Note: Ever wondered why Rocky wasn't part of 'Forever Red'? Well, here's our answer ... have fun! And please drop comments into the box at the door? CR/DB
Seasons To Remember
Chapter 12: Rocky Moments
"Here, Jay, why don't you take these out; we'll bring the coffee when it's ready," Tommy suggested, handing his son the once-again laden plate.
"Are you guys going to tell the others tonight about you being Power Rangers?" his son wondered.
"Maybe not tonight, but real soon. Tonight's not the night for that," Tommy said. "It's the sort of thing that could really take over the evening."
"But I can tell Lynne later?" Jay asked hopefully.
"Yes ..." and he shooed his eldest child off with a laugh. Shaking his head, he added, "You'd think he was 17 again, not 37."
Kat merely smiled. She saw that the coffee was finished, so she removed the pot from the coffee maker and refilled the carafe.
"Ready?" Tommy asked her.
"There's just one thing about the whole Red Ranger mission that I never understood," she said.
"What's that?"
"Why wasn't Rocky with you guys? After all, he was a Red Ranger, too."
"You mean, we never told you the story?" Tommy asked, incredulous.
Kat gave him a look that seemed to say, Duh!
"How could we have forgotten; it was classic Rocky," Tommy snickered. "He was supposed to go with us but never made it. Afterwards, when he told me and Jase about what happened, we figured Someone Up There just didn't want him going on that mission after all ...."
~*~
The phone rang, and Rocky answered it on the first ring. Even though Sarah had their three-month-old daughter in the bath, catching the phone so it wouldn't wake the baby had become second nature.
"Hello," he said, his smile evident in his voice. These days, it was hard not to smile. The dojo was doing well. He had a wonderful wife and a beautiful daughter. Life was smiling on him.
"Rocky, it's time."
Tommy's words acted like a slap in the face, and Rocky's breezy mood swiftly evaporated, to be replaced with something he hadn't felt in years: battle readiness.
It was a shot of adrenaline unlike any other he had ever experienced. It provided a focus and clarity of mind unmatched by even meditation. It was a sensation he hadn't felt in years, and God help him, he missed it more than he wanted to admit, even to himself.
At the time of his back injury, he had thought he was ready to retire, but he hadn't wanted to go out like that. It had left a bitter taste in his mouth. Then there was his replacement ... nothing against Justin (he'd been a capable Blue Ranger), but it had rankled giving up his powers – what had been his honor and responsibility since Jason had passed the torch to him – to a mere kid.
But that was behind him now. He was needed once again – as the Red Ranger.
"Where and when?" he asked Tommy.
He could pinpoint it almost to the exact minute when Tommy had first showed up at the dojo to tell him and Jason about Andros' mission and his fears that Machine Empire rejects were trying to resurrect Serpentera. His blood ran cold at the thought, remembering what it was like to face the most fearsome Zord ever built.
Tommy told them every former Red Ranger was going to be needed to confront this evil. He was putting them on stand-by because word was going to come at a moment's notice.
Every former Red Ranger ....
Although Rocky had been Zeo Ranger III-Blue, he'd never felt quite comfortable in that position. In his heart, he'd always be a Red Ranger ... however, those power coins had been destroyed long ago. He knew he could still call on his Ninja powers – as Kim had demonstrated when Lord Zedd had stolen her coin, but what he really needed was the battle armor, not his Ninja fighting togs.
Jason had given voice to their mutual concern, but Tommy assured them that Andros had found a way to reactivate their old morphers. Neither he nor Jason knew the Space Ranger very well, but if Tommy trusted him .... Apparently, it was sufficient assurance for Jason, and if it was good enough for the first Red Ranger, it was good enough for him.
Even now, a frisson of excitement shuddered down his spine as he touched his power morpher, complete with Ninja Power Coin, as he removed it from its hiding place. Touching it again had been like being reunited with a long-lost friend. It had so inspired him, he had dug up every red shirt he still owned to help him get into the right frame of mind.
"At the NASADA main hangar in an hour," Tommy informed him.
"I'll be there," Rocky promised solemnly. He no sooner broke the connection than he hit the speed dial for his brother. Miguel would cover for him at the dojo.
