heard a soft slithering sound, as if something were taking shape a couple of feet behind her.
She could feel it's breathing on her neck, and its eyes boring into her neck.
It was almost as whatever was behind them had its sights on just her, as if it were trying to analyze her.
Turning around, she saw nothing. Even though the feeling of being watched lingered around, more intense than it had been before.
She shrugged it off, gripping the power daggers tighter in her hand.
Something was definitely there, even if she couldn't see it and she knew it was bound to reveal itself eventually.
The monster hissed lightly as it looked down at the yellow ranger as it followed them, crawling like a spider along the ceiling, remaining hidden in the shadows.
So this is the Yellow Ranger? It thought, as its eyes turned yellow. Beelzalea had told him about the rangers, and said that they were to be eliminated and that it was his task to eliminate them.
Hm. A lightening based Element to the Ranger Power? It thought, that could prove useful, lightening is pretty powerful.
As it crawled above the group, its body began to shift from the spider like form it had just moments ago.
With a light thud, it released its grasp from the ceiling, landing gracefully behind the group of Rangers. A pair of wicked looking yellow daggers gripped in its hands.
Hearing this thud, Aisha and the group froze in their tracks, and turned towards the source of this noise.
A creature, with a human like appearance was standing there. They were clothed in armor that resembled a mix between the Bear Zord, and the Yellow Shogun Zord.
In the parts were skin would have been exposed; the creature appeared to have a collective and solidified mass of shadow.
"Who are you?" Aisha asked, as she backed away from the monster.
The creature tilted its head and crossed its arms staring unblinkingly at the Rangers.
"I, Shadow Chameleon, am the strongest and most loyal servant of my mistress..." It stated, its eyes flickering as it spoke.
"Who are you, Yellow Ranger?" it suddenly added before Aisha and the other could make any sort of comment, or movement to retreat.
Aisha put her hands on her hip. That was an absurd thing to ask, even more absurd that this creature had asked and answered this question all in one shot.
She was the Yellow Ranger, that's who she was. If this creature knew that then why did it even bother asking?
"I'm afraid you've wasted too much time in trying to answer my question...." The monster stated, sparks starting to come from the edges of the daggers.
With one loud roar, the monster rushed at the rangers, swiping the daggers through the air.
As the daggers cut through the air, giant yellow bolts of electricity released themselves from the sharp and jagged tips, traveling through the air towards the group.
When the bolts hit the ground missing the group only by a few inches, they exploded, causing some of the hallway to crumble, creating a wall between them and the monster.
"C'mon let's get out of here before anymore trouble shows up." Adam stated as he looked at the pile of debris.
Aisha and the group nodded, and they all took off running down the hallway.
Let's go before more trouble shows up? Aisha thought recalling her friend's previous words. Trouble has already shown up! This whole place is nothing but trouble!
Kimberly bit her lip, as she looked around the place. They had arrived at the place where they were supposed to be meeting up with Aisha and Adam, and had been here for a good few minutes, but the two rangers had never shown up.
The smoke that was rising from above the trees in the direction of the castle was starting to worry her.
She hoped they were okay, and on their way there.
After all, she really wanted to see if her mother was okay.
"They'll be fine Kim. I'm sure they just had a minor hang up on something. I mean, it's got to be difficult leading that many people out of a place like that safely." Jason stated as he sat down on a nearby boulder.
"Aye, that fortress is one tricky place, but it is possible to escape." Silver stated as she paced the area.
Billy nodded and placed his gloved hand on Kim's shoulder silently, to reassure her that he agreed with what Jason and Silver were saying.
No sooner than he doing this did they hear a loud rustling of the leaves on the nearby path leading towards the castle.
Something big was coming towards them.
Tommy quickly crawled up to the top of a larger boulder nearby to see if he could see what was coming towards them.
"What in the hell?" He caught himself saying as he squinted to see if he could see any better at whatever was coming towards them.
In a matter of seconds, a large group of familiar looking people ran into the area.
Kimberly felt her heart leap with joy as she recognized the group that had just appeared. In fact she was sure that every Ranger in the group right now was experiencing the same sense of joy and relief that she was experiencing.
She quickly rushed over to her mother, kneeling down to the woman who was trying to catch her breath.
"Are you alright, ma'am?" She asked.
As she looked at her mother, she took notice of how pale and sickly looking her mother appeared to be. It appeared that Ivan's spell had really gotten to her mother.
However, her mother was smiling as she wiped some sweat from her forehead.
"Well, with all things considered in what has happened in the last day or so, being out in the fresh air, and getting a little exercise, even if it is running for my life. I'm good." She laughed.
Kimberly smiled as she looked down at her mother. Even if she didn't look very good right now, her mother always kept her spirits up and tried to make light of the situation she was in.
Mrs. Hart got to her feet, and dusted herself off, and ran her fingers through her hair to fix some of the strands that had come loose.
"Kimberly is never going to believe this story when I tell her!" She stated to the Pink Ranger who stood before her.
The Pink Ranger gave a slight laugh. "I'm sure she won't."
Just like I'm sure you wouldn't believe that your daughter is a super-hero, and you're talking to her right now. Kimberly thought with a brief smile from behind her helmet.
"From here, we've got 30 minutes to make it down to the beach, and teleport, and with that monster chasing us down, we'd better get going if we're going to make it on time." Billy stated turning to the group.
Silver bowed her head for a second. "We'll accompany you to the beach, disarming any additional traps we may have missed earlier." She stated.
Billy nodded to Silver before turning to the group.
"Alright, let's get going!"
"Some genius plan your monster was; killed by rocks." Rita scoffed as she shot a glance towards Beelzalea.
The white-haired Magi took several graceful, glide-like, steps over to the balcony.
"My mistress. I assure you that the Shadow Chameleon is not a useless monster."
With an inward smile to herself, she placed her hands on the railing before her. "You shall see for yourself soon mistress."
Kylie slowly approached her father. Her power coin was clutched in her hand. She could feel its embossed metal surface against the palm of her hand.
It had been a little while, since her father had gone outside before Kylie had decided to follow. She had to ask permission from Zordon this once, to see if it was okay to bend the rules that the Ranger code had put in place.
"Nice night out here..." She stated, as she looked up at the darkened and stormy looking sky. She knew that her words weren't quite right.
Mr. Lain only gave a brief grunt as he acknowledged the younger girl's presence.
"I noticed you were kind of mad back there..." Kylie continued, her voice cracking with an uncertainty of how she could get this conversation going smoother.
Crossing his arms, Mr. Lain frowned and kicked at the grass under his feet.
"It's a family quarrel, over something that happened a long time ago..." He finally stated after a few seconds, seeing how Kylie wasn't going to leave.
Kylie nodded showing that she understood.
A silence had fallen between the two as Kylie tried to figure out how she should continue the conversation from here.
After seeing her father become angry whenever her uncle had mentioned her, she knew she had to tread through this subject lightly.
"Please, don't get angry when I ask, but this, thing that gets you mad when spoken of...is your daughter?"
Mr. Lain raised an eyebrow and looked down at the dark haired girl wearing purple who stood beside him.
That was a strange way of putting it, but yes it was the mention of his daughter that usually sent him into a fit of anger. After all, he had gotten over it enough that he didn't feel the need to speak of her every time there was a chance he figured that others should learn to do the same.
"It was my fault. I shouldn't have gone into the desert to do research on that stupid medallion, or at least I should have never let Jin talk me into allowing her and Kylie come along with me. I should have known something like that would have happened." He muttered to himself, unaware that he was speaking loud enough to be heard.
Kylie unfolded her hand, and outstretched her arm towards Mr. Lain.
"Medallion...something like this?"
She watched as Mr. Lain's eyes became wide with horror, and he backed away from Kylie, as if the power-coin she held in her hands was a deadly snake about to strike him.
His breathing was heavy, and quickened, as his mind started to race through the memories of all the awful things that had occurred that one day in the past.
