Jen stepped through the portal, quickly getting a good look at her surroundings. As far as the eye could see, there were no trees, no buildings, nothing. The moon shined through the otherwise dark surroundings, but not enough light to ascertain where she was.
She turned around as Camille and Trip stepped through the blue swirling vortex behind them. Camille shook her head slightly, trying to fight off the disorientation. "Whoa, what a rush," she sighed as Tommy stepped through the vortex as well.
"Is everyone accounted for?" Jen asked.
They glanced around. "Where is Katie?" Trip replied.
It was Tommy who reached inside the blue vortex with one hand, and seconds later, pulled Katie through.
"What is this place?" Katie asked as she looked around.
"I can tell you that this is New Silver Hills, and year is still 3000, but it seems that events took an unexpected turn in his reality," Camille mentioned.
The blue vortex began to shrink until finally, it disappeared altogether. "Alright, Captain Logan said we had one hour, so I don't suggest we split up. The last thing we need is for someone to get left here in this – whatever this place is," Jen instructed.
"She's right, we should stick together and cover as much ground as we can," Tommy elaborated.
"From the looks of things, I'd say that either Time Force was never founded, or has already been destroyed. There doesn't seem to be any type of technology anywhere," Trip mentioned.
"But how could Time Force simply disappear?"
"It didn't. Remember, one change in the time line could have prevented Time Force from being founded. The major turning point in the evolution of Time Force was the formation of the Silver Guardians. If something disrupted that, future history would have changed for this world," he explained.
'He's right rangers,' they heard a voice say.
It was Tommy who reached for his morpher. "Captain Logan?" he asked.
'The one and only. As soon as you arrived in that reality, I ran a spectrographic analysis, and as it turns out, Time Force did exist, but is gone now,' he said.
"What do you mean?"
'In the year 2001, Time Force did send a group of rangers to prevent Ransik from changing history, but from what I've read about this world, it was Frax who broke away from Ransik and not only destroyed him, but defeated the rangers as well. As a result, Frax overthrew the entire world with a race of androids, and humans have been all but destroyed in this world,' he explained.
"An entire world run by robots," Katie sighed.
"Are there any humans left?" he asked.
'None that the records indicate, but that doesn't mean there aren't a few resistance movements with humans in them. Just stay out of harms way until the hour is up, then return to base,' he told them.
"Why not just transport back now?" Jen asked.
"Opening the portal prematurely would cause an instability in the portal itself. There's no telling where we might end up," Camille told them.
'She's right. It's best you just wait until the time expires,' he said.
"Thanks Captain. Tommy out," he said, turning off his communicator.
"The first thing we should do is find somewhere to lay low until the portal reopens," Jen suggested.
"You're not going anywhere humans," they heard a voice say.
They turned around only to find themselves surrounded by a group of robots. Each of them seemed to heavily armored, and each had a phaser riffle in hand.
"Is this the part that you tell us we're under arrest?" Katie asked.
"No, this is the part where we destroy you," one of the robots said as they aimed their weapons at them.
"Let'em get'em guys," Jen said, standing in position.
"TIME FOR, TIME FORCE," they called out, each of them morphing into their ranger uniforms.
Katie lunged at two of the robots, slamming them together. As they fell to the ground, she kicked another one in the chest, knocking it into a fourth robot. Tommy and Jen teamed up, hitting a double kick to one of the robots, knocking them over. As they fell to the ground, Camille picked up one of the phaser riffles, blasting a hole through the remaining robots.
"So much for that," Trip said as he powered down, then leaned over, examining one of the robots.
"What is it Trip?" Camille asked, powering down as well.
"I don't recognize the configuration on these robots, they're far beyond anything Frax has ever been able to accomplish. He's got to be getting help," he said.
"But from who?"
"At the risk of sounding insensitive, who cares? We'll be out of here in about 45 minutes, what goes on in this world isn't our concern," Jen told them.
