Power Rangers Nexus

Chapter 34: The Deal

The rest of the journey was uneventful, apart from the odd proximity mine or motion-activated laser grid. Andros insisted that any and all conversation be kept to a minimum, which aggravated some but seemed ideal to others….particularly, Ashley and Terina. The Yellow Space Ranger had been glaring daggers at the smaller girl since the fight. Terina supposed it was because she'd been about to brutally murder someone. Not that it made much difference, seeing as Andros had gone and executed them all anyway.

Eventually, the smoldering wreckage of broken vehicles ended abruptly in a high, impenetrable-looking wall, covered with brutal spikes and mounted with automated gun turrets about every ten meters. Something about the wall's construction seemed to indicate that it had been hastily re-built. Long, dark gouges in the ground behind them showed where the wall had been placed before, and the time before that, and the time before that, until it had been demolished and pushed back by the war.

Andros led them to a door that was concealed in the detailing of the wall, opening a hidden panel. He pulled off his helmet and stared into what had to be a retinal scanner, because a beam of light shone into his eye.

Terina, despite her troubled mind, did a double-take. Andros was HOT. Especially the hair, dark with yellow streaks, pulled back into a ponytail.

"Password?" the machine prompted.

"Em Tnes Tlaw," Andros said.

There was a sudden surge of movement, and with a loud clanking sound, part of the wall retracted revealing an opening.

Beyond the Neutral Zone, the planet seemed much cleaner, if no more natural. Isolated bunkers were scattered across the landscape nearby, and farther back could be seen the rooftops of large industrial buildings.

Andros led them all to one of the bunkers, where he opened another mechanical door, this one revealing a strange, bulky blue tank. One by one, the Rangers piled in.

Surprisingly fast considering its size, the tank raced down the Kerovan streets, finally arriving at a large compound deep within what appeared to be a residential area.

The doors to the massive compound ground open, revealing a bustling hangar in which numerous mechanics were tinkering with what appeared to be advanced aircraft. Other workers were busy loading and unloading crates and materials off of ground-based transports.

The tank parked itself and everyone disembarked.

One person (a medic, to judge from the patch on his shoulder; a white circle containing a red heart, a single drop of blood falling from the bottom) ran up to them.

"Draffut," Andros acknowledged.

"Andros. We were beginning to worry. Is everyone okay? Anyone injured?"

"This one," TJ said, as he and Carlos brought up Aviarus' stretcher.

"A Sirenian! And he is in bad shape, isn't he? Hmm. I'll have to brush up on my Sirenian anatomy in a hurry. Take him to the medical wing, would you please? I'll be there shortly."

With a nod, the two Rangers carted the unconscious alien off through one of the doors at the back of the hangar.

"Terina's also been hurt," Electra said in her soft monotone.

The Yellow Ranger's head jerked up at Electra, startled. She hadn't realized that anyone had noticed. She hadn't taken her hand off her shoulder since she'd demorphed. There was no sign of any blood, but that was hardly surprising; blasters tended to cauterize the wounds they made.

"Here, let me have a look," the Medic said, rushing over to her.

"No!" Terina cried, backing away. She took a deep breath. "I mean, no. Thank you. I'm fine. It's just a scratch."

"You'd best let me be the judge of that. I'm a professiona-"

Terina's voice dropped to a low growl. "I said NO."

The Medic fell back a step, seeing the murderous look in the tiny girl's eyes.

Regaining his composure, he turned back to Andros.

"Anyway…Andros, I'm supposed to tell you and your team to report to Barthello's office. You're expected. What should be done with…?"

The Red Space Ranger looked around at the disshelved Terran Rangers.

"Take them to one of the interrogation rooms. I still need to talk with them. See that they're comfortable. And be sure to tell TJ and Carlos to come as soon as they finish with the Sirenian."

Draffut nodded.

As Andros and the others made their way through the hangar, the medic turned to the Terrans and Urchin.

"Well…come along, then." He looked them all up and down. "It has apparently been a very long day for all of you."

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

"Not exactly the Hilton, is it?" Electra asked, looking around the interrogation room thoughtfully. It was a simple, four-sided room, too small to be comfortable, too large to be cramped. A large rectangular table stood in the center of the floor, ten folding chairs arranged around it.

Troy was busy tapping at the walls. "This is where the two-way glass should be. I wonder if they can see through the metal somehow?"

"It can be done," Urchin said. "I would not doubt that it is."

"Are you okay?" Tommy asked. The Aquitian looked pale, and was beginning to tremble slightly.

"I must rehydrate soon. That is all."

"We'll have them bring us some water when they come to talk to us," Mara said. "I could use a drink, myself."

"What do we tell them?" Troy asked, turning to face the others. "When they start to question us?"

"The truth," Tommy said simply. "We haven't done anything wrong. I think if anything, they owe us a ship."

"Six ships," Electra corrected. "The Mega-V Shu-"

Troy jumped across the room and slapped his hand over her mouth. Electra didn't move, but raised an eyebrow at him.

"This is an interrogation room," he said. "Let's not say anything we wouldn't want overheard, hmm?"

Electra gave an exaggerated salute, then removed his hand from her mouth.

