After hearing about Hayden's condition, the Rangers in the Garage were in no mood to do anything.
Scott was sitting with Samantha, who had returned from delivering the water bottle to Leanne and needed to be in the arms of her boyfriend for comfort.
Flynn was sitting alone on his end of the couch, playing with the smoothie Gemma made him to try and comfort him. But, as he had already told everyone else, nothing was going to be of comfort until Hayden was back home.
Summer was back in the garage with Dillon, thinking about her decision. She hadn't told anybody about her encounter with the rivals. She wanted to wait until she had a better idea of what she should do.
Mike was furious, as expected, and he was beating himself up about this. He wasn't there to help Hayden at all when she got sick and he could have been. Like Summer, he could have spoken up about her random dizzy spells. Maybe then something would have been different.
Dillon was angry as well, but not for the same reason. He had grown to see Hayden as a demonic and slightly annoying little sister. When he found out someone had gone out of their way to make sure she would die, he nearly smashed a hole through the wall. On top of that, this whole situation made Summer cry. No one made Summer cry without meeting his fist.
Ziggy was trying to keep everyone looking on the bright side. He had put on a puppet show to get them to laugh, but it didn't work. He was still trying, but was quickly losing hope.
Greg was looking over Hayden's past medical records and even snatched a few from the hospital so he could know her current state. He already knew Leanne was on the case in NewTech, but he figured the team would feel better if they actually saw someone working.
Dani was in a state as well. She wasn't bouncing in her seat, or smiling like a five year old. She was curled up on the couch moping. She and Hayden had always been the best of friends. They grew up living next door to each other, and they were usually in the same classes at school. They had sleepovers almost every night during the summer. If Hayden was gone, Dani wouldn't know what to do.
Dr. K was miserable as well. She was upset that she might lose a Ranger, but she was also upset that she wasn't going to be able to talk to Ziggy about her feelings, and she was going to have to bottle them up once more.
Gem and Gemma seemed to have calmed down as well. Boom hour had now turned into boom minute, if it even occurred.
"This is stupid," Dani finally said. "We're Rangers. Every day we run the risk of losing someone..."
"Yeah, but this is the first time that it's real," Sammy sighed.
"Oh, it's real alright."
Everyone in the Ranger base turned to the monitors as Chloe appeared. She seemed to be alone on the other end, which confused the Rangers.
"What the fuck do you want?" Mike asked, clenching his fist. Chloe laughed.
"It's now been twenty-four hours since your precious little Hayden has fallen, and we're ready to strike a deal with you guys to save her."
"A deal?" Scott asked.
"Give us project Ranger. It's all we want."
"And why would we just hand our Ranger deal over to you?" Dillon asked. "You sent one of us to the hospital."
"Please, it was going to happen sooner or later," Chloe laughed. "Now you don't have to wait for it."
"Give us our cousin back," Dani growled, getting up off the couch and approaching the computer.
"I will, if you do this one thing... what colour are you?"
"Silver," Dani glared.
"Oh, that colour is so cool! Screw pink, I want the silver one! Put your morpher down and..."
Summer stepped up, pulling Dani away, "You don't want silver," she said. "If you do steal our morphers, you guys are going to want a full team. You should take Pink."
"Summer, what are you doing?" Mike frowned, Summer shushed him while Chloe thought.
"You're right... I'll stick with pink, I guess," Chloe glanced over to Samantha. She didn't recognise her as a Ranger. "You'll be the Ranger monkey. Your first job is to get the Pink morpher and rewire it to fit my DNA."
"Ranger monkey?" Samantha frowned. She pushed herself up using Scott's leg and glared at the computer screen. "I am not a Ranger monkey!"
"Says you," Chloe shrugged. She held up a remote, "You guys see this, right? This is a little device Zack created to go along with Deathcode, the virus we gave Hayden. If I push this button, she died on the spot."
"You wouldn't push it," Samantha tested, but as soon as she saw the girl's finger inch closer to the button, she regretted it. "No... no..."
"Do as I say, monkey, or Hayden dies."
Samantha lowered her head. She grabbed her car keys and walked away. She didn't want to do this, but she didn't want her sister to die.
