Power Rangers: Blue Echo
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine (Except Adrian) and this is a not for profit work.
Author's Note: This is a light and fun hero story I'm doing in addition to my more serious stories. Takes place in the SPD Power Rangers time period with a strong focus on Sky, Bridge and possibly the Power Ranger Universe in general.
Stage 01: Restart (Blue Generation)
The sky was crimson red. The smell of smoke and blood filled the air. Civilians, both human and alien littered the streets and lay either dead or dying. Medic crews tended to the injured as huge chunks of asphalt and metal hung off of large, ruined skyscrapers. On the top floor of the bombed out Tarekis Financial Building, in the CEO boardroom, a young man of 15 was desperately tending to his father's wounds. A sword was sticking cruelly out of the father's body, seemingly in a demented parody of the sword and the stone legend. The boy tried grabbing a hold of the sword but it burned his hands.
"Adrian, it's okay." said the man in red to his son.
"IT'S NOT OKAY! We gotta get out of here now." Adrian tried to grab the sword again but his father grabbed his hands. With his head he gestured to the far wall. Blood was trickling down his mouth. "Papa!" the young man squeaked futilely.
"I have one more...assignment for you...son." Adrian looked over to the far wall where his dad was looking. Upon it there was a strange looking glyph that seemed like an ornate triangle that was glowing a unearthly prismatic color.
"The Axis of Time." Adrian said flatly.
"Use your powers...to fix this..."
"That's a serious violation..."
"I would do it for you without question."
"Same. But how to activate it?"
"Just put your morpher on the glyph."
"Where will I go? Won't Time Force get pissed?"
"The Triad will be your main concern. They'll send their troops after you. The axis...will take you somewhere...with an emotional connection..."
"Back to you, father?"
The man was struggling to breathe now. "Most likely..."
"I'll go and save you father!"
"Save...all of us..." Adrian's father then kissed his son's palm. Some blood leaked on Adrian's charred flesh. "Don't look..." he said. Meaning, don't watch me die here.
"I won't." Adrian swiftly stood up and walked over to the glyph and held his Blue Morpher directly on the symbol. "See you soon, dad." he said not looking behind him. The symbol spins round and round like a wheel then enlarged into a gate.
"Come home safely." Was all the man said as he watched his only son walk through the interdimensional gate.
New Tech City (Present Time)
Schuyler Tate signed the crew reports at S.P.D headquarters. He looked over the Zord service reports and the enemy surveillance information. No enemy activity, and S.P.D was running smoothly. Nearly a half year into being the Red Ranger of his B-Squad and so far things were peaceful and normally functioning.
So much for the big prize promotion.
Sky tried not to feel bitter about things, after all, this was the goal of all the fighting, all of the sleepless nights and painful wounds.
"So, if Jimmy Crack Corn and no one cares then what's the point? I mean I'd care if cracking corn was more interesting. I do think all blue tail flies should be under scrutiny though. They seem murderous. I'll bet if the master popped corn more people would care, hey, I think popcorn with toast would be a great combination! Especially, if we got the caramel kind but then it'd be all sticky with the butter. Nah! I think it'd be awesome anyway...oh you're giving me the look Sky."Bridge said in a flourish.
"No, there's no look." Sky replied.
"Yeah, it's the rambling zone out look." Bridge said in a huff.
"Nah, we should try caramel corn toast and butter for breakfast sometime."
"Really? Excellent! It's shift change by the way, Z and Syd are already making plans for their time off this weekend."
"Hmm, that's nice. We have good weather." Sky said absently. Bridge could sense a strong amount of apathy but it wasn't really directed at his friends.
"So what are your plans glorious leader?" Bridge asked.
"Plans? What plans?" Sky replied.
"Same as ever, I see. With our reduced workload you should get out more often. I'm going to the Galactic Electronics Trade Show this weekend, you should go too."
"Isn't that for vendors and corporations only?"
"Commander Cruger wants to have an unofficial eye on the proceedings and apparently Kat wants to contract some vendors for S.P.D business."
"So we can have even more gadgets and playthings." Sky said a little cynically.
"Exactly! So should I ask for another badge?" Bridge asked purposely ignoring Sky.
