Disclaimer: Power Rangers belongs to Disney and the like, which I am not affliated with.

Conner knew perfectly well that he shouldn't go. He knew that it could be a trap, that he'd been stupid enough to fall for Trent's traps before. But he was worried that Trent might pull something, might kidnap Kira or do something drastic and ridiculous. Conner wasn't really sure of what Trent was capable of these days.

He also knew that he should tell the others. So they could keep an eye on him in case it was a trap. But they would try to talk him out of it, he knew. And he didn't want to be talked out of it. Because he had been hoping for this grudge match to end all matches for some time now. He had been burning for this fight ever since he'd first found out that Trent was really the White Ranger.

As he drove towards the soccer field at the park, planning to park his car in the parking lot and walk to the quarry, Conner wondered how Trent had found out about his crush on Kira. Conner had concealed it as best as he could; not even Ethan knew about it. He kept it hidden because he knew that while Kira denied it fervently, she still had feelings for Trent. It wasn't as though she could help them, because she liked him long before he turned on them. Conner both stepped back out of honoring those feelings, and disappointed that she was still able to maintain them, no matter how small.

Conner strolled into the quarry, adopting a casual manner, though every muscle was tense and ready, and his mind was working overtime. He scanned the place; the sleek gray rock walls surrounded him on three sides, small patches of trampled grass littering the ground. No sign of Trent. On the bright side, no sign of anyone else, either.

"I'm here," Conner barked out.

"Right on time," Trent said, stepping out of the wall, or so it would seem. With a wince, Conner remembered that camouflage was Trent's additional power. "Are you ready to start this?"

"I'm ready to end this," Conner said, lifting his wrist and turning his bracelet into his morpher. "Dino Thunder, power up!" he said, as Trent morphed with "White Ranger, dino power."

They came to a standoff, White versus Red. "No Zords," Conner said.

"Just you and me," Trent agreed. There was a split second before the two Rangers charged at each other, going hand against fist, punching and kicking, matching each other move for move. Occasionally one of them would land a spectacular blow on the other, but neither went down. Conner felt every single injury, throbbing in perfect, surround-sound synchronization, but he stood his ground proudly. He could only hope that the same was holding true for Trent.

At the same time, the two of them delivered powerful roundhouse kicks that caught against each other, rendering the opponents off-balance and sending them sprawling. Conner clutched at the stitch in his side, breathing heavily, staring the White Ranger down.

"You know," Trent said, stumbling to his feet, "Kira never really liked you."

"That may be true," Conner said, following suit as quickly as he could. "But at least I can say that I'm her friend. What are you to her? Just some annoying little bug that needs to be squashed."

Trent was just releasing a barrage of energy arrows as Conner was pulling his laser out and firing. Some of the opposing attacks connected in midair, eliminating each other with a show of sparks; some of them went wildly off course, though doing no real damage; and most of them made their marks. Conner flipped through the air and crashed to the ground heavily. He was relieved to see that Trent was no longer on his feet, either.

"Had enough yet?" Conner asked, grateful that his voice didn't betray the exhaustion he was feeling.

"I'm just getting warmed up," the White Ranger promised, and charged at Conner, sword at the ready.

Conner was only just getting to his feet when the White Ranger attacked, and was still in the process of converting the Thunder Max from laser to saber. Naturally, he was blindsided and went down hard--though he was only about halfway up and therefore didn't have as far to fall. He sprung back up with catlike grace that caught him by surprise as much as it did Trent. He jabbed his sword out, and caught Trent's side.

"Is this why you hate the Rangers so much?" Conner asked, standing over Trent's prone form. He knew it wasn't the wisest of plans, and he knew he was going to regret it in no more than a minute, but all the same, he couldn't resist the chance to gloat. "Because you realized that we meant more to Kira than you ever could?"

"Zeltrax is the one with a stupid vendetta, not me," Trent answered, and as Conner had more or less predicted, the White Ranger swept the Red Ranger off his feet so they were both on the gravel. "I just torture you guys because it's so easy and so fun."

At that, Trent abandoned any sort of Ranger etiquette, giving up on the graceful martial arts and settling for pure playground moves, half-crawling on top of Conner and punching him repeatedly in the gut. Conner coughed, and felt blood sloshing against the interior of his helmet. He knew the suit was stronger than it looked, and was able to withstand a lot of things, but he'd just been subjected to all kinds of pain this afternoon.