"Well, not that you guys are at out command, I think it's time we take over this place. We'll be there in thirty minutes to choose beds. Those of you kicked off will have to sleep on the floor."
"Like hell we..." Summer covered Dani's mouth when Chloe's finger moved towards the button.
"Don't say anything stupid, Dani,' Summer whispered.
"Oh, and my brother and cousins want a morpher too. Any recommendations?"
"Yeah, kiss my ass," Dillon frowned, shutting off the computer.
"So, we're just going to let them walk all over us?" Mike asked. "We're going to give them morphers and let them rule us?"
"We don't have much of a choice, lad," Flynn sighed. "It's that or Hayden dies!"
Summer pulled away from the conversation. This wasn't what Hayden wanted to happen, but it's what Summer thought was best. She couldn't let Hayden die, especially not like this.
Hayden told her to do what was right, and Summer knew this was it. She wasn't going down without a fight.
Half an hour later, Sam was back with the Pink RPM morpher, ready for another user. She couldn't believe she was stealing her sister's morpher, to give it to the girl who was trying to kill her.
"There you are, Monkey. I was beginning to think you ran off," Chloe laughed, jumping up from the couch where she sat with her brother and cousins.
"I'm not a monkey," Samantha frowned. Chloe just waved it off and looked at the morpher.
"Oh, it's so pretty," she smiled. "How does it work?"
Samantha tried to hold back a laugh. They had come this far to be Rangers, and they didn't even know how the technology worked?
"You just have to push the giant self-destruct button," Samantha smiled. She took the morpher from Chloe.
"Well, where is it?" Chloe asked.
"Right here," Samantha said, smashing the morpher into the wall. It cracked, and some of the wires started popping out. Samantha looked at it, before continuing to smash it. "You know, sometimes the button gets stuck and you have to force it a bit."
She slammed it one final time, and the morpher shattered into pieces. She looked down at it, with a look of horror on her face, before handing it to Chloe.
"Oh, Dr. K's not going to be happy when she hears that you broke the morpher!"
Chloe was appalled her monkey would defy her. She glared at Samantha and held up the big red button of doom.
"You'll regret doing that," she said.
"Not really," Samantha shrugged. "I mean, you liked silver better, right?"
"Now I have to take it," Chloe smiled. She walked over to Dani and ripped her morpher off her belt. Dani looked up at the dark haired bitch, but laughed when Chloe tried to figure it out.
"MONKEY!" she yelled when she began to really struggle.
Samantha smiled. She took the morpher and slammed it against the wall. "It works the same way."
Again, Chloe was in total shock. She didn't respond to her monkey's horrible behaviour. She just grabbed Summer's morpher and sat back down.
"I'll figure this one out on my own," she said.
Samantha grinned, "Okay."
Dani looked over at her oldest cousin, "What the fuck?"
Samantha smirked, "Now, you're not a Ranger and Summer's not a Ranger. You don't have to listen to her anymore."
"Ooh," Dani smiled.
"I've chosen my colour!" Zack smiled, standing up.
"It better not be red," Alex grinned, looking at Scott and snatching his morpher. The former red Ranger sighed, but smiled when he realised Samantha was right. Now he wasn't a Ranger, he wasn't on the team, and he didn't have to be a Ranger monkey.
"Black," Zack smiled.
A bunch of oohs and uh-ohs sounded through the room as Dillon turned to look at the little nerd of the group.
"Do you really want my colour?" he asked.
"Actually, yes," Zack smiled.
"And what on earth makes you think I'm just going to hand it over?"
Chloe tossed Zack the red button. Dillon eyed the little nerd carefully.
"You push that button and I will serve you to the cat tomorrow morning," he said.
"There's a cat?" Zack asked.
Karly bounced out from under the couch and grabbed onto Zack's back, attacking him with her claws.
"Eat dog food you furless freak!" Karly yelled. Zack squirmed, trying to get Karly off him before she hurt him too badly. Dillon explained his chore to the boy who was about to take his morpher.
"Every morning, the black Ranger has to feed demon cat. And believe me, if she doesn't like you, she will eat your hand."