"Kai, my brother in-law set you up to this didn't he?! He's purposefully trying to torture me isn't he?!"
"If I were you, I'd get rid of that thing, it's cursed. Trust me!" He added in an additional panic.
Kylie closed her fingers around the coin, and put her hand back down at her side, and looked at her father curiously.
"...I've barely known Mr. Kuriyo long enough for him to 'set me up' to doing anything to torture you." She stated raising her eyebrow curiously as she looked at the haunted expression on her father's face.
Mr. Lain crossed his arms and looked over. "Hm. maybe your right, Kai wouldn't ever purposefully decide to torture me, especially not about that, knowing how much it would upset Jin as well."
After a few seconds of silence, Mr. Lain looked towards Kylie, his eyes curious.
He had a couple of theories starting to form, about Kylie, although he wasn't sure how valid any of them were.
This girl standing before him could be an illusion of his mind, brought on by fourteen years of stress and grievance for his daughter that finally decided to take shape knowing that his daughter's death was going to be mentioned tonight.
However, the problem with that was other people had acknowledged her presence tonight. Since other people had taken note that she had been there, that meant that she clearly wasn't just a figment of his imagination.
Of course, then there was the other theory, that this girl might possibly be his daughter's ghost, that had just appeared tonight had had been following his brother in-law around.
The problem with this theory was obvious, his daughter had only been two or three years old when she had died, so her ghost being a teenager would not make sense.
Then there was his last theory. Easily ignored because he knew his daughter was dead. There was no way that this girl could possibly be his daughter.
But to prove the validity of at least one of these theories, there was one thing that he had to ask.
"Where did you find that medallion?"
Kylie opened her hand and looked down at the coin in her hand.
"I've had this....about fourteen years now. It used to belong to my father."
Mr. Lain took a step closer to Kylie as she replied. His interesting had been piqued; with her response.
The time frame did match up.
"How old are you?"
"16, I think.....sir..."
The girl didn't even know her own age for certain, that didn't make a whole lot of sense, Mr. Lain thought raising an eyebrow.
Kylie crossed her arms. She knew what her father was trying to get at. He was slowly trying to get her to reveal her name to him, although all these questions were nothing more than background check to help him build up the courage to ask.
"It's as I was trying to tell you Kouji..." Mr. Kuriyo's voice came from behind the two of them. Causing the both of them to turn and regard the other man with curiosity.
Mr. Kuriyo took a step towards them. The light from the inside of the house was casting a warm glow behind him, but obscuring part of his face in shadows.
"This little lady right here claims she is Kylie Lain." he stated putting his hands on his niece's shoulders as he spoke.
The trio stood in silence for a few minutes. Kylie and Mr. Kuriyo had smiles upon their faces, even though Mr. Lain was looking skeptical.
Just because this girl made claims that she was Kylie Lain, didn't mean that she was. After all, any one could just make claims that they were someone that they weren't.
"....I know your still doubtful Kouji. But, I believe that the medallion that this girl holds is proof enough that she is your daughter." Mr. Kuriyo stated with a shrug as he stepped over beside Kylie.
Mr. Lain crossed his arm. He wanted to believe them, but that would mean the least plausible theory he had--the one where this girl was actually his daughter, alive and well--would be true.
If there was one thing that made this claim untrue, it was the design he had saw upon the coin that was in the girl's hands.
"....It's a raptor...not a rabbit." he stated.
Mr. Kuriyo raised his eyebrow curiously, what was his brother in-law talking about. Raptors and rabbits?
"The design on that coin, it's supposed to be a raptor, not a rabbit."
Kylie bent her head and looked at the coin in her hands.
"....It was, until recently."
Mr. Lain frowned, how could he be sure that this girl still wasn't lying to him? Honestly he wasn't in the mood to put up with people lying to him, and trying to deceive him, and he was starting to lose his patience with this girl.
"Look, Kouji, I'm sure if you need more proof, this girl is willing to take one of those tests that proves that she's your daughter." Mr. Kuriyo stated with a sigh as he put his hand on his forehead.
His step-brother could be so stubborn some times.
Kylie bit her lip and reached into the side pocket of the purse that she had gotten today. There was only one thing that was going to clear this all up.
From the side-pocket she withdrew a rather charred up and old journal.
"....this is yours..." She stated, although it sounded more like a question than anything.
Mr. Lain's eyes were wide as he saw this. The journal was indeed his. He remembered it from all those years ago, remembering that it had been caught in the fire that day.
"I found it in the place that my adoptive mother Ceres, used to call 'my home'....she said it was something that my father kept while researching...said he was a scientist..."
Kylie could see her father become more relaxed, as he started to believe this. Only his daughter would have been out that far in the desert to even know where that old place was.
Mr. Lain's eyes were starting to water up, as he tried to restrain his tears at the sight of his daughter.
Hell, Kylie thought as she brushed away some of the tears that were starting to roll down her cheeks. It didn't look like either one of them were going to be walking away from this dry eyed by the end of the night.
Before Kylie could even take a step towards her father, she was nearly tackled in a hug by someone she didn't' even realize was standing behind her.
Once her vision had cleared up and the hug had loosened enough for her to turn around, she turned and looked up into her mother's teary eyes, and smiling face.
"Oh, Kylie! Is it really you?!"
Kylie gave her mother a warm smile. "Yes, it really is me, mom." She stated before embracing her mother in a tight hug, tears starting to roll down her eyes freely.
The beach was in sight.
There was ten and a half minutes left.
We're going to make it! Tommy thought to himself with a sigh of relief as he followed behind all of the others.
With the distance that the beach was from them, there was no way that Beelzalea or Ivan could have set up any additional traps to prevent them from getting out of there.
Of course, Tommy knew better than to be so sure of himself about that.
Just like if there was a way for them to get past any difficult solution, there was a way for their enemy to place a trap right where they least expected it.
"Alpha! We're almost outside of the Teleportation disruptor barrier...prepare for mass teleportation." Billy stated into his communicator as he ran.
"You got it Blue Ranger."
"Alright, once we get to the beach, we're going to have to link hands in order to for this to work. Just a word of advice, stay close, and whatever you do don't let go." Billy called over his shoulder to the parents.
"I'm afraid I can't allow you to leave just yet Power Rangers." A voice came from just ahead of them.
Tommy felt his hope just come crashing down on him, sinking into a bottomless oblivion as he looked at the black-armored monster that was before them.
"Oh you again! I thought we got rid of you already!" Aisha stated in shock.
The monster appeared to have a smirk upon its shadowed face. "I never let a question of mine go unanswered."
Motioning towards the black armor that was upon its body, the monster added. "As you can see, I have changed my power to reflect that of the black ranger."
Its eyes turned towards the Black Ranger, narrowed upon him as if trying to further analyze him.
"Which means, the question now goes to you Black Ranger. You have ten seconds"
Adam tightened his grip on the Power Ax, as he stepped to the front of the group.
"I don't have time for your stupid questions!"
The monster gave a growling laugh, as he pulled an Ax that looked very similar to the Black Ranger's power weapon.
"What's the matter Black Ranger? Are you afraid of answering a simple little question?"
In one quick motion, Adam flipped the Power Ax around, and switched it over to cannon mode and aimed at the monster.
He knew what this monster was trying to do.
It wanted them to answer his question, by revealing their identities. Adam knew that if they purposefully revealed themselves like that, without special permission; especially with their parents....normal civilians in other words, undoubtedly --due to restrictions that had been set upon them when they had received their powers-- they would be stripped of their powers.
Without their powers, they would be defenseless, and not to mention stuck in this dimension.
They would be easy targets to destroy.
"Who are you? That's all you have to answer..."
"Shut up."
"....Answer incorrect."
With a grunt of annoyance, Adam attempted to fire the cannon at the monster.
A dull click was all that came from the cannon.
