Disclaimer is in part one.

Like Sands in the Hourglass, part 2
Machiro-el

Nick looked up as a figure burst through the doors of the Rockporium. He was prepared to discourage another customer before seeing the figure of a monster looming before him. He jumped out from behind the counter.

"Don't suppose I can interest you in a record. You look like a big GWAR fan."

"Grr. Argh." The monster threw a bolt of something at Nick, which narrowly missed him and turned a nearby record sleeve into a puff of dust.

"So what's your story?" Nick asked flippantly as he switched to his wizard attire. "Parents didn't love you enough?"

"Aaargh!" the monster screamed, and sent the bolt straight at Nick.

Nick sank to his knees as cold agony washed over him. His joints throbbed, his skin felt thin as tissue.

The monster cackled and skipped away as Nick struggled to do anything more than track its progress with his eyes.

He snapped open his Mystic Morpher. "Guys, help." His lungs felt leaden and liquid.

"We're on our way!" he heard Chip call.

---->

Nick's eyes were open and nothing made sense. Shapes blurred together and colors mingled in strange rainbows. "Nick, are you all right?" he heard Udonna ask underneath a strange buzzing in his ears.

"Ugggh," Nick managed. "Anybody get the name of that monster that hit me?"

No one answered, the shapes he took to be his friends simply stared at him

Nick waited patiently for his vision to clear up, which it did - a bit. However, it stubbornly refused to clear completely. "Guys?"

"Nick," Xander asked, "we couldn't find the monster again. We found Koragg, and he..."

Madison said nothing, she simply threw herself into Nick's arms. Pleasant as she felt there, he couldn't help but wheeze at the impact.

"Guess that monster took more out of me than I tho-"

That was when Nick noticed the condition of his arms.

"Shi... what happened... why am I..." His arms were old and wrinkled; his brain rebelled at the look. Then he remembered the customer at the store. "It's an aging monster."

Chip nodded. "We think so. Don't worry buddy, we'll find a way to get you back to normal."

Xander grunted affirmation. "No worries."

"How BAD is it?" Nick wanted to know. "I look awful, guys."

"We think it aged you about fifty years," Madison said hesitantly. She looked around, and her gaze settled on Vida. A Vida that looked younger now than Madison.

"Vida?" Nick croaked. "It hit you too."

She nodded. "We think so. My morpher is being wacky, but I still transform right. I don't think you're up to that kind of stress right now."

"Right," Nick said. "I'll be fine in a few, if Vida can fight..."

"Nick," Udonna said firmly. "You are not well. You have several hereditary diseases, and the shock to your system from morphing could be extensive."

"Yeah," Xander added. "The only thing it did to Vida was it turned her into a thirteen year old. Didn't even know she'd changed until she demorphed. She's fine."

"And you're not," Vida added.

"Heredit-"

Madison looked down. "Diabetes, for one. Chip checked. But unlike his, yours was accellerated without any sort of treatment."

Nick wondered if he would start liking okra any minute now and rubbed his forehead. "Okay, then let's be reasonable about this. How can we affect a monster we can't directly touch?"

"And how will you know destroying it doesn't make the spell permanent?" the unmistakable voice of Clare contributed.

"Because I'm not going to be stuck as a thirteen year old forever, that's why," Vida announced.

Xander couldn't resist a grin. "Watching you in the bloom of womanhood again? V, I wouldn't miss that for the world."

Vida glared. "And this is the reason why I'm not going to be forced to go through puberty again," she said forcefully. "My parents might get some idea about putting me in pink."

Nick gazed in disbelief at the liverspots covering his skin. His deep skin had slowly faded with time, it appeared, and now had a transparency to it. He felt unnerved. Nick knew people in their seventies who looked better than he did. Whatever this monster did, it aged you HARD.

Madison stepped forward. "It's okay, Nick."

Vida, who was glaring at Xander, added, "We'll get you back to normal, Nick.

He sighed. "It's not okay. But until it is, I guess I'm going to have to make due."

"And in the meantime," Udonna said, "We are without a Red Ranger." She seemed to be pondering things. What things, Nick wasn't sure.

Should have the next chapter out in a week or two, barring freak blizzards or el nino.