"I'll eat more than his hand," Karly threatened, dropping off Zack's back to look him in the eye. She was small, but she was already putting the fear of god in the four rival's hearts, "This kid made the stuff that poisoned my human. That chick gave it to her and Mr. Heartbreak broke her heart!"
"I'll feed the cat then," Alex shrugged, "She doesn't seem to hate me."
Karly pounced on Alex and bit his leg. She kept her grip on him by digging her claws into his leg. When she was finally pulled off by Samantha, Alex' leg was dripping in blood.
"Yeah, she doesn't hate you," Chloe laughed.
"I'll eat all of you if I have too," Karly growled.
"Well, off to bed," Chloe yawned. "We've all picked our morphers. Now we should rest up for our first day of rangering."
Chloe walked to the girls' bedroom and locked the door behind her, leaving all the girls to sleep on the floor. They exchanged looked, while Samantha mouthed "What a bitch!"
Alex played with the red morpher, while Zack stole the black one. They each went into the boy's bedroom and took a bed.
Nathan got up and walked over to Mike, "I should have won this one," he said, pulling the D-Green morpher from Mike's hand. "Now, I guess that just leaves Blue, Light Green and Gold on our team... they can sleep on the couches."
Nathan walked into the boys' room and slammed the door, locking it as well.
"They are total jerk-heads," Dani grumbled.
"Huge jerk heads," Samantha sighed.
"Yeah, but they know how to get Hayden back on her feet," Mike breathed. "Until they make a mistake, there's nothing we can do."
-----RPM-----
At the hospital, Hayden was reading the newspaper. There was nothing else to do inside these white walls.
She shed a tear at the front cover.
RPM Switching Gears. New Rangers Hit the Scenes.
Beneath it was a picture from inside the Ranger base. Apparently there had been cameras watching the exchange.
She opened the paper and saw a column that made her laugh.
Ranger Psycho Cat Should be Put Down, or Given a Kitty Morpher.
Only Karly could earn the title of psycho cat and end up in the newspaper for it. She was like any other cat. Strong-willed and believe that humans were simply a tool for food. But she was very protective of her humans, and was ready to do anything to protect them, even eat a jerk's leg.
She read more articles about the RPM team and they just made her furious. Summer was giving her morpher to Chloe? Dillon had handed his to Zack? And Scott was okay with Alex having his?
On top of that, her sister was being called Ranger Monkey? Hayden wouldn't stand for any of this, and seeing as she was the only one willing to stand up to the rivals, she was going to bust out and find them.
But first she needed to find some decent clothes.
-----RPM-----
It was early the following morning, and Samantha was already hard at work making brunch for the jerk-Rangers. She had been woken up by Karly, who had been kicked awake by Alex, and told that the Rangers needed a full breakfast to get them through the day.
"Stupid Rangers," Samantha growled, spitting in the eggs before dumping them in the pan. "I think I'll make these eggs loogie-side up."
While the eggs cooked, she checked on the bacon.
"Burned to a crisp," she smiled. "Just the way I like them."
She put the bacon on a plate, ready to serve.
"Now the toast," she grinned. Samantha buttered it, thinking of what she could do to the toast.
She carried the tray of toast over to the table before tripping. She caught herself, but the toast fell right into the garbage.
"Shit!" she frowned, before a smirk came to her face. She picked up the toast and scraped off the coffee grounds. "That'll work."
She set all the food on the table, then looked to the skies. "I know I'm not supposed to use Angel powers, but they tried to kill my sister. Please don't hurt me!"
She winced as the food glowed pink. Then, it cleaned itself off, or at least, made it look like it did.
In reality, the loogie, the burnt bacon and the coffee grounds were still there. No one could see it though.
"I smell bacon!" Alex grinned, hopping over to his seat and grabbing a handful of bacon.
Dani was awake with the others as well. She reached for a piece of toast, but Sam grabbed her hand.
"I think you should make your own toast," she said. Dani frowned.
"Why?"
Sam pulled her cousin to the garbage, showing her what was inside, before pointing to the toast. Dani held back a laugh and nodded.
"I'll get my own toast," she grinned.
-----RPM-----
Not far from the Ranger base, Hayden was struggling to keep going. With every step she took, her vision blurred. She was finding it hard as hell to keep going, but she was going to make it, no matter what.