Not too soon after this failure of power, the power Ax vanished from Adam's hands.
Tommy rushed at the creature, his weapon drawn.
He didn't know what had just happened to cause Adam's weapon to fail or even to disappear like that, but he was sure that the Shadow Chameleon had something to do with it. Directly attacking this creature head on seemed to be the best option.
The Shadow Chameleon smirked as the white suited Ranger came closer to him, rushing at him, ready to drive the tiger-saber through him.
In one giant bounding leap like a frog; the Shadow Chameleon vaulted himself high into the air.
Tommy felt his breath caught in this throat as he saw the monster high above them, almost lost in the violet and orange light of the evening sky.
Quickly he had to sidestep the falling monster, as it came crashing into the ground, driving the edge of the ax into the sand.
Upon contact with the edge of the blade, at least three or four feet of ice covered the sand in this spot.
Tommy swallowed hard. It was a good thing that blade hadn't struck him, if it could easily freeze the ground like that, god know that it would have done to his head, or even if it had managed to cut open his ranger suit and draw blood.
"What are we waiting for? We can't just let him fight alone!" Kimberly shouted as she drew out the power bow and rushed towards the monster, joining Tommy in his fight.
Billy looked to Jason, Aisha, and Adam. He wasn't sure if they should be joining in on this fight. After all, time was running out for them to get out of here, and Alpha was surely almost finished, adjusting the teleportation systems, so that they could be leaving this place.
"We have to hold him off until Alpha is finished." Jason stated drawing out his weapon and looking towards the battle.
"Hopefully Alpha hurries up." Aisha stated giving a glance back to the adults behind them.
With a fierce battle cry, the four rangers rushed into battle joining their friends.
"And, so the question goes on to you White Ranger!" The Shadow Chameleon shouted, slashing at the White Ranger with the ax, missing him by only a few inches.
As it's weapon passed by the white Ranger's suit, it waved like a hologram for a few seconds, before in a motion similar to water rippling in a pond, it solidified once more, into a wicked looking dagger, resembling Saba, except that it did not have a tiger's head upon it.
The monster's armor drained itself of color and began to shift from resembling the frog zord and the black shogun zord, to resembling the Falcon Zord and the White Shogun Zord.
"You have ten seconds to answer my question, or else you'll end up just like your two friends; the Black and Yellow Rangers."
Tommy cast a look to the two rangers that this creature had mentioned.
He noticed that the two of them were the only ones who didn't have their Power Weapons drawn out, and were having difficulty summoning, (or really re-summoning, since one of them had just had the weapon vanish on them, and Tommy assumed that the other had this same incident happen to whenever the two had encountered this monster earlier.)
Every time they tried to re-summon their weapons, from the "mallet space" they existed in prior to their use, a brief spark or wisp of powder like snow would appear, but quickly be extinguished. The weapons not appearing.
What had this creature done exactly? Tommy wondered.
Unfortunately trying to figure out this, and trying to attack the creature; had caused Tommy to waste the time that the Shadow Chameleon had set upon him to answer the question.
Tommy felt Saba vanish from his grip, just as he was about to land a strike on the monster.
The Shadow Chameleon let out a laugh as he watched the White Ranger quickly draw his hand back, looking at them as if he couldn't believe what had just happened.
He swiped at the white Ranger, sending a beam of white-light towards him.
Tommy jumped out of the way of the crescent shape of white energy that had been released from the dagger.
His dodge got him out of the way of harm, but took the Gold Ranger completely off guard.
Jason grunted as he was knocked off his feet by the blast.
He had taken hits like this before, but there was still something about being hit with pure energy that stung worse that anything he had ever felt in his life, and to be hit square in the chest by it was even worse.
Quickly Jason got back to his feet, and returned a like attack at the Shadow Chameleon, causing it to draw its hand up to its face, recoiling in pain as the blade of the scythe cut across the bird like armored face.
"Fine, it looks like it's your question now Gold Ranger."
"The Shadow Chameleon barely does anything to the rangers, and yet they're almost dropping like flies!" Goldar growled as he watched the scene from the moon palace.
Zedd looked towards Beelzalea. Her mouth was draw into a tight curve, and her eyes filled with a look of satisfied glee.
"Unbelievable. Shadow Chameleon seems to be more advanced and useful than any of the monsters that Finster has ever made!" Rita stated with a look towards Finster.
Finster seemed to be deep in thought about something else at the moment, too busy to pay any attention to Rita's comment, even if it was an insult to him.
"What's the secret to this monster...? I mean what's it been doing exactly?"
Beelzalea's white eyes turned to a greenish gray as she looked towards Rito, who had been the one to ask her this question.
"Shadow Chameleon runs a quick analysis on its enemy, and shifts its power to reflect that of the target, and uses that power against them. When he asks them a question; any sort of question, he will place a time-limit upon the rangers. If the time runs out....access to that Ranger's power is blocked, and will remain blocked until the question is finally answered."
"So, they're powerless?" Ivan asked turning from the image of the rangers in battle towards Beelzalea. The monster had not been a part of their plan for this island.
Beelzalea crossed her arms and looked over, her face stern looking.
"Not necessarily. They still have the capabilities of teleportation, and enough energy left to stay morphed. But every other power, such as Zords and weapons and any special attacks are blocked." She stated as she began to pace the room.
"It's a lose-lose situation for the rangers. Reveal their identities and get their power taken away, or they leave the question unanswered and have their powers blocked off. Genius!" Rita laughed gleefully.
Zedd growled under this breath. He could have thought of a monster just like that if he had been given the opportunity. Besides Zedd himself could point out a ton of flaws that this creature had.
He knew better than to be jealous that Beelzalea was getting praise for her idea, but he just couldn't help it. Ever compliment she received just put him that much lower on the scale of respect. Soon she would be getting more respect than even he, the ruler of this castle, was getting.
Shadow Chameleon had managed to cut off all but two of Six Ranger's powers by the time that Alpha had finally managed to call, alerting them that they were ready for teleportation.
"We'd better get out of here while we still can..." Billy stated as they rushed over towards the group of parents.
He was sure that there was only a matter of seconds left for them to get out of here anyhow. Most of their time had been wasted trying to hold off this creature.
Quickly, they all linked arms.
The Shadow Chameleon wasn't going to let them get away that easily. As the teleportation field was just starting to appear, he quickly leapt forward latching his bird-like talons into the White Ranger's shoulders.
A bright light came before all of their eyes, and the feeling of being lifted off of the ground occurred shortly after.
Thud
"Uhgggh..." Mr. Oliver managed to say as his side made contact with the ground. Who ever had teleported them could have tried to put them down a little lighter, and even on their feet, he thought. But he supposed it didn't matter. After all they were out of that place....and he didn't hear that faint buzzing of looming destruction in his head anymore.
"Every---everyone alright?" Mrs. Cranston asked as she sat up, adjusting her glasses upon her face, and took a look around the room.
"I think so..." Mr. Park stated as he got to his feet looking around at the place. "But....Where are we?"
This place, it was full of technological equipment that didn't seem to be of this earth. A blue control consol took up most of the room in this area; the lights upon it were blinking in random sequences.
Was this a space-ship? Mr. Cranston caught himself wondering. The technology here was simply amazing! He just couldn't help but stare in awe and wonder at everything around him. He just couldn't decide what to focus on first.
"The Command Center?" The blue Ranger asked, causing all of the parents to turn their attention towards him.
So that's where we are, Mr. Cranston thought with a nod of understanding. This was the base of operations that the Power Rangers worked out of, the one that the Black and Yellow Rangers had mentioned earlier.
"Ah, Oh?! Welcome back Rangers.....and others?" Alpha stated turning from the consol towards the large group. He was rather surprised to see that the whole group had landed in the Command Center. The teleportation field had been arranged to bring them back to a safe location close to Angel Grove.