"But it is our concern, it's what we do. If we allow Frax to continue making these robots, it's only a matter of time before they discover that inter-dimensional travel is possible. If an army of these things came through the portal, we'd have no way of stopping them all," Trip explained.
"I hate to say it, but Trip is right. If we can put a stop to these robots here and now, we should. If we wander too far away from the check point, we can use the sight to sight transporter to get back," Tommy said.
"Even if there is something we can do about these robots, we don't even know where the factory is. It could take us days just to find it," she pointed out.
Just then, the robot Trip had been working on stood up and began to walk away. "It's okay guys, they're designed to return to home base if a malfunction occurs. Safe to say us beating the snot out of them qualifies as a malfunction," he said.
"So all we have to do is follow this guy to where ever he's going, storm in and destroy an entire complex of evil robots," she glanced down at her morpher. "And we've got 39 minutes to do it," Jen mentioned.
(*)
The five of them followed the android back to what appeared to be a complex of some sort, doing their best to stay out of sight. The android stopped in front of a door, and moments later it opened, allowing it in.
Jen silently motioned to Camille and Trip to investigate, and the two of them hurried over to the building. Camille peeked inside, where they seemed to be an entire army of androids being built.
"Looks like thousands of them," she sighed.
"More like hundreds of thousands. It's going to take more than we have to shut this place down," he said.
"What do you suggest?"
"We could plant charges along the outside of the building and blow the place sky high, but I'm sure that if androids have taken over the entire world, there would have to be buildings like this all over the place. Taking this one out won't do much good," he said.
At that moment, an alarm went off, and the doors on the building opened, letting the entire android army out. Before Camille and Trip had a chance to move, they were surrounded by androids. Jen was ready to make her move, but Trip motioned her to stay away as the androids pulled them inside.
"I can't believe it, power rangers," they heard a voice say as they headed inside.
The androids led them to the end of the room, where they was a thrown of some sort. The chair itself spun around, and an android glared down at them. This android, however, wasn't like the others they'd encountered. From first glance, it appeared to be human, but with bio-mechanical parts attached to it.
"Who are you?" Camille asked in a firm tone.
"My, such confidence in your voice young lady, but you're hardly in the position to play twenty questions with me," the android said.
It was Trip who recognized the voice. "Frax?" he inquired.
"Oh so you do remember me, I'm so happy," he said.
"But what happened to you, how did you……."
"After the war with Ransik, I was left for dead. A scientist found my remains and reactivated me, trying to transfer his thoughts into my exo-skeleton. What he didn't bargain on was that I wouldn't give up my body without a fight, and his consciousness was absorbed into my bio implants," he told them.
"So you're part human now?"
"More than you think. Over the years, I was able to perfect the scientist's theories and I've successfully intergraded a biological host into an android body. I am, in essence, a human," he explained.
"All the humans on this world weren't killed, they were turned into robots," Camille sighed.
"What I don't understand is how the two of you have been able to survive all these years and not be discovered by my droid alliance. I suspect you're from the future," he said.
"Believe what you want, but know that it won't be too long before your operation is shut down, and all the humans are set free," Trip said.
"And who's going to save the day this time? The two of you? Do you honestly think you'll be able to put an end to what I've accomplished here? The two of you will make fine additions to my alliance," Frax said as he stood up.
Just then, the other rangers broke through the windows in the building, making their way towards Frax. Camille and Trip broke away from the androids who held them, then lunged at Frax, taking him down.
"What are you expecting to accomplish here rangers? The entire world is under my control, there is nothing you can do to stop that," Frax told him.
"I can think of something," Camille said as she fired a disrupted at him, hitting him at point blank ranger. Sparks shot out of his body as he collapsed, and his eyes dim. Seconds later, there was a spark in each of the androids as they fell to their knees.
"What's happening?"
"Without Frax, the robotic implants aren't holding. They're breaking free of his control," Camille brought up.
