Episode 5, Chapter 5 – Will

Will swore quietly to himself; things were not going at all how he had planned. After they had lost contact with the other Rangers and Goldar had retreated back into the police station, Will and Jack had decided that one of them should go around to the back of the building to make sure Goldar wasn't trying anything funny. Not being able to hear from the three Rangers was bad enough, but now Will couldn't get through to Jack, either. And when he tried Zordon, he got nothing. Rita obviously knew that the Power Rangers were here, and already she was proving that she was more powerful than anyone had anticipated.

The only good thing was that the small group of police officers hadn't taken advantage of Goldar's disappearing… yet. Will's suit could just pick up their conversations far down the street. Even as he listened, it was clear that support for attack was growing. If the Rangers didn't take back the station soon, the police were going to throw every last man into the fire.

"What to do, what to do," Will muttered. Everything about the past few hours – had it really only been hours? – still rattled Will's mind when he thought about it too much. Today was the Fourth of July; there was supposed to be fireworks and burgers and Lee Greenwood's "Proud to Be An American". He was supposed to be stuck in traffic right now coming back from the lake. Yet here he was.

"…an't… do th…"

Will snapped back to reality. Someone was speaking in his head, but it sounded like the jammer still kept it from completely going through. The speaker continued to talk, but Will couldn't catch anything more.

Then the front doors of the police station opened.

Goldar and a strange woman in similar gold armor strode out into the streets. They held chains in their hands that dusted the ground with darkness as they rattled, and at the other end of those chains were Ewan, Jess, and April. Pure darkness bound their arms and legs so that they stumbled and fell down the stairs that led to the sidewalk. Goldar and his new friend cackled at the sight before turning to address the police officers down the street.

"Hey you!" called Goldar with his hoarse smoker's yell. "Puny humans! Look here! Three of the only people strong enough to oppose us have been captured! Still wanna take back your sorry little base? Ehhhhhhh heh heh heh heh heh!"

"Guys," thought Will, "it's me. Are you okay?"

"Get us out of here," thought Ewan. None of his usual bravado. That was odd. "Please."

Definitely odd. Ewan must be pretty rattled to say "please".

"Goldar and Scorpina are going to kill us if you don't do something," thought April. "You better be quick about it! Get out here and help us!"

Goldar and Scorpina slung the three Rangers down the street and towards the gathering of officers. The Rangers landed hard and rolled. Ewan cried out and began to mutter something about a broken arm. Even though they were still a block away, several officers stepped back.

"Where is Green?" Will asked.

"We don't know," thought Ewan. "God, my arm…"

"Just get us out of here!" thought April.

Will prepared to jump from the building. If he landed between the monsters and the Rangers, he might be able to knock Goldar and – what was her name? – Scorpina away to give him some time to break the chains. He gripped the edge of the building and marked his jump, but a vision of white cut his leap short.

Light slowly melted into greens and browns. Will stood atop a mountain summit in the heat of afternoon, only he knew that he was not Will but the old White Ranger, a large dark man built lean, like a lion. He stood without moving, his gaze surveying endless tracks of land before him and his mane of wild black hair fluttering in the winds. The slightest of sounds behind him gave away a visitor.

"It is unlike you to venture so far on foot," said the White Ranger without looking. "Why not just teleport?"

Rita smiled. There was no denying her beauty; a face like hers could start wars, and perhaps, in fact, had. "I wanted to see what all the fuss was about," she said, coming to a stop at the White Ranger's arm. "You always talk about how the journey is more important than the destination."

"And?"

Rita shrugged. "Once was enough."

"Was that your zord I heard?"

"I never said I hoofed it the entire way up here. But enough of that. Now that I'm here, what's say you and I ditch this silly surveying and, oh I don't know…" she ran a hand down his arm and held on to his wrist ever so lightly, "go somewhere Zordon can't find us, do something he wouldn't approve of." Her other hand started to reach for his waist, but he slapped it away.

"No, Rita."