Mrs. Hart's eyes went wide in surprise as she noticed the strange robot talking to them. She had never seen anything like it before.
"What are we doing here?" Billy asked curiously as he looked around at the group. He was personally surprised that the command center had even allowed their parents in like that.
"Uhh, Guys, that's not important right now... Look!" Kimberly stated pointing towards the viewing globe.
The screen was showing a giant sized Shadow Chameleon just on the outskirts of Angel Grove. It would only be a matter of minutes before started causing havoc in the city.
"We're going to need to call the Zords..." Tommy stated as he took a step towards the viewing globe.
The others agreed with silent nods.
"Wait! What about what that monster? Remember what it did back there?" Mr. Campbell suddenly spoke up.
"Yeah, I know for a fact that four of you can't even use your power weapons...and the question time limit that that monster placed on the Pink Ranger already ran out...so I can bet you anything, that if you can't use your power weapons, you might not be able to summon out Zords..." Mrs. Campbell added putting her hand on the Yellow Ranger's shoulder, to keep her from going.
"Mrs. Campbell is correct, I'm afraid. The Shadow Chameleon has closed off connections to the morphing grid for five of you. As a result, you only have enough power to remain morphed, but not enough to call upon your Zords to battle."
Tommy gave a sound of protest, about to suggest that they look for another way, but Jason put his hand on his friend's shoulder. There was nothing that they could do in this situation and they would just have to sit this one out.
Giving a look to his friend, Tommy nodded, and then looked towards Zordon.
"Then we'll have to use the new Zords...." He stated with determination ringing in his voice. That monster was going to be destroyed one way or another, even if he wasn't able to help.
Billy took a step forward. "I'll take the Wolf Zord out and try to hold him off from causing too much damage until the others arrive."
"But, what if that monster decides to turn that question on you?" Kimberly asked a worried tone in her voice.
"Then hope that the others get there in enough time..." Billy stated before teleporting out of the room.
Beeep! Beep! Beep!
The communicators' alarms went off, causing all of the rangers in the Lain family's living room to suddenly jump and look towards Kylie's parents.
Each of them were trying to politely excuse themselves even though the emergency that this alarm indicated was more than enough excuse for a hurried leaving , and signal that it was time to go without further alerting Kylie's parents that they were indeed the Power Rangers.
Only a few seconds after the communicator alarms went off, a loud siren screech was heard from outside.
"A Monster attack? This late?" Mrs. Lain wondered as she looked out the window towards the horizon. She could see the looming shadow of a monster in the early evening mist that was covering the distant Down Town Angel Grove.
"Umm... We...really ought to be going." Tanya stated slowly getting to her feet and casting nervous glances towards her two friends, and then even more nervous smiles towards the three adults sitting across from them.
Everyone nodded, getting to their feet and headed for the door.
"Wait...kids, your leaving during a monster attack?" Mrs. Lain asked hardly able to believe that they would even consider doing this. She was sure that even they knew that they shouldn't be out during a monster attack.
"Well, we sort of have to...mom..."
"No you don't. You kids are staying right here until this attack is over. I'll call your parents and tell you that you are here. I'm sure they'll understand." Mrs. Lain stated getting up from where she was sitting and walking towards the phone that was attached to the wall near the hallway.
Kat bit her lip and looked towards the others. She couldn't just come out and say 'the monster attack isn't going to be over until we get out there....' unless she just wanted to make things worse.
Zack crossed his arms and began to think of a solution that would allow them to get out of the room. Even though he had just met Mrs. Lain, he was sure she was one of those mothers who during a monster attack wouldn't let the people in her house go anywhere without someone else unless they absolutely had to.
Only, Mr. Kuriyo knew that they were the Power Rangers, having accidentally found this out.
So, the rule of 'never reveal your identity to anyone' had an exemption to accidental discovery and special emergency circumstances.
They couldn't exactly just make it look like an accident that they had morphed...even if they had gone to another room and teleported out of there and had accidentally been discovered that way.
It seemed like the others were having difficulty with taking on this monster, if they had been called in for assistance.
"Well guys this looks like a definite 'special circumstance'....So....should we?"
Trini nodded reaching for her morpher.
The others took a deep breath of hesitation before reaching for their morphers.
"Alright. It's Morphin' time! Silver Ranger Power!" Zack called out holding out his morpher as the gray light emitted from it.
The others followed, calling out their respective colors as the lights shot out from the morphers, transforming them from their ordinary clothing into their ranger gear.
"....I'm sorry mom and dad. I would have told you both earlier...but I was told that I couldn't tell! The most I was allowed to do was show you guys the power-coins so that you would know that it was me!"
All Mrs. and Mr. Lain could do was sit there in wide eyed shock, unable to believe what they had just saw, that whole group, had just turned into Power Rangers right before their eyes. They were the Power Rangers, and their daughter was one too!
"It's okay, we'll be sure to bring Kylie back safe!" Kat stated before the group teleported out of the house.
Billy had done his best holding off the Shadow Chameleon for the last few minutes.
Lucky for him, the Shadow Chameleon's questions were ineffective against the Wolf Zord. Even if the blue ranger was inside of the Zord and the question was directed at him, it all seemed to bounce off of the Wolf Zord.
Maybe it's because I've always felt like I was a part of the Wolf Zord, and if it asks that question...it's simply answered: I am the Wolf. Billy thought as he launched a barrage of lasers at the Shadow Chameleon
Of course, this was hardly the time to be thinking on almost poetic/philosophical points, since the Shadow Chameleon was still coming at him with all its force and the others had not arrived yet.
Shadow Chameleon had shifted powers to reflect the wolf Zord's own water based powers, so the Wolf laser's attacks only did minimal damage.
Several minutes into the battle, Billy had managed to have the wolf Zord latch it's mechanical mouth onto the Shadow Chameleon's left arm, causing the monster to howl in pain as the razor sharp 'Teeth' that lined the inside of the Wolf Zord's mouth dug into its shadow-like skin.
Vigorously the Shadow Chameleon began to swing its arms around, trying to shake the Wolf Zord.
It took several powerful swings before the Wolf Zord was sent flying, landing with a crash on the street, after skidding across the pavement for several feet.
Billy had to cover his ears as the Wolf Zord went sliding down the street. The screeching sound of metal against asphalt was not a charming sound. Even though the sound was temporary, its earsplitting tone rang in Billy's ears amplified to an unbearable roar that tore at the Blue Rangers ear-drums.
As the wolf Zord came to a halt, Billy exhaled his breath. He was feeling rather disoriented, since the wolf-Zord had taken a couple of flips before it had hit the ground, and while it was sliding across the pavement.
From his blurred he saw two streaks of Orange and Bronze fly past him, followed shortly by an explosion.
"You alright down there?" A voice came over his intercom system.
As Billy got the Wolf Zord back on his feet he took another breath as he looked towards the Zords that had arrived.
"Yeah. About time you guys got here though."
Billy gave an inward smile as he looked towards the Six Zords that had arrived. He had been waiting to see a few of these new Zords in action.
"Wow, this is so cool! I can't believe I'm actually piloting a Zord!!" Tanya stated cheerfully as she adjusted her grip on the controls of the Lion Zord. She had always dreamed of doing this, imagining how awesome it would be.
"Don't get too ahead of yourself there. We've still got a monster to take down, and we can't be losing our focus." Trini warned with a lighthearted laugh as she pushed a few buttons on the control panel, and fired a blast towards the monster.
"Ah, come on; let her have a little fun. If I seem to recall, you were just as excited as her when you first got to pilot a Zord." Zack replied with a laugh, right before sending the Owl Zord swooping down
The Shadow Chameleon recoiled as blasts from the Wolf, Lion, and Tiger, and Dragon Zords hit its armor, cracking it.
In response, the monster took aim at the Owl Zord and sent a blast of water towards it.
The blast grazed the left wing of the Owl Zord as Zack maneuvered the bird Zord out of range.
