Ch. 2 Secrets of the Morphing Grid

[Play Power Ranger SPD theme instrumental on You Tube]

"Power Rangers!" They yell in harmony.

All at once the two rangers feel a surge of energy the likes of which their previous transformation couldn't compare. Neo looks at his hand in awe clinching his fist he feels as if he could crush a boulder with a single hand. The robot moves to engage swinging the very same dagger that gave the two so much trouble before. As a look of determination envelops Neo's face, Roy is already on the move. Blocking his attack with ease, Roy delivers two-shift kicks to his lower body finally pushing him back with a spin kick.

"Woah." Roy couldn't stop himself from utterly, "I don't remember him being this slow."

The robot stumbles before regaining his balance and points at the two newly powered rangers. "Don't think you've got a chance just because you're color-coded now." as he finished his sentence Neo leaped into action jumping onto a nearby countertop and coming down with a roundhouse kick to the face. The robot does a flop landing on his back, as he tries to make his way to his feet Roy gives his a swift kick to the gut sending him through the far wall out of a second story building onto the loading bay.

Eric and Damon can only watch in awe as the two rangers jump through the newly created hole in the wall to engage. Dr. Rawlings was watching as well but not simply in awe she was analyzing. "Incredible! They didn't simply take your access to the morphing grid, they've somehow merged the technology we created here with it."

"Are you saying they have access to our powers?" Eric asked.

"Not exactly." Dr. Rawlings explained, "Those are still the suits I designed but they've somehow been influenced by your links to the morphing grid that the rangers are using to power them. Red Quantum Ranger... Green Galactic Ranger... I never could've envisioned..." she caught her mind wandering off with the implications of all this before quickly returning her mind to the present. "I have a hunch." she paused rushing to found a communicator to give the Rangers a message.

"What's happening?" Damon asked confused.

Finally getting her hands on a communicator Dr. Rawlings reaches out."Rangers, can you hear me?"

Rolling to evade an incoming attack Neo hears a notification in his helmet. "Doc Rawlings is that you?"

"Rangers you have weapons in you're morphers" Dr. Rawlings explains, "Try to bring them out!"

"How do we do that?" Roy says with grit trying to hold the robot back.

"You navigate the interface with your helmets just focus your attention on the prop in the bottom left corner of your vision."As Neo focuses his attention on the image a hud of appears before him, then by quickly focusing on the weapons on the menu they materialize in his grasp.

"I got it!" he yells with a eureka like tone in his voice."Quantum Blasters!" in his hands were two twin mini pistols colored black and red. They didn't look like much to the naked eye but he could tell they packed a punch. "Little space please!" Neo yelled urging Roy to get some distance. Roy quickly obliged opening the arms of the robot wide then kicking him in the chest and using the moment of the impact to flip behind Neo. "Quantum Blasters Fire!"The robot erupted in a ray of Red beams.

"Let's give this try!" Roy said focusing, "Galactic Saber" it looked similar to the Quasar Saber only the guard was a lot smaller, it was single-bladed like a katana rather than like a broad sword and the blade glows an otherworldly green. Running to engage Roy yelled, "Cover me!" As the Red beams continued to devour the robot Roy leaped on Neo's shoulders and came down will a sing powerful slash. Mimicking Roy, Neo jumped over his fellow ranger coming down with a rain of fire causing the robot to begin a slow fall to the ground. Suddenly Roy yelled, "I'm not done with you yet!" With an amazing burst of speed, he ran pass Neo to deliver a single slash across the robot's midsection. The robot finally hit the ground an explosion was soon to follow.

"Just as a thought." Dr. Rawlings exclaimed, "Those aren't the weapons I designed. I wonder what other secrets does the morphing grid have that we've yet to discover."

Suddenly a missile came out of the sky and hit the corpse of the newly defeated robot. No doubt from the space ship hiding in orbit. And from the missiles rather than an explosion an erupting of millions upon millions of nanobots appeared rebuilding the robot from the ground up, only this time he was 50 meters tall towering over the base standing in the nearby ocean alone.

"Didn't see that coming," Neo says with a bit of shook in his voice.

"I did." Eric and Damon say in harmony."You'll get used to it."

"Doc what do we do now?" Roy asked.

"Are their zords ready to go?" Eric added on.

"Zords?" Neo whispered under his breath.

Dr. Rawlings nodded, "The zords are good to go, however... Three Zords are required to create the Heroic Megazord."

"Three Zords, two rangers. Fantastic" Roy said thinking out loud to himself.