"Sure, I really got nothing else to do."
"Great! I'll tell him right now." Bridge ran off excitedly. Sky smiled a little bit over Bridge's enthusiasm. Though if this becomes a case of "How many freebies can Bridge Carson get?" I'm heading for the exit. Sky sat down and began to work on some more surveillance forms when his personal cell phone rang. He answered it.
"I SAID Shift Change, Sky!" came Bridge's voice on the other end.
"Right, I'll pack it in." Sky laughed as he turned the cell off. He put the files in a manilla folder and took it with him. He'll work on them after dinner.
Somewhere, there was a beautiful palace. Statues of gargoyles and demons were artfully arranged and were even rather aesthetically pleasing to look upon. A cascade of pristine water flowed throughout the grounds as stags, gazelles and even a bird of paradise lapped up the water. There were trees from lost civilzations whose fruit could feed a man for the rest of his lifetime yet he'd still hunger for more. Armored sentinels stood guard on every major door. There was a statue of a hydra who mouths poured water out making it a fountain. There was a dark chamber where the roof was open and the full moon shone overhead. The moonbeam was in the center of the chamber. On the floor there was a symbol of circle and a triangle inside of it. The circle had an alien language written on the outside of it. Three very imposing armored men in Bronze, Silver and Gold armor approached the circle. They all had flowing capes and ornamental crowns upon their heads.
The armor was styled after the armor of the Power Rangers.
"The Axis of Time has been awakened." The Gold Ranger said with anger.
"It is still unguarded, we may be able to undo this and get back to our original plan." The Silver Ranger said.
"You know that no single force may control the Axis. It phases in and out at random and follows mortal emotions." said the Bronze Ranger.
"If we secured the Axis we not only would have mastery of time, but of other dimensions as well!"
"We may can already assume that the Blue Second went to a point before our first attack in order to stop us."
"Time is not linear, we may already be destroyed as we speak."
"Nay, my dark brethren as long as we are in Oroborus Palace we exist for the most part outside of the space time continuum." the Gold Ranger spoke with conviction.
"So would the Ranger Wars commence sooner than even we originally planned?" Asked the Bronze Ranger.
"We can piggy back on the emotions the Blue Second used to awaken the Axis and send out a strike force. Once we secure the Axis of Time we may begin the first wave of attacks upon New Tech City again." The Silver Ranger explained.
"Then it's settled, we the Triad of Metamorphosis will commence Operation: Lone Ranger!" The Gold Ranger declared. Soon all three rangers thrust out their right hands and joined them together in the circle. "Trimorph Power Converge!" Suddenly the circle began to glow with a fierce energy as a pillar of raw power as the three rangers began to sculpt and bend their significant powers to their will.
Adrian was in some rancid motel eating some instant ramen and watching the news. The teen looked like death warmed over, but he was not suicidal. Get a grip. Your dad's alive and well here and probably at his best too. How to warn him about the Triad and upcoming Ranger Wars? Soon an anchorwoman popped up on screen.
"Another feature of this year's Galactic Electronics Trade Show will be the creation of a time capsule! In it will be the cultural artifacts, languages and technology of all of this galaxy's planets and people and will be sealed away for future generations. Remember though GETS is not open to the public..." Adrian barely got out of his stupor. Ah man, that sounds exactly like something the Triad would want to get a hold of so they can study the habits of this galaxy's people. Assuming they can get control of the finicky Axis of Time. Adrian sighed. In less than 12 hours he'd see his father again.
The next day Sky and Bridge were driving to the New Tech convention center in Sky's car. Sky had on a long sleeved red shirt and denim whereas Bridge had on a blue sleeveless "muscle shirt" and shorts along with his gloves. For all intents and purposes Bridge looked like he was going clubbing than spending all of his money at a dealer's hall.
"I was thinking of getting the world best toaster, but the one I got now was last years world's best toaster. So I thought about looking at the new models of the robot dogs but then R.I.C is pretty much the best too. So NOW I'm thinking of getting me a pizza oven/ice cream maker so I can heat pizza up while making ice cream too!"
"Bridge, there's no such thing!" Sky chuckled as he passed some cars on the freeway.