Zack had to admit, he was quiet enjoying this new Zord himself.
Back when he had been the Black Ranger, he had been in control of the Mastodon, and later the Lion, Zords. Both of those, Zack imagined, were probably much similar to driving a tank, since they were both large land based vehicles.
Now, the Owl Zord was completely different, aside from the obvious fact that this zord was flying, (which that reason alone was part of the reason that Zack was enjoying this Zord.)
The only problem that Zack had with the Owl Zord was that the controls were a lot more sensitive than he was used to. If he just barely tapped the controls, he found that the Owl Zord would take off in a nose-dive, or begin barrel rolling through the sky.
He had to constantly remind himself that this zord wasn't like the previous two Zords he had commanded, and that he didn't have to bear down on the controls just to get the Zord to do what he wanted it to do.
"So where are the others?" Kat asked from over the intercom
"Well, we ran into some complications with this monster earlier, and they're having a few problems with their powers " Billy responded as he dodged out of the way of a concentrated blast of silver colored air, as the Shadow Chameleon had shifted its power to reflect the Silver Ranger's power.
"Figures so...but at least you guys are back safely." Kat stated.
She brought the Dragon Dagger to her lips and commanded the Dragon Zord to launch missiles at the Shadow Chameleon.
"Safe for now, Rangers. Even if I can't block off your power because of your Zords, my power is still superior to yours, since your powers are weakened...because of damage I have done to your counterparts in the 'Great Power'." Shadow Chameleon growled as he swung the bladed Nunchucku at the Dragon Zord.
The attack caused the Dragon Zord to stumble backwards and fall on a building nearby, destroying part of it, and causing an explosion to take out part of some of the buildings around it.
Alone stood atop a nearby building watching this battle. His arms were beside him; his hands were open and relaxed as he looked on at the battle. From behind his masked-shogun-like helmet his light blue eyes were calm looking.
"This tactic again...." he stated to himself aloud.
His arm gently shifted so that his hand was gently resting against the handle of the katana that was sheathed at his hip. He should be helping the Rangers, and he knew that.
But, without a Zord, he was just about as useless as the other five rangers were. The Minute that the Shadow Chameleon could target him. He would be blocked off his own powers.
Besides, Alone thought as he looked down at the ground. The last thing that the Rangers would need in this battle would be for the Shadow Chameleon to shift over and match his power, being able to utilize it against them.
"....bring out Shadow Chameleon, your first general, to weaken your opponent. Do you plan to launch an all out assault on this planet soon?" He asked the open air, as he watched a burst of purple energy fly the building that he stood on, just barely making contact with the Shadow Chameleon.
Kylie jumped slightly as the lasers fired from the Rabbit Zord's eyes. She had not been expecting that to happen.
Pressing a few more buttons, the Rabbit Zord bound into the air, nearly landing on a building.
Giving a mental grunt, Kylie felt her face go red under the purple helmet. She was probably looking like a complete idiot out there to the others; she didn't even know how to pilot a Zord!
It looked like it was second nature to all of them! Heck even Tanya, who had just as much experience as Kylie herself did at commanding the Zords and being a ranger seemed to know what to do
Calm down Kylie, She could hear a voice saying. Although it was in her head, she swore she could hear the voice loud and clear as if whoever was talking to her was right there with her.
"Ceres?"
Yes my child. It's me.
"I don't know what I'm doing..."
That's quiet alright. That's why I'm here. Usually the first time piloting a Zord, the Power does most of the work, and guides the pilot for the most part, until they can figure out what to do. You are new to this Zord, just as Tanya and many of your friends are new to their Zords, despite some of them having previous experience with Zords...and like you will, they have their animal spirits guiding them.
"Thanks Ceres!" Kylie stated happily as she looked towards the control panel.
As she reached towards the controls she could begin to feel an instinct in her head, an instinct she knew to be Ceres's guidance, which seemed to tell her exactly what needed to be done.
"Man! That guy just keeps shifting his power!" Kimberly stated as she watched the viewing globe. The Owl Zord had just been knocked out of the air by a powerful blast of ice from the now purple armored monster.
"The Shadow Chameleon shifts power based upon the its last attacker. After shifting power, it aims for an opponent with an opposing element....to do the most damage to it." Alpha stated as he read off the data that they had gathered so far over the battle.
Jason slammed his fist down on the edge of the control panel. His frustration with this whole situation had become greater with the passing moments that he was barely able to contain it any more.
"We should be out there helping them!"
Adam crossed his arms as he looked towards Jason. He knew how irritated his friend was, he believed the same thing that his friend believed, but knew that it was impossible.
"It only shifts to one attacker's power...." Mr. Cranston suddenly stated as he watched the scene on the viewing globe.
The Ranger's parents had been silent for quite some time as they watched, in shock, the battle that was going on.
"See? Whenever the Lion and Tiger Zords attack in unison, it only shifts its power to one or the other." Mr. Cranston added as he pointed at the globe whenever the two zords he mentioned attacked.
"Maybe the monster can't handle more than one power at a time, because no matter what they are, they'll either balance out or completely oppose each other...which leaves him vulnerable." Mr. Campbell suggested, shrugging his shoulders.
Aisha looked up from where she was standing, it seemed like there was a good idea in this...
"So...then why not combine all those forces into one, and go for an attack? I mean surely your megazord, doesn't switch over to an entirely new element when all parts are combined?" Mr. Oliver suggested as he watched the battle.
Tommy clenched his fist. That just might work!
"Guys, Go into Megazord mode. Shadow Chameleon might become overwhelmed, and might not be able to shift power."
"Got it!" Zack stated over the communicator.
"Alright guys and gals. Let's do this!" He added to his team-mates.
With a nod in unison, all of the Rangers reached over and flipped the necessary switches and pressed the appropriate buttons for their Zords to start going into Megazord mode.
As each of the Zords made the transition from being individual animal Zords, into being pieces of a whole, Each of the Rangers teleported out, and joined each other in the main control room that was located inside of Tor's head, even though the Owl Zord was officially the head, it acted as more of a helmet than anything.
It was an awkward Megazord if anything.
With the Dragon-Zord Spear, the "replacement parts Megazord" slashed at the Shadow Chameleon
Shadow Chameleon did not seem impressed by this sudden shift from six Zord into two. However, it did seem rather angered that it was only able to shift into matching the Blue Ranger's power, instead of constantly changing targets.
Alone watched from the rooftops, his eyes narrowed behind his helmet as he looked towards the fight as in continued on.
Having the "Replacement" Megazord out there was a good plan, but it still wasn't enough. Not when the Wolf Zord was still out there providing something for Shadow Chameleon to draw its power from.
"...and even if they were able to get Shadow Chameleon to go into his true form at this rate. One Megazord isn't going to be enough." He mused to himself as he watched the Megazord get slammed against the road.
Right now, Alone thought, there were six other Rangers that needed to be out there, but couldn't be.
Frowning Alone turned away from the battle and looked towards the sky. He knew of a way that he could help, even it was nothing more than a temporary solution and wouldn't exactly reverse the Shadow Chameleon's affects on the other Rangers, but it would give them the upper hand.
Unfortunately, it is just one more thing my superiors may frown upon. He thought before vanishing.
"Uuugh!! Come on guys get up!!" Kimberly shouted in frustration as she saw the Replacement Megazord and the Wolf Zord get knocked to the ground once more.
This fight was not going exactly as she was hoping, and she really wanted to change that. If only they could call out the Ninja Megazord. Heck the Shogun Megazord would work too!
"Alpha, can't we do anything to try to establish some sort of connection with the Ninja Megazord and the Shogun Megazord?" Aisha asked turning towards the robot. Her voice was full of concern and anxiety, which it almost came out as a squeak.
"I'm afraid that is impossible." Alpha responded.