"Rangers!" Dr. Rawlings explained, "Use the hud to summon your zords the same way you called upon your weapons before." Within moments an eruption can be felt below Lightspeed Headquarters as both Ranger call upon their zords. They were both jets that had obviously been upgraded with advanced technology as they moved like spaceships rather than only forward. While the Red Jet looked more or less like a traditional jet the green jet not only had two wings but also tow noses while the cockpit was positioned further in the back right in front of the thrusters. Like before they morph these zords were without color. It didn't take long to figure out how to remedy that. "Rangers, these are your Vectors. With the rise of this new threat, you'll need access to zords the likes of which have never been seen before. You see..."

Was all she had time to say before Neo interrupted her, "No time to chat, Giant robot here." as the two rangers jump into their cockpits. The moment the rangers made contact with their new machines the morphers ignited transferring their newly formed links to the morphing grind to their zords."Red Vector Locked and loaded." a red and black color scheme overcomes his new zord.

"Green Vector Online," he said as he's zord's gray coloration change to one of green and white. Roy wasted no time drowning the enemy with precision fire. Neo on the other hand.

"HOW DO YOU STOP THIS CRAZY THING!" Neo screamed.

"Neo stop fooling around. You act as you've never flown a spaceship before." Roy chastised him.

"Huh, maybe because I haven't!"

"Strange, even kids learn how to fly spaceships at a young age on Mirinoi do. Is that not a thing on Earth?"

"Not so much. No!"

Roy keeps up his onslaught as Dr. Rawlings desperately attempts to tutor Neo with little success. After Neo narrowly avoids slamming into his fifth building Roy finally chimes in, "It's no good, he's knocking us away like flies. I need more power if I'm gonna take this thing down."

"As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted." Dr. Rawlings started. "the Megazord may require three vectors but in order to enter starship mode you only need two. Unlike zords of the past, these were made to combine in any order producing a different arsenal depending on which vector is the lead. All a particular ranger needs to do is take the lead."

Neo zooms by barely avoiding another building yet again. "Neo if you're done playing around, I'm taking the lead!"Roy exclaim.

"Please help me," Neo whispered under his breath.

[Play Go Green Ranger Go instrumental on You Tube]

Roy smirks," Let's go, Heroic Starship!" Suddenly Neo could feel a strong force pulling his zord toward's Roy's. A tractor beam? Seemingly on his own, the zord begins to transform. The nose goes down and the wings pull apart positioning themselves to connect just in front of Roy's wings. The Front of his ship pulls up resting perfectly between the two noses of Roy's ship their cockpits merge becoming a single space Roy sitting behind Neo. And their thrusters lay one on top of the other. "Now that's what I'm talking about!" Roy smiles, "Heroic Starship... Green!" Noticing the ship was now safely under Roy's control Neo breathed a sigh of relief, but his relief would not last long.

Roy immediately took the ship into a dive the enemy robot in his sights. With the press of a button, green beams ripped into the robot causing him to stagger for the first time.

"You got 'em!" Neo cheered.

"Not done yet," Roy said coldly, without explanation Roy dove the nose of the ship into the gut of the robot.

"What do you think you're doing?" Neo asked cautiously. Roy did not reply.

"Heroic Starship Full-power!"Roy shouted. The engines of the ship roared as the thrusters ignited slowly but surely lifting the fifty-meter robot off the ground. Before the robot realized it he was twenty meters off the ground, then fifty then a hundred.

"Did you really think I'd let you get away with this?" The Robot roared as he pulled out his dagger and tried to stab the starship from above. Suddenly a hand disconnected from the starship and preceded to hold his arm in place, "What? This isn't over yet." Quickly he transferred the dagger over to his opposite hand and with all of his force threw it at lightspeed headquarters. Roy was frozen in shook he never imagined the Robot would do something so desperate. If that giant dagger hit the base so many people could die, Damon could die.

Oh no I was too reckless Roy thought to himself, can I make it back in time? As he starts to begin to turn the ship around suddenly another arm disconnected from the ship from the bottom this time with a blaster in hand. And with precision accuracy snipe the dagger out of mid-air. "That was a close one." Neo sighed, "Don't worry Roy I got your back." Relieved as he was he was too angry at the robot's trickery to display anything other than contempt.

"You'll pay for that!" Roy yelled as the starship left the Earth's gravitational field.

"What is he..." was all Dr. Rawlings had time to say before it hit her. Quickly she hoped on a terminal to transfer him the last known location of the Empire Spaceship.

"You're a lifesaver Doc," Roy smirked, now free of Earth's Gravitation field the starship begins to pick up speed at an alarming pace. Soon a notification of an anomaly is sent directly to Roy's zord. "That's gotta be it!" With no hesitation at all, he rammed the Robot still clinging to the starship into the hidden spaceship. Quickly searching for a weapon, he finds exactly what he is looking for. "This is where it ends! Lost Galaxy Saber!" Like before two hands disconnect from the starship wielding a large blade and in one motion they run the robot through piercing through the spaceship as well. "Full-power!" They shout in harmony. With quite a bit of resistance, they cut the Robot and the Spaceship clean in half. The resulting explosion engulfs the Heroic Starship.

