Disclaimer: 'Power Rangers' (all incarnations) are property of 'Saban', who are in some strange way related to Disney, who run the show on ABC. No infringement is intended.
ROARING ON THE WIND
By Etcetera Kit
Chapter Fourteen: Hold On To What We Got
Conner tried to navigate the stairs down to the lab while holding an armful of sleeping bags. He had barely escaped his house—lying through his back teeth to his mother about why he was sleeping over at someone's house on a school night. Kira had backed him up on everything, saying that the sleepover was more like a real life experience sleeping on an archaeological dig or something. His mother had looked dubious, especially when he raided the camping closet and put all the sleeping bags, cots, air mattresses and spiffy pads that went under the sleeping bags in the back of his car. He had then snitched a bag of Oreos and a twelve-pack of Coke from the pantry, hopefully without his mother knowing until he got far away. Kira had given him a look that clearly asked, 'And what are you going to do with those?'
"Midnight snack," he had hissed, before hiding it under the sleeping bags.
Now he was trying to get downstairs to take the sleeping bags to the people that had to sleep in the lab. He thought he had made it down, but missed the last step, lost his balance and ended up falling on his rear end. Luckily enough, he still had all the sleeping bags.
There was some male laughter and a female voice said, "Are you all right?"
Ethan was standing on the step above him with some of the air mattresses. "That was seriously graceful, man," he said with a grin.
Conner glared at Ethan and dumped the sleeping bags on the floor. A blonde woman was standing over him. She was kind of pretty and slim with her eyes hidden behind a pair of wire-framed glasses. She was offering him a hand up. He gladly took it and let her haul him to his feet. "You must be Conner," she said with a smile.
He nodded. "That's right. And you are…?"
She smiled one of those hundred-watt smiles. "I'm Kendrix." She paused and pointed at Leo. "I belong to him," she said in an easy, joshing tone that said she was going to play into male ego trips, but didn't really believe in them. Leo rolled his eyes.
"Let's get these sleeping bags out," Cole said, moving Susie from where she had been half-asleep on his lap and setting her in the captain's chairs in front of the computer. He moved to help pick up the sleeping bags.
"So it's the new, new guy?" came another voice tinged with a slight accent that Conner would have described as New York, but he wasn't sure. He looked up to see Jason moving to help with the sleeping bags. He had forgotten that the original Red Ranger was going to be down in the lab with the people without morphers.
"I guess so," Conner replied with a shrug.
Jason looked from Cole back to Conner. "New guys," he said shaking his head.
"Weren't you all the 'new guy' at one point in time?" Kendrix asked. She pulled a faded 'My Little Pony' sleeping bag out of the pile. Conner recognized it as one that used to belong to his little sister when she had been much younger. Kendrix spread it out over the already existing air mattress and tucked Susie into it along with her Good Luck Bear.
"Not me," Jason said. Susie fell asleep almost the moment she was in the sleeping bag. "Cute sleeping bag," Jason added in an undertone. He gave Conner an appraising look. "Was it yours?"
Conner stared at him in disbelief. "No. It was my little sister's."
Jason laughed. "Don't look so mortified, kid. I was just teasing ya'." He paused as Leo and Cole began to blow up the air mattresses. Mary Anne, the other girl who belonged to Billy, was sitting in the other captain's chair with her laptop. Like her sister, she looked ready to collapse on the spot. "You have a big family?" Jason asked him.
"I guess so," Conner replied. Ethan handed over all the remaining air mattresses and then headed back upstairs. "I have a twin brother, an older sister and a younger sister."
"Middle child syndrome?"
He shrugged. "Not really. There are two of us who tie for the middle." He paused and looked at Jason. "Do you have any siblings?"
Jason cracked a smile. "Two older sisters." He shuddered dramatically. "I sympathize with the older sister bit, kid, really I do."
Leo wandered over to them as Cole was finishing with the air mattresses and Kendrix was talking softly to Mary Anne. "I've got an older brother and a younger sister," he said with a grin.
"Good Lord!" Jason said empathically. "Two middle children."
Conner looked at Leo. "Did you have middle child syndrome?"
Leo shook his head. "My little sister is four years younger than me. When there's that much of an age gap, it's almost like being an only child. I think if I really had to identify with a birth order it would be the youngest."
Jason frowned. "How far apart are you and Mike?"
"A year," Leo replied. "I guess you could say that me and Mike were planned. My mother wanted two boys about a year apart. Then four years later, along came Ella."