He felt pretty bad for the Rangers, He knew they wanted to help, but there was just nothing they could do, unless they wanted to risk losing them in the morphing grid by boosting up the power output, but even that wouldn't help, and might harm the others whose powers were still working.
Either that or just have them give up their powers completely by revealing their identities. And with that option there would be no way that the Power Coins would even bother to recognize them as the rightful possessors...and so replacements would have to be chosen.
"I think I might know a way..." Alone's voice suddenly spoke up.
All eyes turned towards the armor clad man had just appeared.
A silence fell around the room for several seconds before Alone began to explain his plan.
"The power that I posses and utilize in my 'ranger' form originated in part from the Great Power of the Ninjetti itself. While morphed, I can shift power and animal spirit at will...." Alone began.
Kimberly crossed her arms. To her something was still fishy about Alone's story about his power, but she dared not ask any questions in regards to what he was saying, not when it seemed like he had some sort of plan on helping them out.
"Even though my power is similar to the Ninjetti Power...it is regarded as a separate power itself." Alone continued.
"And your point is?" Tommy asked curiously crossing his arms.
Alone turned towards the White Ranger, as he began to explain further.
"If I can temporarily transfer some of my power to each of you to match the animal spirit you possess, your Zords and weapons may at least recognize traces of the corresponding Ninjetti Power, and can be operated."
"Really?!" Aisha asked, almost hopeful.
"It is dangerous, mind you, and there is a chance that the differences between my power and the Great Power of the Ninjetti are too great for you even to accept even a piece of my power. In addition, my power may have a violent reaction to what little power you are capable of access...and could very well kill you." Alone continued, casting a look towards the Yellow Ranger.
He noticed that the Yellow Ranger seemed to slump back down to where she was sitting, clearly she didn't like these risks at all.
None of them liked these risks, but what other choice did they have?
"Well, I'm up for these risks, no matter what happens." Jason suddenly stated, catching everyone by surprise.
Usually it was Tommy who was trying to convince everyone that they had to take a risk, and gamble their power and their lives for what might end up proving to be a complete failure by the end of it, Jason was usually the one who was hesitant about taking risks until he had a logical approach to it, ruling everything else out from being an option.
"We can't just let our friends get clobbered by this monster. We're a team, and if what Alone said earlier about the our power being a part of a collective 'Great Power' then we can't just let half of our power get destroyed. If they go down....then what chance to we have, if more than half of the Great Power gets destroyed...we're only going to be at half strength. Not even that, with the current situation. If they go down, we might as well just hand the Earth over to Rita, Zedd, Beelzalea, and all of them and tell them we surrender." Jason stated, his eyes burning with a fierce determination behind his helmet.
Kimberly nodded. She agreed with what Jason was saying whole heartedly. They had to take a risk or else--she gave a look towards her mother--or else everything that they had just worked for would have been for nothing.
Surrender just wasn't one of those words in the Power Ranger's vocabulary.
Tommy took a step forward and nodded, showing that he was in agreement with taking this risk.
Not too long after, Aisha followed, knowing that there wasn't much else that she could do. They were her friends, and Jason did have a point, plus she didn't think she would have ever been able to forgive herself if Rita and Zedd took over Earth and she had done nothing to try to stop them.
Adam gave a look towards his mother, even though he knew she didn't know it was him, He was in on this too, even if it meant actually making those rumors that his mother had heard true.
"Even if we die, we can at least say we tried something..." He remarked.
With a smile, Alone motioned for the Rangers to line up in front of him.
"But what about the Red Ranger's Zord?" Tommy asked after a few seconds.
Now that he thought about it, In order for this to work like it should, Rocky should have been there. Someone had to pilot the Ape Ninja Zord unless they wanted to go with a Ninja Zord that was missing an arm.
Alone gave a hesitant smile from behind his helmet.
"That is exactly what I was just about to get to." He stated turning away from the rangers
"I will try to access control of the Ape Ninja Zord through the use of my power."
There were a few minutes of silence as Alone tried to gather the energy to bring himself to continue to speak. He turned his gaze towards the Ranger's parents.
"I have dealt with Shadow Chameleon in the past, and I feel that additional help may be required."
Tommy didn't like the sound of Alone's voice or the way that he was looking towards their parents at this point. He wasn't seriously expecting them to help was he?
"The Shogun Megazord may have to be utilized. If it is alright with each of you, I would like to give you a temporary control over a part of my powers so that you will be able to join the rangers in combat."
Well, Alone was being very blunt about this wasn't he? Kimberly thought as she looked towards her mother. Personally, Kimberly disagreed with the idea completely. She didn't want her mother putting herself in danger like that. Plus, having to temporarily accept a power that Alone himself has said could potentially kill the Rangers.
If it could probably kill a group of people who still had a trace of Ranger power with them, Kimberly could only imagine that it would certainly kill a normal person!
"But we don't even know the first thing about piloting those things!!" Mrs. Campbell began in protest.
Alone gave a weak smile from behind his helmet that was directed at her. "That is no problem, and it is exactly why I am asking all of you for assistance. At least 11 of the 12 animal spirits should be able to handle the Shogun Megazord, so you will not have to actually do anything."
Mr. Oliver clenched his fist as he nodded in agreement saying that he would definitely accept that power if it meant helping out the Rangers.
"Well, you rangers did help us out of that awful place. So, the least we can do to repay you, by helping you out." Mrs. Hart stated, before biting her lip nervously.
One by one, the Rangers parent's began to agree to take on a piece of Alone's Power temporarily in order to help out the Rangers.
Nodding, the Ranger's parents lined up beside the Rangers, until a long line had formed.
Prepared to transfer his power, Alone withdrew the katana that was at his hip, and approached the first Ranger.
Tommy took a deep breath as he stood in front of Alone. The dark-armored warrior's armor changed from being solid black to being black with a white feathery pattern on it.
Alone focused a part of this power into the weapon in his hands, causing the weapon to glow with a radiant white light.
As the broad side of the blade gently touched Tommy's shoulder, he could feel the power rushing through him.
Even though he hadn't realized that he had been feeling drained at all, Tommy suddenly felt energized.
The feeling lasted only temporarily as Alone removed the blade, and proceeded onto the next person, the color of the light energy that was focused into the sword changing, as the pattern upon Alone's dark armor changed.
Once Alone had made his way around the room giving pieces of his power to everyone, he bowed his head as he looked towards all of them. The pattern on his armor was now a flame pattern, in bright blood red. Showing that he had already changed his power over to match that of the Red Ranger's so he could attempt to control the Ape Ninja Zord.
It was obvious by the way that Alone's hands were starting to shake slightly, that the previous power transfers had taken a lot of energy out of him. The others just hoped he'd have enough power to help them finish this fight.
"Oh...wow...Look at this!" Mrs. Campbell exclaimed after a few seconds.
Upon receiving the small bit of Alone's power, the Ranger's parents had morphed into ranger suits. The suits were much like the Ranger's suits, except where the Ranger's had a diamond pattern upon their suit, the Ranger's parent's had two stripes of gold, running from the neck of the suit down to the boots, only being covered up by the black belts that they wore, which had no morphers upon them. The Ranger's mother's suits were all fashioned with skirts which is where the gold stripes stopped, and instead of leggings that matched the rest of the ranger color suit, they had black leggings and boots that were in their proper "ranger" colors.
Each of their helmets were fashioned to look similar to the Rangers' helmets, except with a streak or two of black here and there on the helmet.
"Finally, Spandex that doesn't make me look fat..." Mrs. Hart joked as she examined the pink suit she was wearing, and adjusting the helmet on her head.
Jason had to admit, seeing all of his friend's parent's decked out in Ranger gear, was pretty....well, weird.
It was funny that at least one of the Ranger's parents seemed to have gotten a ranger suit that matched their child's ranger color.
Tommy's dad was wearing a white ranger suit, while his mother was decked out in a Bronze suit.
Kimberly's mother was of course, wearing pink like her daughter.