"Awww come on!" She threw her arms around his neck and stood on her tiptoes, yet even then she didn't come up to his chin. He refused to look down at her. "We've been Rangers for how long now?"

"Many solar cycles."

"More than any other human! And for what? Nothing's happening! Nothing is wrong, and at this rate, nothing will be wrong for perhaps another hundred solar cycles. So let's get out of here. Let's go do something fun for a little while. No one will miss us, and if something does go wrong, Zordon can just whisk us back to base and tell us what to do like he always does."

"And what did you have in mind, little Black Ranger?" He still didn't look down at her, but Rita seemed to be willing to take what attention she could get.

She hopped backwards, yelled, "Ambition!", and became a Ranger hooded in black. "Watch this," she said. She bent down and placed her hands on her own shadow. When she lifted her hands up, they were holding onto a black staff made of ebony and a fine mist of darkness that fell off the handle and colored the grass below it a single shade darker.

"Your weapon has changed," said the White Ranger.

He crossed his arms, but Rita took her staff in hand and twisted it in circles until something began to shimmer before her. "There are things we can do," Rita said as she twirled the staff, "that Zordon never told us about. He's holding back from us, and I think it's our duty as Rangers to investigate our own powers and push them to their limits."

She stopped spinning. Before her stood a perfect replica of her Ranger self. The White Ranger unfolded his arms and slowly walked around the apparition, taking in its every detail. "Impressive," he said at last. Rita breathed a sigh of relief and threw her staff into the air with a whoop. "But Zordon must have a reason for not telling us of these things. This ghost Ranger is a deception. It is a lie. What kind of defenders would we be if we had to resort to falsities to protect? We would be no better than those who would seek to destroy."

Rita caught her staff, but even under the hood it was obvious that she hadn't expected his answer. She waved an arm, and the mirror image disappeared. She dropped her staff into her shadow, pressed a button on her wrist, and teleported back to her zord without another word.

The mountain summit lurched downward and became a dark rooftop. Will found himself gripping the roof's edge so tightly that he now held two small chunks of roof in his hands.

"Hey," April thought, "are you there? Goldar's not kidding around. He'll kill us if you don't get out here, damnit."

"Don't worry," thought Will quickly. "I'll be out there in a second. Oh, hey David, Jane, Susan, look… if I don't make it out of this, I want you to tell my mom that Charlie loves her very much, alright?"

"Okay Charlie," thought Ewan. "You got it." That was all the answer Will needed.

He scanned Goldar and Scorpina and found a strange anomaly on Goldar's right hip, but when he tried to look closer all he saw was black. Rita's work. It was a slim chance, but it was still a chance. If that thing on Goldar's hip was what Will thought it was…

Goldar slowly drew his sword from his side and laughed again. Scorpina took up Goldar's chains and kicked each of the Rangers into kneeling positions. Goldar paced behind them. "What a pathetic group of Rangers!" he bellowed. "The night has only just begun, and already three of you belong to Rita! All it'll take is one swing. Those little hoodies of yours won't be enough to stop this…" He touched the flat of the blade against Ewan's shoulder. Ewan cringed away and pleaded again in Will's mind to save them. Will withdrew his pistol. He'd only get one shot. He just had to wait until Goldar was in position.

Scorpina and Goldar looked around the street as if expecting something. "Please Charlie," begged Ewan, "I don't want to die!"

"Don't worry," thought Will, "I'm coming." He aimed his pistol.

"Goodbye, Yellow Ranger," chuckled Goldar. He swung straight down and buried his sword deep in Ewan's abdomen by way of his shoulder. The two halves of Ewan fell apart from each other, and the kneeling body crumpled forward. Jess and April began to cry hysterically. No one noticed the small beam of light that arched from a nearby rooftop after Goldar's swing.

"You asshole!" April screamed in Will's ear. "You fucking asshole! You just let him kill David!"

"Yes," thought Will. "But while Goldar was busy pulling his sword out of the fake Ranger, I shot the jamming machine tied to his belt. Goodbye, Rita."