"We got holographic theater, virtual reality vacations and even guaranteed broadband for all households! I want my hybrid pizza ice cream maker!"
"It'll probably just go into the junk box where all your other useless stuff goes."
"Hmph, when I get my hot pockets with ice cream in them I won't look you up." Bridge snorted. Then he changed the subject. "So, what did you think to look at?"
"Me? I was probably gonna get an upgrade to my personal organizer." The one with the cell phone, internet, alarm clock, DVD player, ATM, TIVO, notebook and mp3 player was completely five minutes ago.
"Hmm, another pawn in your never ending quest to control every little aspect of your life?" Bridge said lightly. He felt a sharp jolt of pain coming from Sky. He quieted down. "Hey, having some problems?"
Sky just looked at the road as the turn off for the convention center came up. "I don't feel like I need to be here anymore."
To his credit Bridge didn't crack a joke about being in an empty car. "Typical. You bellyache about not being S.P.D One and now it's yours, you're not happy."
"I guess I learned to take stock of what really would make me happy. It's just...a job now."It was really painful for Sky to admit that.
"For a long time that's all what you were about. Much to our dismay and discontent."
"I always believed in what we do and who we are..."
"But now Sky Tate wants to charge forth instead of the Blue and Red Rangers." Bridge reclined back. "Now do you see why we were always trying to push you into doing stuff with us? So that this very thing wouldn't happen!"
"It's always been there on some level, I'm just noticing it now." Bridge could now feel the sadness come to the forefront of Sky's mind. He felt bad about pushing people who wanted to spend time with him away. Bridge came to a decision.
"Alright!"
"What?" Sky declared startled as he made his way on the off ramp.
"We're gonna shakedown every exhibitor! From hot tubs, to home entertainment centers! We're not leaving till every exhibitor gives us free stuff!"
"You are not going to bug all these people when I'm with you!"
"Aw, come on! They practically throw stuff at you for attending! Literally. And the door prizes! Can you imagine that we get the convention center doors if we're lucky?"
"Wha, Bridge where did you hear that?" Sky asked bewildered.
"Insider source on my chat room club, duh! You can hear lots of stuff that's gonna happen before it happens!"
"Future knowledge huh? We've all seen how time travel manipulation works out REALLY well for all the parties involved." Sky retorted scathingly.
"Hey, while you're out in the dealers hall pick me up a wet blanket to go with the one you're always wearing!" Bridge replied cheerfully.
"It'd be weird having two sets in the same squad." Sky said lightly despite himself.
"It's all good, we'll just get a king sized blanket to put all of B-Squad under."
"Sheesh, you MUST be my best friend if you can come up with lame ideas that I completely agree with." Sky said starting to break a smile.
"Yep! It's in the contract, buddy so don't you forget it!"
Meanwhile in a side entrance to the convention center, a short, elderly man with a walking stick in a white lab coat was talking with the guards. He flashed some credentials and the guards let him in. Following him in, it looked as if he had a complete five man set of Powers Rangers as body guards except they all were in one color:gun metal gray.
"Trying for that government contract with android worker rangers?" The guard asked.
"It's just a demonstration." the old man said.
Adrian was sitting on the steps of the convention center in a pale blue shirt and shorts looking like a stray dog amid the throng of aliens and humans coming in and out of the building. For not being open to the public a real festive atmosphere developed anyway with food carts set up along with live music. Adrian's stomach growled. He didn't have enough money to eat and stay at a motel and it was a lucky break that his currency was still good in the past. Adrian was very fair looking and his hair was at shoulder length. Although attractive, he really looked depressed and unwholesome to be around especially since he still smelled of wasteland. He almost had a "homeless kid" aura about him. He was thinking of trying to find a way in without a badge when across the way he noticed something. He felt as if time had stopped (not literally, but you never know) when he saw them. Two guys walking down the sidewalk and through the crowd. The man in red walked purposely and resolute while the guy in the blue summer clothes was just chatting up everything and everyone in sight. It made Adrian laugh a little seeing Bridge out in large crowds considering his psychic abilities. Suddenly without warning Adrian began to shed tears.
Dad, Uncle Bridge...you're both...
Needless to say, Adrian Tate was more than ready to push Life's reset button.