Billy's mother and father were wearing ranger suits in green and blue respectively.
Aisha's father was wearing Orange, while her mother was wearing yellow.
Adam's Father was now standing there wearing a silver colored ranger suit, while his mother was wearing black.
And, finally, Rocky's parents. Jason took note that Rocky's father was wearing a gold Ranger suit, like he was, and Rocky's mother had taken up the ranger color of her son.
Jason had never expected to be able to fight alongside his friend's parents like this. Even if their power was temporary.
"Alright, I believe we have wasted enough time...your friends are in danger, and we must hurry." Alone stated shakily as he re-sheathed the katana he held in his hands.
With a quick nod, everyone teleported out of the room.
Shadow Chameleon was getting the best of the Replacement Megazord and the Wolf Zord at this point in the battle.
Trini and the others were starting to become frustrated with this whole thing. There just didn't seem to be any way to defeat this guy! If this continued up like it was, they were going to end up taking out half of Down Town Angel Grove if they weren't careful.
Suddenly a blaze of fire streaked through the sky temporarily, colliding with the Shadow Chameleon.
All eyes turned towards the two Zords that had just appeared.
Billy could hardly believe it, he had been sure that the Ninja Megazord, and the Shogun Megazords would have been generally inoperable, due to the problems his friends were having with their powers some time ago.
"Look like you guys need some help..." Billy heard his mother's voice state joyfully over the intercom.
For a second he couldn't believe what he was hearing, until the situation had been explained by Jason.
Without a further word on the subject, Billy quickly set the Wolf Zord to transform to a part of the Ninja Megazord.
Shadow Chameleon was very unhappy with this. Now he had three targets, and not one of them could he draw any sort of power from.
"Fine, you wanna play that way?!' He shouted suddenly as he looked around the group.
A vortex of dark purplish-black energy started to form up around the Shadow Chameleon as his form began to change one last time.
As the energy cleared, Shadow Chameleon had turned into a very Lizard like monster. Even though it looked like a green armored Chameleon, the sharp spines all over its scaly body seemed to suggest otherwise.
"Let's see how you like me in my true form." He growled. The shadow Chameleon's voice suddenly contained an otherworldly growling undertone too it as it spoke. Its eyes were flickering vibrantly.
The Shadow Chameleon flicked its tongue towards the Ninja Megazord, before sending out a barrage of spiny needles at it.
The Ninja Megazord was hit by the needles, which caused minor explosions on the surface of the Zord, but did no further damage. To this the Megazord did a flying kick towards the Shadow Chameleon sending him towards the Shogun Megazord.
The Shogun Megazord swiped at him with its sword, sending the Shadow Chameleon towards the Replacement Megazord. This stuck at it with its weapon, sending the Shadow Chameleon off towards the Ninja Megazord.
This game of pass and attack went on for several minutes until the Shadow Chameleon was very disoriented and weakened greatly. He was panting heavily as he looked around the group of Megazords that were around him.
"You may have me beaten Power Rangers, but my mistress will control this world. Her influence has already begun to change things around this world, and is growing stronger by the day." Shadow Chameleon panted out as he looked towards the Ninja Megazord.
"You tell your mistress Beelzalea to bring it on! We're ready for whatever she throws at us." Tommy stated bravely as he looked towards the other Rangers, with a confident nod.
He didn't know if it was this other power talking, or if he really did believe that they could work past whatever was in their way.
Everyone else seemed to be feeling this exact same confidence. (With the exception of Alone, who was just standing there looking down at the controls in front of him silently.)
"Beelzalea, my mistress? Ha! What do you think I am, some sort of manufactured clay and magic monster? She has no control over me!"
"Then who is your mistress? Minerva?" Zack asked harshly, although with curiosity booming in his voice.
Shadow Chameleon laughed as it flicked its tongue. Even though it didn't speak, the laughing alone proved to them that Minerva wasn't the mistress that it was talking about anyhow.
"I believe one of you already know....." he added darkly after a few seconds, looking towards the Ninja Megazord.
The Five Rangers' in the Ninja Megazord turned their eyes towards Alone, who was looking straight ahead his hands gripping the controls tightly, ready to attack.
It was obvious he was the one that Shadow Chameleon had been talking about. After all he had stated that he had dealt with Shadow Chameleon before.
"Alone?" Tommy asked curiously, trying to see if the black armored man would begin explaining thing to them.
However only silence came from Alone as he stood there. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking, what torments were running through his head. All they knew was that they weren't getting an answer out of him anytime soon.
"Boost up the Power output in all three Zords, and focus it in the weapons. When I say fire, attack at once, and finish this guy off..." Alone stated sternly after a few seconds.
Everyone hesitated, if they destroyed this guy they weren't going to get to hear anything else, and would be left with questions of their own that Alone certainly wasn't going to answer.
Besides the Shadow Chameleon, Alone was the only one who seemed to know what was exactly going on anyhow.
"But..."
"Do it--" Alone commanded sternly looking straight ahead.
Shadow Chameleon was laughing as he sensed Alone's anger. He had managed to strike a nerve in the boy that he had been hoping to strike.
"He..." Kimberly began in protest.
"Now!" Alone barked turning towards the Pink Ranger. His voice was unusually harsh and demanding, completely unlike the calm tones that it usually carried. It was almost as if he was fighting to reach out and strike someone.
Without another word the Rangers, in all three Megazords, began to do as Alone had told them to do.
He'd better be explaining stuff later, or at least giving some sort of apology.
Who did he think he was the leader?
Well, whoever he thought he was, Kimberly certainly didn't like his attitude.
"Fire!"
In one simultaneous blast, the three megazords attacked the Shadow Chameleon. The resulting explosion created a bright multicolored light, which engulfed the monster, and lit up much of the night sky of Angel Grove. Through the light, everyone could hear Shadow Chameleon giving one loud screech as he was disintegrated into nothing.
As the battle came to a close, there was an awkward, uneasy silence that had fallen between all of the rangers.
The silence lasted long into the time that all 23 of them returned to the Command center.
No one knew what to do next. After all there was still the issue with their powers going on; that Alpha alerted them was still causing a problem, even after Shadow Chameleon's death.
Some were afraid to even speak to Alone, at the risk of him still being rather edgy.
"Well, that was rather fun. Thank you for giving us this opportunity." Mrs. Cranston stated turning towards Alone, finally able to bring herself to say something to break the silence before it crushed them all.
Alone de-morphed from his outfit, returning to the black trench coat and military-like uniform that he usually wore. He gave a calm smile to Mrs. Cranston, thanking her and the other Ranger's parents for volunteering for such a task.
One by one the Ranger's parents removed their helmets and looked towards the Rangers, with bright cheerful smiles on their faces.
"Well, you know our true identities. So I think, as temporary fellow Rangers, it is only fair for us to know yours." Mr. Oliver stated as he rested the white helmet on his hip and looked towards the other adults beside him.
The Rangers all looked to one another hesitatingly. Should they? That wouldn't be breaking any sort of rule that it would end up taking away their powers would it?
It would reverse Shadow Chameleon's affects...
Kimberly nodded as she looked towards the others. "It's got to be okay. I mean, they're fellow rangers. Remember when I ended up in the past that one time? I didn't lose my power and they knew who I was..." She began.
Tommy and the others nodded, remembering Kimberly's trip to the past, and encountering their ancestors, and giving them the ability to become Rangers.
Tommy was the first to reach for his helmet; he looked towards his father and mother as he started to undo the latches on the side of the helmet. "Now, don't be too surprised..." he warned them teasingly.
Mrs. Oliver didn't exactly understand why the white Ranger would be making such a joke, especially directed specifically at them like that. What did he have some sort of deformity on his face that was so shocking just to behold. Did he even have a face? Did he even have a human face?
....Or is he my son, standing right there in front of me? She thought once Tommy had completely removed the helmet, and she saw her son's face smiling back at her.