At first, he'd been concerned about leaving his now-thriving business, but Tommy taking a leave of absence from the racing circuit and missing crucial races at Talladega and Lowes had impressed upon him the importance of the mission.
Rocky grabbed his keys and bounded down the hall in search of Sarah. He at least owed her some sort of excuse. In his haste, he'd completely forgotten she was bathing Sophia, and he was forced to double back after futilely searching the rest of the house for her.
"Hon, I gotta run ... an emergency ...." he fumbled. Once upon a time, the glib lies and half-truths tripped off his tongue easily. But that had been with his mother. He'd justified it all by telling himself that mothers expected the occasional falsehoods from their teenagers; however, wives did not expect their husbands to lie to them.
He still couldn't believe his good fortune in meeting up with Sarah Diaz after all these years. In high school, the pretty, intelligent, athletic young woman had dated Adam a few times, but it hadn't been serious. After high school, like him, Sarah stayed in Angel Grove, taking classes part-time and helping out her family. He had met up with her again when she brought her youngest brother to the dojo to start classes.
He couldn't suppress a smile as he studied his lovely wife. He doubted she felt very lovely at the moment, though. Her thick, shoulder-length dark brown hair was all askew as if it hadn't seen the brush yet this morning. Her expression was one of exasperation, and she looked like she'd been given a bath, too. However, her deep brown eyes still glowed with love and happiness as she regarded their little Sophia.
"Can you do one thing real quick before you go?" Sarah asked pleadingly, looking decidedly harried. "This is Sophia's last diaper ...."
Rocky did some mental math. A trip to the store should only take fifteen minutes, tops. He'd have plenty of time to spare.
"I'll be right back," he promised and dashed off.
Things didn't quite work out as planned. When he left the store, he discovered his car battery was dead. An elderly gentleman offered him a jump start, but it was as if the guy could only move in super slo-mo.
He was practically dancing as if he had ants in his pants by the time his good Samaritan was finished helping him. Scarcely had he slid behind the wheel than he was peeling out of the parking lot with all due haste .... only to be stopped for speeding a few blocks later.
By the time he returned home, he was not a happy camper. At least the officer had taken pity on the 'jittery new father' and had let him go with a warning. Thank you, spotless driving record!
He sped through the front door, tossed the diapers on the couch, then hustled towards the kitchen where he heard Sarah talking.
"Honey, I need to go ...."
"Rocky, please! It's Mama about Abuela Maria – she's not good," Sarah said quickly and quietly, gesturing towards the high chair where Sophia sat fussing for her breakfast.
He had to go, but he couldn't ignore his hungry baby. Glancing at his watch, he sighed.
"Daddy has no time to play airplane," he muttered as he did his best to quickly shovel the food in. Sophia, however, was not cooperating. It was still a little early for her to be having solids, but Sarah wasn't producing enough milk, and the pediatrician recommended starting her on rice cereal and a little fruit.
By the end of his 'battle of the breakfast', Sophia was wearing more than she had eaten, and he was wearing the rest.
"If I show up wearing your breakfast, the guys will never let me live it down," he murmured. He'd change shirts real fast, then hand the baby off to Sarah and still make NASADA without getting a speeding ticket.
One fresh shirt later, he picked up the bedroom extension to see if Sarah was still on the phone. She was. With a long-suffering sigh, he scooped up his little girl.
"How long could it take to get you changed?" he asked rhetorically as he headed for the nursery.
How long could it take? Longer than he'd anticipated. He quickly came to the conclusion that he wasn't dressing his infant daughter but fighting a mutant octopus with Sophia's angelic face! No sooner than he'd get one arm in a sleeve and start to work on the other, then the first one would pop out. The same thing happened with her legs. And all the while, she was laughing ... the sweetest, bubbly baby laughter imaginable.
"You think Daddy's playing, don't you," he grumbled through gritted teeth.
In the end, he finally triumphed and zipped up her sleeper with a flourish.
"Ah ha!" he crowed.
She smiled sweetly, burbled wetly, then made the rudest noise of all, accompanied by the foulest stench of all.
"You didn't ...." he groaned, even though it was evident she had and wasn't any happier about it than he. And she let him know – quite vociferously – her displeasure at being wet and stinky.