"Take Frax into custody, we'll take him with us to make sure he doesn't get control of these people again," Jen said.
"Whatever we're going to do, we have to do it now. The portal will open in 12 minutes," Tommy mentioned.
"Lets get out of here," Katie said as she put Frax over her shoulder and walked away.
(*)
"Is this the place?" Jen asked, looking around in the empty field.
"I don't know, it all looks the same," Camille said, trying to sound something familiar from the last time they were there.
Tommy reached for his morpher. "Captain, this is Tommy. We're at the transport coordinates, we think," he said.
'The portal won't open for another five minutes,' the captain responded.
"Understood."
"I wish we had more time to look around, to find out what other changes went on in this world. We're the first people to ever have the chance to travel successfully from one world to another and back, this really is the beginning of a new era for not just Time Force, but for mankind as a whole," Trip told them.
"You're starting to sound like the captain now," Katie mentioned.
"He's right, we've truly gone where no one else has dared to go, this really is a groundbreaking event," Camille said, defending him.
"Thanks Camille,"
A few feet away, a blue swirling vortex opened. It was Tommy who was the first to notice it. "Our ride is here guys," he said.
The five of them headed towards the vortex, but before any of them could step inside, someone came through the vortex.
"What the hell?" Katie exclaimed.
Five figures stepped through the portal, and seconds later, it closed. Each of the figures had on Time Force uniforms.
"Oh my God," Jen sighed.
"It's us," Tommy added.
The five of them stood face to face with their doubles, with the exceptions of Camille, who found herself staring at Lucas back in duty uniform, and Tommy, who was face to face with Alex.
"What the hell is going on?" the other Jen asked.
"I think I have an explaination," both of them Trip's said in unison.
"This should be interesting,"
"It's reasonable to assume that in other realities, I've created the Slipstream dimensional portal. If that's the case, there is other Time Force somewhere who has assembled the same special unit team that we have," he said.
"That means we stand the chance of bumping into ourselves everytime we travel to a new world," the other Trip added.
"If you guys are here to see what's going on and report back, you can just go back. We've already been here," Katie mentioned, still holding Frax over her shoulder.
"Maybe you overlooked something," the other Katie brought up.
"I doubt it, we're good."
"We're better,"
"I doubt that."
Katie dropped Frax and stood face to face with her other self, but it was Alex who stepped in-between them. "Listen you two, we're all on the same team…. Kind of. There's no need for us to fight amongst ourselves," he said.
"He's right," Tommy added.
The other Jen noticed Frax as Katie put him back over her shoulder. "What is that?" she asked.
"It's Frax, he'd been changing humans into bio-mechanical androids on this world, but we put a stop to it and we're taking him into custody," Jen told her.
"That goes against Time Force protocol," Lucas said, chiming in with his opinion.
It was enough to make Trip crack a smile. "Since when do you care about the protocols?" he asked.
Lucas stared at him. "I always care about the protocols," he said firmly.
"Well, that might be your protocol, but our Time Force has given us strict instructions to……" she was cut short as another vortex opened. "That's our ride," Jen said, heading towards the vortex.
She was the first to step through, followed by Katie with Frax over her shoulder. Next was Trip and Camille, leaving Tommy with the other Time Force officers.
"Good luck you guys," he said, nodding slightly, then stepped through the portal.
"Was that Tommy Oliver?" Jen asked as they watched the vortex close.
"You mean from the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers? Naw, it couldn't have been," Alex said.
(*)
"Your first mission was a success rangers, I'm proud of you," Captain Logan said as he shut down the portal.
"Thank you sir," Jen said.
"I'll get this guy down to containment," Katie said, walking out the room with Frax over her shoulder.
"Were there any incidents?"
The four of them looked at one another, then back at the captain. "No sir," Tommy said, speaking for the group.
"I look forward to reading your reports none the less. Get some rest, you've earned it, and we'll start bright and early tomorrow. Dismissed," he said.
One by one, all of them walked out the room.