"She was the mistake?" Jason asked.
"In every sense of the term," Leo stated, his features clouding.
Conner gaped at Leo. He couldn't imagine his parents ever treating one of them like they had been a mistake. Even if his parents had another baby now, they would still treat it like they treated the rest of the children. His father would always laugh and tell them how he always wanted a big family to go camping with—and they went camping all the time. His mother just smiled and held the family together with Band-Aides and paper bag lunches. His older sister was the bookworm, he and Eric were the athletes although Eric preferred more disciplined sports like karate and his little sister was the social butterfly. And they were all loved equally. None of them were treated like a mistake.
"Conner!" Ethan yelled from upstairs. "Doctor O says to get up here now!"
Conner groaned. "I've got to take up my post," he told them. "You guys got enough sleeping bags and stuff."
Jason and Leo looked around. "Shouldn't be a big deal," Jason told him.
Conner raced up the stairs two at a time and bolted out onto the front porch where he had left some sleeping bags and sleep pads. Doctor O and Coach were sitting in the lawn chairs gazing out at the night sky, the porch light casting a warm yellow glow over them. Ethan was sitting at the picnic table with a book. Conner sat down at the picnic table across from Ethan and dragged out his Oreos and Coke from where he had hidden them under the sleeping bags.
"Hungry, are you?" Ethan asked.
"Midnight snack," Conner replied.
"It is midnight," Doctor O added, glancing at his watch.
"See?" Conner said with a grin as he opened the package of Oreos and began to eat.
TJ looked around at the, for all intents and purposes, dank cave that he and Carter were going to have to spend the night in. Because they would have been sleeping on a dirt floor otherwise, they had gotten some collapsible army-type cots that Conner's family apparently used when camping. The cots weren't too uncomfortable and the sleeping bags didn't smell musty and unused. On the contrary, they smelled like they were used frequently, like someone had taken the time to wash them in between camping trips.
"I don't know what's going to happen, Dana," Carter was saying softly into his cell phone. "No… I want you guys to stay put in Mariner Bay." He paused and smiled into the phone. "Of course I'll be careful… I have my morpher. Okay… I love you too… Bye." Carter hung up the phone and let out a deep breath. TJ couldn't imagine how hard something like this had to be on him—he had a family back home to think about. Maybe it was time for all of them to take being a ranger off of the top of their priority list and replace it with their families. But there was no changing the situation now—Tommy needed all of the man power he could get in order to fight off Mesogog, especially since they only had one functional zord.
"Everything okay back home?" TJ asked.
Carter shrugged. "I just wish we knew what was going on so I could tell Dana." He paused, his gaze wistful. "She's scared," he said softly.
"Do you blame her?" he countered.
The Lightspeed Ranger shook his head. "I don't. I understand why she's scared. I just don't want anything to happen to them."
TJ remained silent. Carter's children were still so little, too little to lose their father in a freak accident of nature. If he remembered correctly from e-mails and baby shower invitations, Cory was three and Heather was eighteen months. What was it that had made any of them rangers in the first place? What made Tommy pass on his Turbo powers to him? What made Captain Mitchell pick Carter to be the Lightspeed Rescue red ranger? It all seemed to be a cruel trick of fate, giving them incredible powers and the ability to protect the earth and then it always came back to haunt them.
And that brought them here, facing Mesogog and everything that he could do to them, to their way of life. From the little that Tommy had said, TJ assumed that Mesogog knew about all of them—it wasn't that hard either, tracking morphers and power sources. If the reptile freak was smart, then he would want all of them out of the way, because if the Dino Thunder Rangers fell, then there would be other pissed off rangers to contend with. There were so many other rangers out there that they could call on to help—the rest of the Space Rangers, the Galaxy Rangers, the Lightspeed Rescue Rangers… and the list went on and on.
But most of them had families, children… lives that did not revolve around being rangers anymore. He thought briefly of the rest of the Turbo and Space Rangers. Andros and Ashley obviously did not need to be here, did not need this on top of their newborn baby, but they came anyways. Justin had started college back in Angel Grove and had a life and friends away from the Power Rangers. Carlos and Cassie were perfectly happy back in Angel Grove, with new lives and acquaintances. If called, they would come, but he didn't want to put any of them in danger. He supposed that that was the natural instinct of the red ranger of a team, even if he didn't remain the red ranger, to protect all the others and take the blows intended for the others.