"Maybe we could just drop your diapers on the moon. That'd take care of those erector set rejects. Phew!"
Still, he couldn't leave her in that nasty diaper. Luckily, he remembered he'd left the new package of diapers in the living room before he took the old one off. En route to retrieving them, he noted that Sarah was off the phone and was disappearing into the bathroom.
Good! I might get out of here sometime this morning!
He returned to the changing table with Sophia and peeled her out of the soiled pajamas – the diaper had leaked. As he started to put the fresh pants on, he discovered it was much too big. He'd bought the wrong size.
He swore under his breath, then prayed Sarah hadn't heard him swearing around the baby. She'd developed hearing like his mother!
Please ... please let there be a spare in the diaper bag! He implored the Powers-That-Be, and was suitably grateful when they smiled on him.
If anything else goes wrong, I'm gonna pull a Tommy and be late!
Thankfully, Sophia was more cooperative the second time around, and Rocky got her dressed in record time.
"Upsy daisy, Sweetie," he cooed, tossing his little bundle of joy up into the air playfully.
In retrospect, that hadn't been very wise. What hadn't come out in his child's diaper, now came out the other end – all over him.
"I bet you're pretty pleased with yourself," he muttered vexedly as he stomped back to his bedroom, a happily squealing baby tucked under his arm like a football.
Yet another red shirt later ....
Rocky hustled out of the bedroom just as his wife emerged from the bathroom. He thrust their precious bundle at her and all but growled, "I hope you kept the receipt; she leaks."
Sarah was too astonished to respond to that comment. Instead, she said, "While you're still here, would you please take out the trash."
"Look, hon, I'll do it later. I'm really, really late ...." he called over his shoulder as he headed for the kitchen door.
"Ricardo Esteban DeSantos, you are not going off to save the world until you take out the trash," Sarah insisted in her best imitation of Mama DeSantos ... right down to the flashing eyes filled with maternal ire.
Rocky pulled up short and stammered, "What did you say?"
Had he been less stunned, he might have dismissed her words instead of confirming her suspicions.
"I've known for a while, and suspected for even longer," Sarah admitted, her tone tinged with sadness. Rocky could almost hear the 'I'd always hoped you trusted me enough to tell me', and fidgeted uncomfortably. It was the one thing hadn't been able to share with his wife.
"Remember back in high school when I went on a couple of dates with Adam?" she began. "One time while he and I were out, his 'pager' went off. He said it was an emergency and brought me home early. I was at my door about to go in, when I turned to tell Adam I'd see him in school the next morning. His back was to me, and it looked like he was glancing at his watch. Then, I saw him vanish in streaks of black light."
Uh oh, Adam was busted and never even knew it!
"After that, I started noticing things about the six of you: your color-specific clothes, the pagers with that weird chime and the strange disappearances, even in the middle of school. The clincher was seeing the Power Rangers vanishing from the park just as Adam had from in front of my house."
"You mean you've known that long and never said a word to us?" Rocky murmured, astonished, recalling what Bulk and Skull would have given to have that knowledge.
"I knew it was a secret, and what good would it have done to tell you? It would have been another worry for you guys. I had enough worries just knowing your secret; knowing that your secret had been discovered would have just given you one more thing to be concerned about, and you already had plenty."
"You had worries ...?"
She nodded. "Before discovering, I'd never really thought about the Rangers being mortal ... about them getting hurt or killed. They were nameless, faceless superheroes.
"But knowing there were ordinary teens in those suits was different. People I knew could be hurt or killed while trying to save Angel Grove – me. I was scared for you guys every time there was an attack.
"And I'm still scared, Rocky. You could re-injure your back on this mission. You could die, and I don't want to lose you. I love you. I need you; our babies need their father ...."
"Babies?" Rocky gulped, latching onto that single word from all of Sarah's explanation.
Sarah smiled shyly and nodded, resting a hand on her tummy. "The doctor said that's why I'm not producing enough milk for Sophia."
"Already? But it's too soon, isn't it?"
"Not really. Remember how excited you were when I passed my six-week checkup with flying colors?" she teased him, recalling how they'd celebrated. "I haven't had an ultrasound yet, so we're not sure of the due date, but I'm guessing next June.