She finally reached the side wall of the garage and leaned against it. That's when she saw something hiding in the bushes. She waited for her vision to return, before picking it up.
"Zwop?" she frowned. It was her pink bear she had gotten when she was just a little girl. Someone must have thrown it out the window.
She hugged it close and kept it with her as she turned into the base.
The doors were open, allowing her access inside. She stayed behind the cars so no one could see her, and tried to look around for something to help her.
She saw Karly dragging a small device with a red button and frowned. She whispered for Karly to come.
"Karls," she called, keeping her voice low. "Here, kitty."
Karly heard her human's voice and looked around. She spotted Hayden hiding behind Scott's car and smiled. Without attracting attention from anyone, she pushed the remote over to Hayden and jumped into her human's arms.
"Hayden! What are you doing here?" Karly asked, nestling into her human's arms. Hayden smiled, kissing her cat's head.
"I can't let the team give themselves up to those jerks," Hayden explained. "There's no way."
"But human, you'll die if they don't follow the jerks' every word. I don't want you to die."
"I'm not going to die," Hayden assured her cat, giving her a tight, loving squeeze.
From his seat, Nathan could hear whispering. Years as a ninja, followed by years in hiding, planning on the death of the Power Rangers helped developed his hearing.
He got up, pretending he just needed to use the washroom. He walked around Scott's car and came up from behind. He grabbed Hayden by the back of the neck and pulled her up roughly.
"Hey, look at what we found!" he called. Hayden squirmed, trying to get out of his grasp, but all she managed to do was hurt herself further.
"Let her go," Samantha growled, stepping forward. Chloe held her hand up, stopping Samantha.
"Aw, boo... why is she here?" she asked. "Whatever, what do you think you can do?"
Karly jumped on the red button and hissed. Summer heard her and ran for both the cat and the remote, before Nathan could stomp his foot down.
Dillon saw his girlfriend was about to be stepped on and ran for Nathan. He tackled the younger boy to the ground, forcing his to drop Hayden.
Flynn ran forward, catching Hayden in his arms and pulling her up. He held her close, keeping her safe in his arms.
Alex wasn't happy. He looked over at Zack and Chloe and nodded. Chloe, the ice queen, summoned her ice ninja powers. Little shards of ice appeared in the air, aimed for Summer and Dillon. Both dropped below the attack. Summer accidentally let go of the remote, and Zack grabbed it.
"Think your little problem's going to go away just like that?" he asked.
"Well, we were kinda hoping," Ziggy started, but he was cut off when Zack lifted his hand with the remote in the air.
"Maybe you guys just need a push in the right direction," Zack grinned.
Karly tried to attack the boy, but he kicked her away. The small cat landed in a heap beside Samantha. She picked her up and held her close, still keeping an eye on Zack and the button.
"Don't do this, Zack," she tried, hoping she could somehow talk him down. "You're a good kid, I know you are."
"Pff," Zack scoffed, "Not good enough to earn the Ranger powers on my own. I've gotta work hard for them, and you guys aren't helping."
"We are the Power Rangers, you noob!" Dani frowned. "Of course we're not helping the guys who are trying to kill Hayden!"
"Correction," Nathan smiled, finally jumping up from the ground and grabbing the remote from Zack. "The guys who have killed Hayden."
Hayden was wide eyed as Nathan looked at her to say goodbye. He knew he had to do it fast, he still had some feelings for her, and the longer he was caught staring into her eyes, the harder it would be to push the button.
"Goodnight," he grinned. His finger inched closer and closer to the button, and for everyone in the room, time had slowed.
Flynn put Hayden down and tried to jump for the remote and the boy holding it, hoping that he could stop his girlfriend's death. He jumped on top of Nathan, struggling to get the remote out of his hand.
Nathan held the remote as far away from Flynn as possible and pressed the button.
Hayden grabbed her chest with her hands and dropped to her knees. She watched as her vision faded to black.
A white light appeared, as Hayden expected, but right in front of it was a light blue glow.
"Take my hand," the light said, "You'll be safe, I promise."
Hayden recognised the voice and smiled. She reached out to the light, choosing to follow it, instead of the white light of death.