Jen and Trip found themselves outside the store with shopping bags in their hand, each of them unsure on what to do next.

"Its been an hour, they should have been back by now," he mentioned.

"I don't want to contact them, it might blow their cover, but I'm not sure what else we can do," Jen sighed.

The door to the store opened as a woman stepped out. "You guys okay?" she asked.

"Yeah, we're fine. We're just waiting for our friends to come back," Jen mentioned.

"You know, a lot of weird things happen here, but with the power rangers around, I'm sure everything is fine," she said.

"The power rangers?" Trip inquired.

"Yeah, up until now I always thought they were a myth. Think about it: average people who wear spandex and defend the city against the forces of evil. Come on, what evil force would concentrate his attack on one city, and why not just destroy the rangers while they're going on with their everyday lives? Just sounds silly if you ask me, but I've seen them. They're real, and they keep the city safe," she explained.

"How do you contact the rangers when there's a problem?" he asked.

"We don't, they just know when there's a problem and they show up," she said.

Just then, Dustin ran up to the store. "Kelly, sorry I had to leave like that, but everything is totally under control now," he told her.

"Good, I saved some work for you in the back," she said.

"Oh, great," he sighed, heading inside.

"Well, I have to get back to work too. I hope your friends show up soon," Kelly said as she walked back inside.

"I don't like this Trip," Jen sighed.

"You're being hard on yourself. I think your shorts are a little too skimpy, but you look nice," he mentioned.

Jen rolled her eyes. "Not that, I mean not hearing from the others, they should have contacted us by now," she said.

"What should we do?"

"We'll head back to the forest and wait for the portal to reopen. If we haven't heard from them in 30 minutes, we'll use the sight to sight transporter to lock onto their location and teleport to their positions," she explained.

"Right," he said, nodding slightly.

"You really think the shorts are too skimpy?" she mumbled.

(*)

"Okay, lets go over this one more time," Lothor said as he paced back and forth in front of the holding cell.

Tommy and Katie sat up against the wall, simply watching Lothor as he paced. Katie knew it wouldn't take much effort to break through the bars holding them, but Lothor had taken their morphers. Getting out wouldn't do them much good if they didn't know where their morphers were.

"I told you, we're traveling ice cream salesmen," Katie told him, mocking him.

She'd faced some of the most notorious monsters, demons, mutants and orgs the universe had ever seen. This guy was more or less human with delusional dreams of world domination.

"You're not making this easy on yourselves, are you?" he took a step forward. "I already know you're power rangers, what I don't know is which ninja academy you're from. I thought we'd captured all the students from all the academies," he brought up.

"Not ours. We're from the 'you're out your damn mind' ninja academy. Its on the Westside next to McDonalds," she said.

"I see you want to be difficult, that's fine by me. Nothing like a little torture to brighten my day anyway," he said, motioning to the guards to open the cell. A group of Kelzaks rushed in, grabbing both of them and pulling them out.

"What shall I do with them master?" Zurgane asked.

"Throw them in the pit of despair. Maybe some quality time to Sidious will encourage them to tell me the truth," he said.

"As you wish sire," he said, leading the Kelzaks down a hall.

They came to an empty room with seemingly no windows, and but bars on the opposite side of the room. The Kelzaks pushed them inside, slamming the door shut, locking it behind them.

"So what do we do now?" Katie asked.

"We wait," Tommy said patiently.

"For what?"

"What do you expect us to do Katie? We don't have our morphers, so even if we fought our way out, we'd have to come back for them. I say we wait. Jen and the others will come for us sooner or later," he told her.

"That's your plan?"

"Pretty much,"

"Well, its time for a new plan," she said.

"Why's that?"

Without a word, Katie motioned to the bars across the room as they opened, and it stepped out. Even on all four legs it appeared to be almost seven feet tall, with jagged claws on each paw. Its eyes seemed to glow an eerie shade of red, and it's fangs looked sharp enough to chew through steel.

"He looks hungry," Katie mentioned.

"You didn't happen to bring some McDonalds on your way from the Westside with you, huh?" he said, backing up slowly.

The two of them found themselves up against the wall as the creature moved closer to them. Just then, it stopped, sniffing around the room, directing its attention away from Tommy and Katie.

"What is it?"

At that moment, Camille disengaged her cloaking device. "TIME FOR, TIME FORCE," she called out, transforming into the blue ranger.

The creature rushed towards her, but she called for her Chrono saber, fighting the beast off. It knocked her up against the wall, but when it charged towards her, she held her saber out, stabbing it in the throat. The creature fell to the ground as blood spilled out the open wound.

"Leave it to you two to get trapped with the beast from hell," she said, powering down.

"Where did you come from?" Tommy asked.

"I've been here the whole time. When you two ran off after that guy, I switched on the cloak and followed you. I thought you might need some backup," she told them.

"Good thinking,"

"I got a good look around this place and I know where they're keeping your morphers. I can do a sight to sight and get us out of here, but without a cloak, they'd catch you guys in a heartbeat," she said.

"What do you suggest?"

"I'll go, get the morphers and bring them back here. Go don't anywhere," she said as she engaged her cloak. There was a stream of blue light, but it vanished as well.

"Where did she think we were going to go?" Katie asked.