"Hey guys."
They both turned to see Cole coming towards them from the group of people in various stages of sleep in the center of the lab. "Shouldn't you be in the lab?" Carter asked him.
Cole shrugged. "I am in the lab. If I go out that door," he pointed to the large door leading into the woods, "then I'll be out of the lab."
"He's been hanging out with Eric too much," Carter muttered.
TJ laughed. "Shouldn't you be getting some sleep?"
"I'm not tired," Cole responded. "It's just so hard waiting for something to happen."
"Don't I know the feeling," TJ muttered.
"Just try to get some sleep," Carter told him in a fatherly tone. "Jason and Leo will probably freak if they wake up and you're nowhere to be found."
Cole snorted. "They both sleep through earthquakes. I seriously doubt that they're going to wake up any time soon."
"That's true," Carter conceded.
"It's going to be a long night," Cole said, sitting down on one end of Carter's cot. TJ had to agree with him—it was going to be a long night.
Eric and Wes had given up trying to go to sleep ages ago. Right now, they were trying to focus on playing cards although neither one of them were quite awake for that. Eric tried to focus in on his cards and failed miserably. It was horrible, being sleepy, yet unable to sleep. He could recall a few times in his life when insomnia plagued him—and it always had to do with something ranger-related. Waiting was the worst thing that any of them ever had to do as rangers. He was also really glad that he had brought along his morpher. When packing, he had considered leaving it at home because the mission didn't sound particularly dangerous… it was getting to be dangerous now, what with that reptile loser on the move.
A light came on in the kitchen. Eric exchanged a quick glance with Wes before both of them jumped to action. They scrambled to their feet and were about to sneak over to the kitchen, when Billy stuck his head out of the door.
"It's just me, guys," he said. "I'm trying to get some coffee or hot chocolate or something for the guys on the back porch."
Eric rolled his eyes and followed Wes into the kitchen. Trust the genius ones to pull something like that when all of them were already so on edge. Billy was putting on a pot of coffee and boiling some water on the stove.
"Cold already?" Wes asked him.
Billy grimaced. "We're freezing."
"You'd probably do better with some whiskey than coffee," Eric muttered sarcastically.
"Seeing as there are two high school kids out there, I think the whiskey is not the best idea in the world," Billy countered, pulling mugs out of a cupboard. He paused as he put the mugs on the counter. "I should probably check on Mary Anne and Susie too."
Eric rolled his eyes as Wes glanced to him. "Do you leave them on their own a lot?" Wes asked, stating the question that the two of them had since they found out that Billy had two daughters.
Billy sighed. "Not usually. I know it seems like I have lately." He stopped, as if composing his thoughts. "I mean none of us have ever had to deal with this before, being an active ranger and a parent. Where do you strike the balance?"
"Indeed," Eric drawled, dropping into a chair at the kitchen table.
Wes rolled his eyes at him. Eric responded by sticking his tongue out. Yes, it was sad but true. The pair of them regressed when they were running on little or no sleep. Or when they had insomnia induced by a mutant dino-lunatic who wanted to return the earth to its prehistoric roots. Why couldn't Mesogog just want to rule the world like all the other crazy weirdoes that the other ranger teams had to deal with?
The water on the stove began to boil and Billy took it off the heat, pouring it into two of the mugs and adding hot chocolate powder.
"That stuff is so much better with milk and not water," Wes muttered.
Billy looked at the clock on Tommy's oven. "It's two o'clock in the morning. I'm not making anything fancy." He paused. "We all may be awake, but no one is alert." He then took the mugs out on the back porch.
Wes grabbed his arm. "Let's get back to our post. Who knows if those crazy Tyranno-drone things will teleport into the middle of the house."
"Sounds like we're in the army," Eric growled, but allowed himself to be dragged back to their post in the middle of the hallway, which had been covered in sleeping bags and throw pillows and more recently had cards spread everywhere. Well, he supposed that cards went flying when one went into a defensive stance.
Eric sank down against the wall, straining to hear noises. The only thing he could hear was Billy in the kitchen and the normal humming noises of a house. The front porch light was on and he could vaguely make out Conner and Ethan sitting at the picnic table. Wes half-fell into the mess of sleeping bag that was his.
"This is ridiculous!" Wes groaned. "None of us can sleep and nothing is happening!"
Eric glanced in the direction of the kitchen. "Notice anything odd about Billy?"