His eyes started to close, the pain in his head too much, the pain in his gut worse. He wasn't thinking clearly, and was just eager to embrace the blackness. Then Kira's face flashed in his mind, and he remembered what he was fighting for. Her.

Okay, if Kira ever found out the real reason that Conner had agreed to this particular head-to-head, she'd kill him--provided of course that Trent didn't do it first. But Conner wanted to just off this loser completely, and Kira was his primary motivation. His knee-jerk reaction was just that: his knee rising off the ground to sharply connect with the White Ranger's groin. Trent rolled off of him instantly, but his suit withstood a lot as well, and when Red clamored to his feet, so did White.

"I love her," Conner muttered, more to himself, but Trent heard it.

"What?"

"I said I love her! Super Dino Mode!" Spikes extended from his suit, and an extra boost of energy rushed through him. It didn't heal anything, but it strengthened him somewhat. He rushed at his adversary, giving Trent everything he had as he fought furiously. He was so intent on the strength of his attack that he didn't even realize that he had no energy to support it. He was running on fumes, but his brain was so hazy with fury that he didn't notice. If he stopped to think about it, his brain would most likely realize what was going on and he would feel the aches and pains, would be too fatigued to move.

His fists and feet moved so quickly that Trent couldn't come up with a system for blocking them, and he was soon reduced to just taking the blows until at last he collapsed on the ground, losing his morph.

Conner towered over him, taking labored breaths, but still standing. "I win," he said. Trent gazed up at him, the expression in his narrowed eyes unreadable. No matter, because they rolled back in his head, his head and shoulders falling back fully on the gravel as he lost consciousness.

Conner moved a distance away and waited for awhile, still in morph, just to ensure that Trent wasn't playing possum. It was a trick he had fallen for before. Then Conner left the quarry, powered down unseen, and threw up in the bushes.

He reached his car and drove home, the corner of his mouth bleeding, bruises making themselves apparent on his arms and gut. He stumbled into his foyer and winced as he tripped and fell into the wall. "Conner, honey, is that you?"

"Yeah, I'm home, Mom," he croaked out, and heard her footsteps as she came in to see him.

"Conner, I--oh my God." She rushed over, and pushed his hair back off his forehead, inspecting him. "Sweetie, what happened?"

"Nothing," he said. "I got into an accident."

"An accident? Is the car okay?"

"The car's fine," he said impatiently, waving her hand off. "It wasn't a car accident."

"Then what was it, Conner?" she said, staring at him now, the concern seeping out of her eyes, and her tone adopting a hard edge. But Conner was too tired to care much.

"It was nothing."

"Have you been fighting?"

"No, I haven't been--"

"It's those new kids you've been hanging out with, isn't it," she said. "You didn't get into fights when you hung out with soccer players..."

"Mom!" Conner interrupted loudly, something that had taken much more strength than he'd been capable of giving. "Ethan and Kira don't fight. Come on. Kira plays guitar, and Ethan's in the computer club. Get real." He sighed. "This one guy was talking trash about Kira, so I decided to do something about it."

"Am I going to get an angry call from this boy's parents?" his mom said, sighing in resignation.

"No, trust me on that," Conner said ruefully. Anton Mercer would probably be thrilled that his son had gotten the crap beat out of him. Something about building character or something, he guessed. "His dad won't even care, if he notices at all. And we did it off school grounds, so no one knows about it."

Mrs. McKnight sighed again. "I sent your brother to that damn ninja school, Conner, not you. Try to stay out of trouble, please, okay? Go get yourself cleaned up."

"Yeah," he muttered, heading towards the stairs.

In the security of his bathroom, stripping out of his sweat-soaked and dirt-stained clothes, Conner steamed up the room as he filled the tub with hot water. While he waited for it to fill, he cleaned the blood from the corner of his mouth, wincing at the sting from the alcohol. All he really wanted right now was a boiling hot soak, no matter how girly it seemed. He just wouldn't ever mention it to anyone. Ever.

He slipped into the bath, and the water scalded his skin at first, then he developed a tolerance for it to the point where it felt quite soothing. While he eagerly anticipated the extra-long sleep he was going to treat himself to soon, he dreaded waking up afterwards, with his every muscle aching.

Then it flooded into his consciousness, that hated little blip of his communicator. He had taken it off, but it only rested on the edge of the tub. His arm groaned with the effort of trying to pull itself out of the heavy water and answer the call.

"This is Conner."

"Conner," it was Dr. O., "we found Trent's body."