Lightspeed Headquarters is silent, everyone looking at their monitors with bated breath and hearts thumping wildly in their chests until a Green and Red starship hurls out of the smoke cloud heading back to Earth. The room erupts in cheers as the gravity of these New Power Rangers first victory sets in.

"Great job Rangers!" Dr. Rawlings calls in unable to hide the excitement in her voice. Now come on some celebrating to do.

A few days later

"Didn't know to celebrate meant a couple days worth of test." Neo said unamused, "Shouldn't we be off-world by now, the empire isn't just gonna let us lick our wounds."

"Can't be helped." Roy explained "Both our vectors got banged up in that last battle. How're the piloting lessons going?"

"I'm working on it... Don't change the subject, that's only partly true and you know it! The words were done two days ago. So why are we still here?"

"And, I think you know that there's only one person with the answer to that question."

Neo places his hand on his chin as if contemplating for a moment finally saying, "Fine." he storms out, causing Roy to reluctantly follow out of curiosity.

"Dr. Rawlings!" Neo says finally finding her, "What's the big idea? We've been waiting here for days. When are you gonna let us locate the other rangers?"

"Other Rangers?" Dr. Rawlings looks slightly surprised by this revelation. Clearly she'd been so enthralled with her work that the thought hadn't even crossed her mind. "Of course, right this way." She says leading them to a nearby lab. There they see their morphers connected to a similar device to the one Roy had seen her connect to the green Quaser Saber before.

"What's going on here." Roy finally speaks.

"Various test to figure out what's going on with these morphers... or the morphing grid itself."

"What do you mean what's wrong, we were able to morph just fine after we got our connection to the morping grid. You saw for yourself." Neo added.

"When you were selected as rangers Neo you were told you'd be the Heroic Force Blue Ranger and Roy the Black Ranger... We did that to try to use the colors of the original power rangers, hopefully, bring some hope back into Alliance."

"What's the big deal? The Mighty Morphing Rangers had both green and red rangers at some point."

"Yes. But the morpher you used was that of the blue ranger meaning in our vault exist our pseudo-Red Ranger morpher, yet I'm somehow looking at the red and green ranger right in front of me. Now how is that possible." Neo remained silent as there was nothing could say. "Those morphers were designed to use another link to the morphing grid but not channel their colors or their powers. Not only that it effect the zords as well. It's as if the morphing grid has a will of its own of some kind, but that's can't be possible. Can it?" She looks up to see the rangers concerned faces and quickly decides not to burden them with this knowledge, after all, they've got a hard fight in front of them. "Your next assignments" She hands them a datapad trying to change the subject. Neo you're being sent to Mars to extract their Ranger Candidate Originally it was supposed to be the yellow ranger but that's up in the air right now. " She catches herself before she brings up the Morphing grid again, "Politically the planet is in turmoil on what to do about the broken treaty. Find they ranger as soon as possible, hopefully, that will give the people the push they need to join the fight. Roy, you're assignment is the same only you'll be extracting the pink ranger. There is a frontier world on the border of the empire's terrority and they've had it rough for some time, they've agreed to join the alliance but only if one of their people becomes one of our new Rangers. Doggie Cruger is there testing the candidates, he'll tell you who to give the morpher to. Am I understood?"

"Yes ma'am." The two say in harmony.

"A single vector is not capable of entering hyperspace." she goes on. "But the Heroic Starships can. We've mounted each of your vectors with the zords of the other rangers. That should allow you to get to your destinations in no time."

The two rangers pick up their morphers and preceded head down into the hanger,"It's morphing time!"

"Heroic Force! Red Ranger Power!"

"Heroic Force! Green Ranger Power!"

Neo hops into the Starship Red as Roy hops in the Starship Green. Neo talks to Roy over an open channel. "You excited for our first missions?"

Roy smirks, "You're exacted that your mission is so much easier than mine?"

"That's not true. I have to deal with the worst kind of monsters of all, politicians."

"Fair enough."

"Hey Roy, can you do me a favor?" Roy looks in his directions somewhat confused, "Can you not tell the other rangers that I wasn't supposed to be the red ranger?"

Roy looks forward and starts he's the engine, "Prove that you're worthy of the color and it'll never come up. And thanks." Neo looks over to Roy this time he was the one that was confused. "For covering me and shotting that dagger out of the sky. I was reckless." Neo gives Roy a thumbs up as Roy reciprocates with a nod. Before long both Rangers were in the sky heading off to their destinations.

Good Luck Rangers Dr. Rawlings thought to herself. If the morphing grid will does have a will of its own this new generation of ranger will have an important role to play.