"Rocky, I know you have your duty as a Power Ranger, and I can't ask you to turn your back on it. Just please come home safely; your family needs you."
Rocky seemed to be frozen with indecision, glancing at his watch to see just how close he was going to cut Tommy's deadline. He looked back at Sarah, who regarded him with patience and understanding. She wasn't going to force him to stay. Then he looked to Sophia who was blowing little tiny bubbles with her spit. Her little rosy cheeks got rounder as she smiled up at him with absolute love and trust.
In that moment, he knew what he had to do, and he reached for the phone.
"Tommy, I can't make it," he said when he connected with the mission leader's cell phone. "You guys go on without me. The Earth has ten other Red Rangers to defend her; my family only has one me."
~ * ~
Kat laughed merrily at their friend's exploits. "Poor Rocky ... what a day!"
"Back when he first told us about it, Jase and I were practically rolling on the floor because we were laughing so hard," Tommy recalled. "He just glared at us and said, 'wait 'til you have kids of your own'. Now, it's funny in a sympathetic sort of way. The first time I had a day like that with Jay ...."
"I'm glad Rocky stayed behind," Kat said, sobering. "If anything had happened to him, what would Sarah and the girls have done?"
"We would have taken care of them ...."
"Just as you took care of the kids and me after Jason died," Kat concluded for him, catching his hand and giving it a supportive squeeze.
"And just as you've taken care of me since I lost Kim," Tommy murmured and raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. "You know, I almost didn't ask Rocky because he was a family man."
That and the fact that had anything happened to him, he would have been responsible, having recruited him. He still didn't like to contemplate the personal Hell it would have been to have to tell Sarah her husband had died. He thanked the Lord that he'd never had to face that.
"If you hadn't, you would have hurt his feelings beyond measure," Kat said.
"I know; that's why I went through with it. I guess someone heard my prayers that he'd decide to stay home on his own."
"Come on; let's get the coffee out there before it gets cold," Kat recommended.
"I'm surprised Lynne hasn't come in checking to see if we'd gotten lost," Tommy joked.
The two returned to the living room to find it strangely silent. Eight pairs of eyes regarded them intently.
"What?" Tommy wondered. "Did I spill something on my sweater?"
"Dad, is it true?" Trini asked, unusually sober.
"Is what true?"
"Jay says that you and Aunt Kat – and Mom and Uncle Jason – used to be Power Rangers."
Tommy's stern gaze fell on his eldest child, who smiled sheepishly and shrugged helplessly. He looked the very image of his father just then.
"Jay, how could you?" Kat scolded gently. "We asked you to wait ...."
"You know Jay – can't keep a secret to save his soul," Trini snorted.
Oliver elbowed his best bud in the side. "She's got that right! It's a wonder you never spilled the beans about us ... whoops!"
"Spilled the beans about what?" Lynne interrogated her brother, regarding him with suspicion.
"Don't worry, bro," Jay laughed, elbowing Oliver in return. "Our folks have known all along."
Oliver's eyes went wide with surprise.
"Known what all along!" Trini fumed, hating to be left out. The boys conveniently ignored her.
"You'll have to tell them sooner or later," Tommy whispered to the boys, giving them a knowing smile. Their wives were liable to give them all kinds of grief for keeping this from them. Thank God it was a secret he'd never had to keep from his wife – or his wife-to-be!
"It makes sense," Rachel mused thoughtfully, diverting the conversation back to their parents. It was obvious that none of her teammates was ready to open this particular can of worms. "I often wondered about my father. Some of the gadgets I'd seen over the years, and some of the technologies he's developed ... they were all based on the advanced technology he'd been exposed to as a Power Ranger."
"Do you mean to say that all our folks – Jasmine's and mine, too – were Rangers?" Ramon gasped.
"All except for your mother," Kat confirmed.
"Whoa!"
"So when you told us about Divatox kidnapping Mom and Uncle Jason, they weren't just civilians," Trini concluded. That certainly shed a whole new light on their parents' early lives.
"I bet you guys could tell some awesome stories," Jay hinted eagerly.
"We could," Tommy responded, "but not tonight."
To Be Continued ...