"After you," Phineas offered, holding a branch back for Nick and Vida, "Congratulation, you made it out alive. Now if you excuse me, I have things to do."

V watched as the troblin skipped away, "Let's hope one of those things to do is a bath," she announced.

Nick stared out at the grass in front of them, letting out a sigh of relief, "Let's get the Fire Heart, and go back and find the others," he announced. Leading the way across the grassy field he paused as it gave way to a rocky cliff.

"It's a long way down," V commented.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of heights," Nick asked, selecting his first foothold down.

"No," V snapped, taking a step down as well, only to grab hold of a tree branch as her foot slipped a little, "Okay maybe a little," she confessed, "But don't tell Chip okay, I'll never hear the end of it."

"You know, my Dad's the best power ranger that ever lived," Nick said, slowly climbing downward, "And he's terrified of candles. We couldn't have candles on our cakes growing up, because it would send him into a complete panic attack. Mom got him into therapy, and he can handle them without freaking out, but he still doesn't like them."

V chuckled, slipping further down the bank, "I'm sorry the greatest power ranger of all time, afraid of candles?"

Nick nodded, "Yeah, but he has a good reason to be, Rita Repulsa used a Green Candle to steal his original power. That was before he and Mom got together, or else it would have gone very differently."

"How so?" V asked, they were now half way down the steep slope.

"Well, Rita's original plan was to steal the green power and use it for herself, if Mom and Dad had been together… it would cause a… blown fuse… their powers are too powerful for anyone else."

"That would have been interesting to see."

"Yeah," Nick agreed, landing finally onto flat ground, "But hey, you managed to climb down the slope."

"You were distracting me," V accused him, "How much of what you just said was true?"

"All of it," Nick insisted, "Now let's find that fire heart."

Nick slowly walked around, trying to figure out what his aunt had meant when she had told him that the key to seeing magic was to look while at the same time not look. How was he suppose to look and not look at the same time?

Something glittered out of the corner of his eye, "There," he announced, pointing towards the sparkle before looking up to see that he was pointing to a pile of rocks.

Now that he knew what he was looking for, he could see the sparkle, "This is it," he announced.

"You sure?" V asked.

Nick nodded, "Yes."

"Then let's see if our powers work here," V announced, pulling out her wand, "Tornado Power."

Nick ducked down shielding his head with his arms as loose dirt and rocks flew up into the air as V spun around in the center of the whirlwind.

Suddenly there was a flash of light as the pile of rocks exploded sending debris up into the air. V stopped panting slightly as Nick rushed forward peering into the center of the remain of the rock pile. Something was stuck inside the rock.

"I'll take it from here," Nick offered, pulling out his wand and melting the rock away from what appeared to be some sort of cylinder.

V rushed forward, grabbing the cylinder, opening it with a grin, "The secret of the fire heart," she announced.

...

Nick shouldn't have been surprised when they were attacked by Necrolai. He should have known that it was too easy, but never the less, they had been caught unprepared. Nick allowed himself to slip into a fighting stance, allowing the skills his parents had insisted that he learn to take over. Every part of the outfit, every muscle a weapon to take out the foot soldiers. Next to him, V was fighting to the best of her ability. Unlike him, she didn't have years of training on how best to defend oneself and others under her belt, just her instincts and the basic knowledge all power rangers have on how to fight.

"They don't stand a chance," Necrolai announced, causing both V and Nick to look at her before going flying backwards with a blast.

"Where are the others by now," V asked.

Nick shook his head, "I told them it was a bad idea to split up," he announced, watching as a taxi cab appeared, heading straight for Necrolai. That was no ordinary cab, there weren't even any paths out here, let alone roads, "We better ranger up," he told V.

Nick glanced out the megazord's cockpit, this wasn't good, they had managed to defeat the cab monster, but Necrolai had managed to get away with half of the Fire Heart Scroll. She would have gotten away with the whole thing if V hadn't acted fast and ripped half of it away.

"Well," Maddy said, "At least we have half of it."

"Tomorrow," Nick announced, "After closing, at Root Core."

The next night Nick, Xander, and Vida where closing up the shop for the night, when Leelee rushed in right as Nick swapped the sign over from open to close.

"Sorry Leelee," Nick called out, "We're closed."

"Perfect," Leelee called out, turning around on her heels as she held up a flyer, "Then you don't have any excuse not to take me to see this great new DJ tonight."