~

Camille wandered down the corridors, stopping at what appeared to be the central base of the operation. Lohtor was sitting on his thrown with Zurgane standing at his side. There were two women there as well, sitting on the opposite side.

"Were you able to determine the source of the energy signal?" Lothor asked.

"No sire. Our censors say it's coming from the forest," he said.

"Don't tell me what I already know General. Geez, what does an evil genius have to do to get some good help these days?" he mumbled.

"I could investigate sir,"

"Really? You think that would be a good idea?" he asked sarcastically.

"Yes sire,"

"Duh," he groaned.

Zurgane nodded, then walked out the room.

"Honestly Uncle, I don't know why you keep that guy around. He's such a loser," one of the girls said.

"You'd be the authority on that, wouldn't you Marah?" the other asked.

"What does that mean?"

"It means you're a loser," she said.

"Am not."

"Are too," she said.

"You're the loser Kapri," Marah said.

"Well, I'm rubber and you're glue," she said.

"I'm annoyed!" Lothor said, breaking them up.

"Sorry Uncle," they said in unison.

"Do you think the two of you could stop bickering just long enough to get the morphers and bring them to me?" he asked.

"I could, I don't know about Kapri," she said.

"Oh yeah, I think…"

"Just do it!" he snapped.

"Sorry Uncle," they said in unison again, hurrying away.

Camille followed them out of the room and down the hall to what looked like another holding cell. Marah opened a small panel in the wall, revealing the morphers.

"You could totally be rangers. If that skinny surfer chick can do it, I know we could," Marah said.

"I could, the spandex would make you look fat,"

"I am not fat,"

"You have put on some weight Marah," Kapri said.

"Have not,"

"Just admit it, you're a cow," she said.

"Am not,"

Camille hit a spin kick, knocking Marah up against the wall, knocking her out. Kapri went to check on her, but Camille gave her a back heel kick, taking her down as well. With both of them unconscious, Camille grabbed the morphers.

"Geez, how does he plan to take over the world with these losers?" she mumbled, teleporting out the room.

~

There was a stream of blue light, and seconds later, Camille disengaged the cloak. "Hey guys, miss me?" she asked.

"Of course,"

"Here, I brought you guys something," she said, handing them their morphers.

"That was quick," Tommy said.

"What can I say, I'm a miracle worker," she said.

"Alright guys, lets get out of here," Katie said.

(*)

Jen and Trip were in the forest, simply watching as Zurgane and a group of Kelzaks searched for the beacon. One of the Kelzaks walked up to Zurgane and mumbled something.

"There is nothing here. We will return to master Lothor and report our progress," he said.

"Not so fast Zurgane," he heard a voice say.

He turned around to see Shane, Dustin and Tori standing behind him. "Whatever you're up to Zurgane, it ends here," Shane said.

"NINJA STORM, RANGER FORM," they called out, replacing their ninja academy uniforms with their ranger uniforms.

The Kelzaks moved in, but the red ranger gave one of them a tornado fury kick, knocking into several move Kelzaks. The blue ranger someone harnessed the power of water, shooting a beam of water at another group of Kelzaks, sending them half way across the forest. The yellow ranger made his move for Zurgane.

"Give it up Zurgy," he said.

"Perhaps another time rangers," Zurgane said, disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

"Alright guys, lets get back to Ninja Opts and let Sensei and Cam know whats going on," the red ranger said.

"Right," they said in unison, following him.

Trip and Jen waited until they were gone, then disengaged the cloaks.

"You know, those guys aren't so different from us," she said.

"Besides the fact that the yellow ranger is a guy and I'd pay to see Camille's uniform cling to her like that?" he brought up.

"No, I'm serious. They work together, they're all friends, and they come together to get the job done. They remind me a lot of us," she said.

"I guess,"

Just then, Camille, Tommy and Katie ran over to them.

"Its good to see you guys," Tommy said, glancing over at Jen. "Nice shorts,"

She blushed. "Are you guys okay?"

"Yeah, we're fine. Thanks to Camille," Katie said.

"All shucks, t'werent nothing," she sighed.

"I think we should disengage the cloak on this world. If we leave it here, those ninja rangers will eventually find it, and the last thing we need to do is expose them to the future like that," Trip brought up.

"Yeah, they've got their hands full with that Lothor guy," Tommy sighed.

Trip headed for the beacon, which was hidden behind a tree, picked it up and deactivated it, then reached for his morpher. "Captain Logan. This is Trip, respond," he said.

'I read you Trip. You guys are running late today,' he said.

"I know, we had some problems, but it's under control now," he said.

'Good. Stand by,' he said.

Jen and Tommy had wandered away from the group a little, not so much that they were out of sight, but enough for them to talk without being overheard.

"It really is beautiful," Jen sighed, getting one last look at the forest.

"Yes, it is," he said.

She turned to him, only to see he hadn't taken his eyes off her. "Tommy, there's something I want to tell you," she said.

"What is it?"

"Our ride is here. Lets go guys," Katie called out as she and the others stepped through the portal.

The two of them glanced over and saw the blue swirling vortex a few feet away. "How about we discuss it tonight, at my place?" she suggested.

"You mean like a date?"

"Something like that," Jen said as she stepped through the portal.

Tommy cracked a smile, and then stepped inside the portal as well.