She had to admit she was pretty shocked.
Here she had thought that Tommy was a very open and honest kid, and all this time he had been running around behind her back hiding the fact he was a super-hero.
In his father's eyes, Tommy could see an overwhelming sense of pride in the knowledge that his son was keeping the town safe. Tommy himself couldn't help but feel a little more proud about being a ranger, knowing that even if his father didn't say it directly, he approved of what his son was doing. Even if the risking his life part wasn't exactly a very pleasing bonus to that.
"To answer Shadow Chameleon's question. I am Tommy Oliver. The former Green Ranger, current White Ranger."
Tommy didn't know why he stated his name like he did, everyone in the room already knew his name...and just seeing his face could have been answer enough to the question. Tommy guessed it was better to make absolutely sure the question got answered so the affects of the powers would be reversed.
Billy followed Tommy, taking off his helmet.
"Billy Cranston. The Blue Ranger." he stated with a slight smile as he looked towards his mother and father.
He noticed that his father seemed to be rather surprised. It was as if his son was the last person in the world that he had expected to do something as dangerous as being a Power Ranger.
Mrs. Cranston on the other hand, seemed to be on the verge of fainting. She was leaning on her husband for support to help her keep herself balanced before she completely fell over from the shock of it all.
"Kimberly Hart. The Pink Ranger." Kimberly stated as she removed her helmet and ran her fingers through her hair. She had a rather ashamed look on her face as she looked at her mother, silently apologizing for not having told her mother sooner.
"Kimberly, this....This certainly does explain a lot of things..." Mrs. Hart stated as took a few steps across the command center and embraced her daughter.
A hug had not exactly been what Kimberly was expecting. She had expected her mother to be angry that she was putting herself in danger to save the world. Her mother had never really approved of her doing dangerous things anyhow. Kimberly couldn't help it as she began sob.
Aisha followed after Kimberly. Removing her helmet and giving a shy smile towards her parents as she removed her helmet.
"Aisha Campbell. The Yellow Ranger."
Both of Aisha's parents embraced her, like Kimberly's mother had done for Kimberly, even though both of them were admittedly a little confused and shaken up by this whole thing.
It explained so much to them. Such as why before they had moved to Angel Grove, Aisha had been really unwilling to move and then after the Ninja Competition had been so ready and willing to move.
One by one the other rangers began to follow, although only a few of them actually had to reveal their identities stating their names and colors, and even former colors. They figured that they might as well join in with everyone else if anything.
Adam was the last one to remove his helmet.
It wasn't because he didn't want to reveal his identity to his parents; it was more because he wasn't sure how they were going to react.
Even though, everyone else had already revealed their identities, that everyone should have made the connect that if they all were friends outside of being Rangers, then chances were that the black Ranger was someone they knew as well...Adam's parents seemed to be pretty doubtful.
After all, for what they knew, he was dead.
He knew his mother was going to end up bursting into tears; it was very obvious that with all that she had been through in the last few days she was on the verge of a break-down and one more shock might just send her over the edge.
She worried a lot whenever he got hurt, and whenever she worried she would try to find some sort of comfort in the smell or taste of peppermint. Adam wondered just how badly the house was going to smell of peppermint once his mother found out that he was putting himself in to danger every day of his life battling monsters.
His father on the other hand, might take it pretty well. He knew that Adam could take care of himself, and there were just some things that he had to do.
As he removed the black helmet, Adam braced himself in preparation for his mother's outburst of tears.
Mrs. Park's heart almost stopped as the light from Command Center fell upon her son's face.
It...It couldn't be!
This had to be a trick of the mind she thought as tears began to form up in her eyes. There was no way that the person that she saw standing here could be real.
"A-Adam?" She choked out as her hand gently touched the arm of the black ranger suited person standing in front of her.
She was surprised that her hand didn't go right through him, at her touch.
He was real. But that was impossible!
With out much of an additional word, or a response from Adam, Mrs. Park threw her arms around her son, and began sobbing uncontrollably into his shoulder.
It is him! She thought joyfully through her tears. Her son was alright, he was alive, and that snake-lady had been lying after all!
"....I-I thought I wasn't going to see you again!" she choked out through her sobs as she looked up at her son's warm smile.
Adam gave a smile as he looked down at his mother and then glanced towards his father. "I was almost afraid of the same thing for a while there."
His father was smiling at him, almost as if completely relieved that he and his wife had gotten their son back.
Adam knew he had a lot of explaining and apologizing to do to his parents to make up for all that he had put them through in the last few days.
"I'm grounded, right?" He asked his dad with a slight smile.
Mr. Park crossed his arms as he approached his son. "You scared your mother and me half to death disappearing like that! You're darn right you're grounded!" He stated with a slight laugh.
"But...seeing how you are one of the people keeping Angel Grove safe, and you'd probably just sneak out again to go and save the world. I'll let you go by this time. Next time, just tell us that you'll be leaving okay?" Mr. Park added with a laugh as he patted his son on the back.
"We're receiving an incoming message from the forgotten demension.."Alpha announced as he brought the transmission up on the viewing globe.
Billy gave a smile as he saw Silver and Roan's faces appear on the Viewing globe.
"Is this thing on?"Silver asked scratching her head.
"Of course it's on...see? That right there says it's on..." Roan replied.
"Oh! Right? Billy can you see us?"
Billy smiled and signaled to the two pirates that he could see and hear them loud and clear.
"Good! Well, I know that we didn't get to say good bye eariler, you all being in rush and all, but I guess now is a good a time as any." Silver stated with a smile on her face.
"I should really be thanking you guys for your help. If it weren't for you guys, we'd proably still be there!"
Silver ran her fingers through her short hair, blushing.
"Well, Roan and I just wanted to say that it was an honor getting to work with you all."
"Too bad you guys didn't stay, We were just about to ask you to become crewmates on the ship, with the way that you guys fought, it would have been nice to have you guys onboard." Roan stated.
"What Roan means to say means is ya'll would have made great pirates, and if you're ever in the demension again, feel free to contact us, so that we can meet up again. Maybe we'll show you around the mainland some time. You guys would love it!" Sliver said cheerfully looking towards Roan, and then towards the other Rangers.
"I know you all are going to be busy protecting your demension, as will we with our demension, but If anything becomes too difficult for you guys to handle on your own, just call us up and the whole crew will be out there in a heart-beat to help you out." Roan continued giving his wife a breif smile.
Silver nodded in agreement.
Billy looked towards the other rangers and gave a smile, telling the two pirates that they would be the first people they would call if the need would arise, and if they would return the favor and come to their aid if the both of them ever needed their help.
The viewing globe flicked off after Billy and the other Rangers exchanged a word of goodbye with the two pirates.
As everyone began to morph back to their original outfits, returning the borrowed power to Alone. The tenseness of the whole area seemed to completely die away. Everyone was in a better mood, and the room was filled with an excited chatter as the Rangers began to talk to their parents about their recent experience as Rangers, and the parents began to ask for their child questions about what it was like to be Rangers, and what they had thought about it.
There was just one problem though, and even though the room was crowded, it wasn't an easy sight to miss.
One ranger was missing.
Mrs. Desantos started getting a bad feeling in her gut as she searched the room for missing Red Ranger. It was safe to assume from the story that Aisha and Adam had told about how they had become Power Rangers, that Rocky was the Red Ranger.
However, he seemed to be suspiciously absent from the room, and had not even joined in the fight against the Shadow Chameleon.
A deathly silence fell over the group as they all took note that Mrs. Desantos was beginning to get the hint that something was wrong at this point in time.
"...Where is Rocky?"
(Well, that chapter is finally done. Sorry that it was so long and that I took so long getting it posted up. It may be awhile before I am able to post another chapter up. Sorry that it was kind of boring...I wasn't sure where to stop the chapter, or exactly what I wanted to do. Well, I hope that you enjoyed it! Until next time!)
