Disclaimer: I do not own PR, yet this is strictly non-profit and is entertainment only. Rated PG for implied nudity and violence. Also, I tried my very best to make this as detailed and as semi-original as possible. I added the nude scene in the hopes that female readers may appreciate the "eye candy" provided by Zhane and review at least this chapter. I am planning to do anything to get at least one review, so please be nice---M.C.
Chapter 3
Soon, we emerged in the unfamiliar terrain of Phaedos, near a crashing sea and rocky landscape. The land almost reminded of me of home, but then a rude awakening reminded me I was on a different world, when Cassie came upon a different, but similar, alien skeleton.
We journeyed further. "Do you know where the Tengas attacked you?" I asked Billy as we journeyed across the rocky land, towards Dulcea's Ninjetti Temple.
"Somewhere over there," Billy replied pointing to a round flat stretch of land, surrounded by high rocks.
***
"Great," Astronema growled, staring into her viewing globe that monitored every planet in the Milky Way. "The Rangers are journeying to Phaedos to recover their powers. Quantrons, go to Phaedos and destroy every last Ranger. They can not be permitted to reach Dulcea. Go. NOW!"
The Quantrons nodded and disappeared in silvery flashes of light.
***
"Oh, no!" Kimberly shrieked, upon seeing the Quantrons appear. "We've only fought the Tengas and they weren't this many!"
Ten dozen of these Cog-like creatures advanced on them, running and waving their blades.
"FIGHT!" Adam roared. "If we can work together, we can get these metal heads!"
Hearing the enraged roar, Adam's message hit me suddenly like a bucket of ice-cold water. He was right.
"Power Rangers!" We cried as one and leapt into action.
I spun around and delivered a swift tornado kick to a clumsy one and delivered a quick uppercut to the soft metal of its chin.
"Justin! Behind you!" Tommy cried.
I turned around. A Quantron was behind me and promptly punched me in my stomach. I recoiled and slumped to the ground.
"Hey you!" cried Aisha. "Mess with my friend and you're going to get it. KI-YAHHH!" She delivered a direct kick to the Quantron who had punched me in my stomach. The Quantron went flying.
We were beating these creatures, but there were too many of them.
We were losing.
"If only we could morph, we can beat them!" screamed Jason.
Just as they were about to beat us, there was a battle cry and a cloaked figure leapt from a low cliff and landed on the gravel. The figure took off its cloak and revealed a blonde woman who was scantily clad in a very small amount of green armor and wearing knee-high boots.
That woman was undoubtedly Dulcea, and she had a long Bo in her hands. She ran towards us, triple-flipped, spun, landed smoothly in the circle. She swiftly knocked an advancing Quantron to the ground. She deftly separated her Bo in two sticks. But she did not spin them, like Tommy said, she wielded the sticks fiercely and joined in the battle.
Using her sticks like Billy did with his Power Lance, she spun them, squarely connecting with the Quantrons' solar plexus, if they even had one, knocking the Quantrons senseless and sent many Quantrons packing.
Snapping her sticks back into her Bo, she helped Kimberly and Kat finish off the remaining Quantrons.
As soon as the last Quantron had disappeared, she turned to us.
She only noticed Kimberly, Billy, Aisha, Tommy, Adam, and Rocky.
"Tommy?" she asked, eyeing Tommy suspiciously. "Why are you here again?"
Tommy looked at us. Then he began.
"After we got back to earth after we got the Great Power, we defeated Ivan Ooze. But, shortly after, Rito Repulso, brother of Rita Repulsa, had brought Tengas, and they replaced the Putties. We went to the Desert of Despair and received our power back.
"But, then, Master Vile came and transformed us into kids. Goldar destroyed the six Power Coins, and we enlisted the help of the five Alien Rangers of Aquitar. When they were sent back to defend their planet, Zordon sent us into various parts of time to retrieve the five Zeo Shards to restore time. Once we turned time back, the Machine Empire came, and we used the Zeo Crystal to become Rangers again.