Wes looked up at him. "No. Nothing other than the normal attributes crazed geniuses who are widowers with two daughters have."
"Not that," he snapped. "Something more elusive." He paused. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say that he looked like he just got laid."
"Yeah, but by who?" Wes countered.
Eric could tell that Wes really didn't care about what he suspected. He picked up the cards and shuffled them, dealing out enough cards to play a variety of games.
"It's probably Kimberly," Wes said suddenly.
"What?"
"Kimberly," Wes repeated. "It's probably Billy and Kimberly."
"Are you serious?"
Wes shrugged. "It's my guess. Who else is there? I mean I think Tommy said his wife died something like eight years ago. Probably hasn't had much sex since then. And Kimberly is here and very available."
Eric didn't bother to insinuate that Wes was in the same boat ever since Jen went back to the year 3000 and left him in the present. He simply nodded in agreement and looked at his cards. For once, Wes had thought of something coherent in one of his half-asleep stupors.
Elsa smiled with satisfaction at the memory of how the zords had died. For once, one of their plans had succeeded. The rangers no longer had their zords… the matter of them coming up with an old zord, a practically ancient zord was of no consequence. The thing had managed to defeat a particularly weak monster and if she came up with a strong monster, the zord would fall along with all the others. Any attempts to revive the zords would be useless. The zords were gone.
"Elsa…"
She turned around to see Mesogog walking into the room. She had been staring at the jars containing specimens used in the Geno-Randomizer, contemplating what would be best to destroy that old zord with.
"Yes, my Lord," she replied.
"How are the island preparations coming?"
"Very well." She cracked an evil smile at the very memory of the latest plan. Mesogog was a pure genius when it came to ideas such as this. His latest plan to get rid of the rangers—and all their friends—was ingenious and it took the messy business of destroying the rangers out of their hands.
"Good," Mesogog hissed. "Once all the rangers are on that island, there will be nothing in between me and that gem. Then there will nothing stopping my dream."
Elsa decided now would be a good time to speak on a matter she had been thinking of while watching the scanner readings. "My Lord, what about the others…?"
"Others?" Mesogog asked.
"The ones without morphers or powers."
"Since there are only two of them, I except it will not be difficult to find them and bring them in with the others."
She nodded quickly. "Of course, my Lord."
"Send out the Tyranno-drones at first light and make sure that there are sufficient numbers of them. We do not want any mistakes." He paused, folding his hands behind his back. "You know what to do and where to put them once they are captured?"
"Yes, my Lord."
"Good." Mesogog crossed the room and sat in his chair, leaning back. "Very good."
Tommy blinked as he opened his eyes. For a moment, he wasn't sure where he was. Then he remembered he was sleeping on his front porch. They—Adam, Conner, Ethan and himself—had not actually gotten in their sleeping bags until close to four in the morning. It felt like it had taken him hours to fall asleep. He felt something hard lodged in the center of his back. He looked over his shoulder and found Conner curled up against his back. If it had been someone other than Conner, he would have been pissed, but since he felt a fatherly instinct towards his students, he let it slide. They were all cold.
The morning sky was gray. He glanced at his watch and realized that it would still be a few hours until the sun came up and some of the cold dissipated. A light mist was rising off the ground and Tommy could see his breath as he exhaled. This was not good weather to be sleeping outside in. Of course, camping was another story. They needed a car with a heater or an RV or something other than the great outdoors. He almost wondered when the sun would come up and they could go back in the house.
He sighed and pulled his sleeping bag over his head, while at the same time trying to maneuver away from Conner who would probably wake up and be mortified about where he had ended up sleeping. His sleep-deprived mind could only think of one thing.
They had made it. They had made it until morning.To Be Continued...
Author's Note: I was going to rant right here, but I've decided, in the words of Captain Hook, that that would be bad form. So I'm not going to, since it won't be worth the time and energy in the long run anyways. I'd like to thank everyone who has reviewed the last few chapters! It's nice to know that someone is out there reading and appreciating this fic. Just drop me a review and let me know what you think-- am I keeping up with all these people and keeping everything with certain subplots going all right? (That made a lot of sense...) But thanks for all the reviews! --EK
(Oh and Manders1953, I'm actually a sophomore in college and I'll be 20 in December. Scary thought, huh? But your logic was sound! I'm in a class called Modern American Literature: 1900 to the Present. I have to take it as one of the required classes for my major. At any rate, that review made me smile. You had a good guess! --EK)