Nick rolled his eyes, Leelee was starting to remind him of stories his mom use to tell him and his sisters about a boy named Skull that had a huge crush on her in high school. It took both his dad and Uncle Jason talking to him, and a threat to press charges on him stalking her, for him to finally to get the message that the feelings weren't mutual. "Sorry Leelee," Nick insisted, brushing past her, "I already have plans for the night."

"Please?" Leelee begged, sticking her lower lip out as she made puppy dog eyes.

Xander shook his head as he cleaned up a few items, "Why do you keep throwing yourself at him," he asked, "Why don't you throw yourself at me?"

Leelee sighed, rolling her eyes, "Okay," she said with a sigh, "You can come with me."

"Okay," Xander said, pumping his fist, "Cool."

"And he can't go either," Nick called out from the office, "He's the one I have plans with."

Xander groaned, he had hoped that Nick wouldn't hear him making plans and get out of what was probably going to be a boring history lesson from Udonna about the ancients and the Fire Heart.

V stepped around the counter, picking up the flyer, "DJ Fly," she read out loud, "Never heard of him, is he any good?"

"He's just the hottest new DJ around," Leelee insisted, "I'm surprised you haven't heard of him."

"I better check this guy out," V announced.

"Great," Leelee said, smiling broadly, "you can come with me."

"Vida has plans too," Nick announced, grabbing Leelee by the shoulders and escorting her to the door.

"But there's new talent in town," V argued, "Our plans can wait until tomorrow."

"No they can't," Nick insisted, shoving Leelee out the door, "You gave your word that you would help V," he hissed, before turning to Leelee, "Thanks for the invite, Leelee, some other time. When I'm not booked," by then he might have figured out how to tell him that he wasn't interested without hurting her feelings too much.

Nick turned around to face the other two rangers in the room, "We have half the Fire Heart scroll to figure out," he announced, "Chip and Maddy are waiting for us at Root Core remember."

"Since when did you become Nick the good witch of Briarwood?" Xander asked, setting down the magazine he was flipping through.

"I didn't ask to be made red ranger," Nick insisted, "But that makes me team leader," he paused for a second notice that V was not making a move to follow, "You coming V?"

"Be there in a few," V called out, "I have some paperwork I need to catch up on."

Xander yawned loudly as he threw down the half of the Fire Heart Scroll, they had been trying to figure it out for over twenty hours now, "I give up, maybe we aren't suppose to find the secret of the fire heart."

"Come on," Nick insisted, grabbing books and passing them out for the others to look through to find something, anything, that might match up with the scroll, "Don't give up, never give up."

"Wow," Maddy said, excepting her book, "Nick, that's inspiring."

"I think it's like a Keeper family motto or something, Mom and Dad always told me that when I was a kid and this morning Udonna yelled it at me when I was about ready to quit," Nick frowned, "Speaking of her, where is Udonna?"

"Last time I saw Udonna she was teaching Clare an invisibility spell," Maddy announced, opening her book.

"That right there could be the problem," Chip said with a smirk.

Nick opened his mouth, about to say something in Clare's defense, even though he wasn't sure what just yet, but he knew that his mother would have him scrubbing zords if she ever found out that he allowed someone to speak bad about someone else in front of him, when the sound of footsteps interrupted him.

"Hi guys, sorry I'm late," V announced, yawning as she plopped down at the table.

"Late?" Nick echoed, "Even my father, who is the king of lateness has never been this late to an agreed upon meeting. You didn't just miss last night, which we would have totally understood, but all of today as well. Where have you been? Why didn't you answered our calls?"

"I was worried Vida," Maddy announced, "We didn't know where you were."

"Look," V snapped, standing back up, "I'm sorry, I gave my word and I blew it. It won't happen again."

"Hey, no problem V, we all make mistakes," Chip insisted.

Nick glanced from Chip to V, wondering if he should accept the apology like Chip or question V more. Suddenly his head throbbed as a voice echoed through it, "Hear me red ranger, or all of Brairwood would be sorry."

Maddy was trying to decide if V was lying or not when she heard a low groan. Nick was pressing his hand against his temple as if he was in pain, "Nick, what's going on?"

"Koragg," Nick explained, "He's trying to speak to me telepathically, something about meeting him in the meadow, or we will all be sorry."

"Then what are we waiting for," V announced jumping out of her chair again, "Let's go."