"After a while, Divatox came along and Rita and Zedd destroyed the Machine Empire by bombing them. Divatox kidnapped a powerful wizard, Lerigot, to open the dimensional gateway to Murainthias and marry Maligore. We then switched our Zeo Power for the Turbo Chargers. We gave our Turbo Power to Ashley, Cassie, T.J., Carlos, and Justin. Then, Divatox came across the Power Chamber, raided it, and then destroyed it. We came back to Phaedos to regain our powers back." Tommy finished.
"I believe your story," Dulcea said. "Follow me. I will give you all the power of Ninjetti. This time, I will accompany you to the Great Monolith."
"But-" Aisha stammered, "last time you came, you said you couldn't come with us."
"This is different, Aisha," Dulcea said. "When more than six people receive the power of the Ninjetti, their many animal guides keep me safe. When the people receive the Great Power, I can permanently safely travel beyond the Sacred Grounds. Now, let us go to the Ninjetti Temple."
***
We followed her to the Greek-like remains of the Ninjetti temple.
Dulcea walked to a low pillar, a little higher than her navel, and began to pray. Once she had finished praying, she waved her arms dramatically, shouted a lengthy, foreign spell, and a big bonfire appeared in a big, hollowed-out circle at our feet.
"Gather around the fire," she said. "Those who are destined to become Ninjetti, they must besiege the fire." Once we had gathered around the fire, she went back to the pillar and took a small wooden vial from it. She carefully poured some glittering sand from the vial in her cupped palms and turned to us.
"Close your eyes and look deep inside. Your animal guides rests within you all. You must find it on your own." She said, and carefully blew all of the glittering sand onto the fire.
The fire jumped high and now within it were many kinds of different spirit animals.
We obeyed Dulcea's orders and closed our eyes and looked deep inside.
Once I had began my mental "looking," I felt a strange warmth envelop me and I felt that I had finished looking inside myself. Then, I suddenly felt part of my mental "soul" was about almost restored, but only a small part of it was missing. I knew that in order to restore the rest of it, I would have to earn the Great Power.
I opened my eyes and saw myself clad in a royal blue uniform; the outfit of a Ninjetti warrior. Glittering like the original Morphin Rangers,' a shiny golden coin was in the middle of my V-shaped vest with the image of a flying blue jay.
I looked at the others. They, too, were clad in Ninjetti garb, each of them sporting their appropriate Ranger color.
The fire had died down, and Dulcea, was too, clad in a Ninjetti garb, except it was silvery gray, with her coin bearing the image of a snow owl.
The others opened their eyes and saw, with some collective gasps at their sudden change of dress.
"Now, let's begin the quest." Dulcea said.
She snapped her fingers and the fire abruptly disappeared.
***
Astronema growled in frustration. Her Quantrons weren't enough to stop the former Rangers from stopping them from reaching Dulcea.
She couldn't stop their journey, because she couldn't land on the Sacred Grounds, lest she risked aging rapidly. She couldn't stop them during their Quest, because pure evil couldn't land in the Neola jungle and just survive.
So she had to resort her tedious task: invade Earth directly by using force. There were currently no Rangers to defend it. And she had no time to waste.
***
In the vastness of space…
A big blue spaceship, bearing the symbol of the Earth colony on Daria (or for the more simpler minds, KO-35) wandered meaninglessly around the vastness of space.
Inside, in a secret cryogenic capsule in the far corners of the storage bay, the glass panel of the capsule began to open, and a young man, not much younger than twenty years old, slowly began to awake, his mussed hair a short, whitish blond.
Drowsily, he clumsily reached for and pressed a big red button on the side of the sleek metal, and the door of the capsule fully melted away, leaving him bare and exposed to the winter-like chilliness of the storage bay. The storage bay was usually just for loads of cargo, not for humans in cryogenic pods. Shivering, he slowly got up out of the narrow, bed-like capsule, rubbed his sleep-induced eyes and blinked.
He looked down at himself and yawned again more slowly, stretching for the first time in five years since he was last awake. Only barely paying heed to his nudity, he stretched his cramped muscles and scratched his back.