"So how did those Terrans end up here?" Tommy asked. "You said they'd been abducted?"

"It was back before any of you became Rangers," Terina said. "One of the monsters Zedd sent abducted a bunch of teenagers from a park in California. We figured it had stowed them in a pocket dimension or something, since that had happened before, and that they'd be set free when we destroyed him, but that evidently wasn't it. After we beat him, we found out that it hadn't really been one of Zedd's monsters at all, just an alien prospector who'd stumbled upon Terra. We figured he thought humans might make good zoo animals or something. But we had no idea where he'd sent them, and since he was dead, he couldn't exactly tell us." The Yellow Ranger sighed. "I know their names because I was the one that got to deliver the bad news to their families. It should have been Deacon, he knew some of them personally, but we drew straws and I lost…anyway, this was back when we were just getting started as Rangers. Before we knew that we'd be causing so many casualties that it'd be impossible to keep up with the obituaries."

"You've caused casualties?" Tommy asked.

"And you haven't?" Mara replied. "That's why cities finally started building monster shelters. Well…..we call them monster shelters."

"What does everyone else call them?"

"Ranger Shelters," Troy replied. "You have to understand, from their point of view, a bunch of hideous monsters show up, then a bunch of freaks in multicolored armor, and they fight to the death, destroying anything in their path. Then come the giant, house-trampling robots…"

"But we're trying to protect them from the monsters," Tommy stated.

"That's a bit hard to appreciate when, no matter who wins, your children have just been stepped on. Most of the people on Terra just want the Rangers and monsters to take their war elsewhere. They don't realize we're at war for them."

"Have you tried telling them? Issuing a press release or something?"

"We've tried everything, Tommy," Mara said. "None of it's worked. So now we just do our jobs, and let people think what they want to think. It's all for their own good, anyway." Mara frowned. Normally, when she said, she sounded much more sure of herself. Urchin's words earlier must have gotten to her.

"Anyway," Tommy said. "So they were transported elsewhere….how were they brought here?"

"Sirenians," TJ said, as he and the other Kerovan Rangers walked into the room.

Tommy appraised the five humans as they entered, seeing them unmorphed for the first time. Ashley was a rather attractive blonde, with a sparkling yellow gem hanging from a chain around her neck. Carlos was Hispanic, as his name suggested, Cassie was Asian, and TJ was a tall, bald black man. Andros looked human enough, unless you counted the streaks in his hair, but there was no telling whether those were natural or dyed that way. If Tommy recalled correctly, the workers in the hangar, and the medic, had possessed similar streaks, so they were probably either natural or typical to Kerovan culture.

The ten Rangers, by unspoken agreement, sat down at the table, Terrans on one side, Kerovans on the other. Urchin stood against the wall, looking tired.

"They bought us from the zoo that monster sent us to," Carlos explained, tossing a bottle of water to the Aquitian, which was gratefully accepted. "And then sold us to the Kerovans as slaves."

"You're slaves?" Mara asked.

"Not anymore," Cassie explained. "We were given our freedom, in exchange for volunteering to test some potentially dangerous military technology."

"Your morphers," Troy guessed.

TJ nodded.

"So if you're free, why are you still here?" Tommy asked. "Your families must be worried about you."

"Their families think they're dead, remember?" Electra pointed out.

"Sorry about that, by the way," Terina said. "If we'd been doing our job as defenders a bit better, you'd have never wound up…"

"Actually," Ashley said, glancing at Andros. "I'm okay with the way things turned out."

Andros, to everyone's surprise, actually smiled back.

"Anyway, we're free to leave whenever we want," Cassie said. "At the moment, we're working for the Kerovan military to save up enough credits to book a flight home."

"I'm not so sure I'll be leaving," Ashley said. "But anyway, we're here to talk about you."

"You know our story," Troy said. "We're sticking to it."

"Your story checks out," Andros granted. "Our long-range communication satellites recorded the Aquitian's distress signal, and his Serpentware license is valid. The only trouble is, what do we do with you now?"

"Send us home?" Mara suggested, as though it should have been obvious.

Andros shook his head. "If we could afford to send you home, just like that, we wouldn't have these four working off the money for transport. All our resources are dedicated to the war, and we can't spare any."

"We also can't replace your ship," TJ said. "Sorry about that."

"We DID recover this from the wreckage," Cassie added, smiling. She produced a heavy-looking black metal briefcase and placed it n the table before them. "Whatever it's made of survived the crash. We can't get it open, though. Any idea what's inside?"

"I have a pretty good idea," Troy said, taking the briefcase and stowing it beneath his seat.

"We can't leave yet anyway," Tommy said. "Not until we find out what happened to Jareth and Deacon."

The Kerovan exchanged glances, then turned to the Terrans.

"We received intelligence that two people were found wandering the neutral zone, near where half of your ship went down. They were captured by a bounty hunter the Darians hired a while back," TJ explained. "We know that they were taken alive, but nothing else."

"I have been authorized to make you a deal," Andros said. "We will help you rescue your friends, if you will agree to perform a few tasks for us."

It was the Terrans' turn to trade glances.

"What kind of tasks?" Tommy asked.