He rubbed his face, yawned sleepily and unashamedly rubbed his bare backside with both hands. Finally repeating the same motions again for two more times, he stretched again and began to wander throughout the storage bay, looking for clothes.
Zhane began pushing aside cardboard boxes his legs, trying to toughen them up, and bumping past metal boxes. He accidentally banged his shin against something hard and rusty. Kneeling down slowly, due to his unused and unstable legs, he carefully examined it, seeing it to be an old, sky-blue footlocker
Fortunately, the lock was crusty and loose, and it yielded easily to Zhane's tentative pull. Zhane pulled up the lid and began to rummage through the footlocker, looking for anything his size. He finally found a large, but very warm wool robe and slipped it on, reveling in the musty smell and the warmth it provided for his Darin skin. Finally, he turned around and saw his friend in an identical silver cryogenic capsule.
He smiled to himself. When Andros would wake up soon, he would be surprised to find that his friend, Zhane, had woken up. Usually, Andros was the early bird around here.
Sighing, he made his way passed the various boxes and cargo. Finally he found a control panel. Turning to the control panel and keyed in what he hoped was a code that still worked in whatever year was it and pressed ENTER. The door slid open and Zhane eagerly ventured out, mentally thanking for the warmth the hallway provided and began to look for the bridge.
He had sometimes been in this ship many years before, when his duties as the Silver Ranger of KO-35 had him and his fellow Rangers used the ship for a MegaZord and place to eat and sleep.
But, Andros, leader and Red Ranger, had sent Zhane off in cryogenic suspension, because of serious injuries. But, something serious had caused somebody to also seal Andros in cryogenic suspension.
Zhane's wandering had proved right and he had finally found the bridge. He had stopped in the doorway frame and looked.
The bridge was expanse and in the back, there was a transparent panel that looked out to outer space. Beside the panel were various computer consoles. In the very middle of the room there was a large control panel. Besides the machinery was an artificial intelligence computer, DECA. DECA could follow every command on the ship by a verbal command. The only way to notice DECA was there if there was a blinking red light on a metal probe high above the machinery. DECA controlled most of the Astro Mega Ship, but there was certain materials that had to operated by human hands, not by DECA.
Zhane turned his attention to the doorway frame. Hanging on a metal hook next to it, was a synthesized uniform. The vest was black, bearing the red monogram of Daria, the sturdy boots were a shiny jet black, while the turtleneck and long-sleeved pants were a dull gray.
Getting dressed, Zhane ventured out into the bridge and craned his neck and looked around the wall, hoping for the narrow metal probe that was the only indicator of DECA's presence.
"DECA, explain the reason why Andros and I were in cryogenic suspension," Zhane carefully ventured.
"The reason why you and Red Ranger were in cryogenic suspension is in this holographic message I have in my data banks five years ago. Only when you were revived, was I to show the message to you." Came the mature female voice, emanating from the blinking red probe.
"What year is it?"
"In Earth years, it is 1998. In Darin years, it is year 3055."
"Oh," Zhane tiredly rubbed his chin. "Run holographic message."
"Running holographic message now," DECA replied.
In front of Zhane appeared a low-quality, shaky, and faded color image of the KO-35 leader, Ricardo Dar.
The holographic image began to speak, voice sometimes quavering. "Shortly before an asteroid was expected to hit KO-35, I ordered DECA to put you and Andros in cryogenic suspension for five years," came the voice of Ricardo.
"I set a course for the Astro Mega Ship to Earth. After the five years are up, you are the first to be revived and you are required to revive Andros after that. The four other Astro Rangers have been killed in battle, and their morphing devices, including yours and Andros's have been stored in the vault. You also must choose four more trustworthy people from Earth to wield the Astro Powers to defend the galaxy from Dark Specter and his minions. Also, your weapons and your Zords are still functional and your Zords are in a new hiding spot."
The image of Rim flickered, then went out.
Zhane sighed, then said, "DECA, prepare immediate cryogenic awakening for Andros. This is more serious than I thought."
"Authorizing early awakening."