Tatsuya looked at the view of the school ground from the rooftop.

"It's so beautiful. I can't believe we never came up here when I was a student."

"It is, isn't it?"

Chiyo had decided to postpone looking at animals with Sakaki so as to catch up with Tatsuya. With their fathers both businessmen, the two had often socialized while their fathers held negotiations. He had been unhappy when his father first asked him to do what Tatsuya referred to as 'babysitting duty,' but he ended up the same as everyone else in being unable to resist her charms, and she had proven helpful more than once on some of his tougher school assignments.

He noticed Chiyo had a heavy look on her.

"Chiyo? What's wrong?"

"My parents and I visited yours back in June. When I asked where you were, your father said you were in Europe."

"He did, did he?"

"Well, when I asked, he and everyone else looked uncomfortable, so I felt he wasn't telling me the truth…"

"No, he wasn't."

Tatsuya paused, thinking how best to tell Chiyo without upsetting her.

"Father and I aren't talking, not since February. I've moved out and am no longer relying on him for any financial support."

"What? But why?"

"Father always assumed I would take over the company. He never seemed to accept that I wanted to live my own life, not just get everything handed to me."

"I guess I understand that. But still, I feel bad that happened. It must be hard."

Tatsuya smiled.

"Actually, I've never been happier in my life. I've met some friends, we work and live together. We help people. I'm actually making a difference."

"Well, I'm glad to hear that! Actually, that's kinda how I feel too..."

"Your and your parents aren't having problems, are you?"

"No, not that part. But, before coming here, well I always liked my classmates and teachers, but I couldn't help feel a little out of place. When I first arrived here, I was scared that'd be more the case than ever, but it's been great! The schoolwork is always interesting, and I've made such great friends! They all treat me like a fellow high schooler, not some little kid. Sure, they're all a little odd, but I feel like I finally belong."

Tatsuya looked down to see his teammates waiting for him and smiled.

"I know exactly what you mean."

Usually when Kaorin got home from school she would do her homework, then work on her various creative projects. Today was different. She got her homework done, but couldn't seem to muster up the will for anything else. She hadn't worked on her latest portrait of Sakaki. She hadn't written any poems about her. She hadn't even worked on her novel, Star Queen Sakaki, even though she had promised herself she'd get Chapter 24 done today.

Instead, Kaorin lay on her bed looking at the ceiling, thinking. She could still hardly believe what happened at school today. It was a scene she had imagined over and over again. The only difference was that in her fantasies, it had always been Sakaki who stepped in to defend her.

She should be happy, she felt, but instead felt oddly discontent. After awhile, she realized why: in a few minutes, Miss Yuri had paid her more attention than Sakaki had their entire time at high school.

It had never bothered her before. Who was she to demand such a magnificent example of womanhood pay attention to a little geek like her? Seeing her at school, being able to bask in her presence, even at times getting to actually talk to her, that was more than she deserved. At least, that was what she thought. But the events of today were making her rethink things.

She think she always knew, deep down, that the Sakaki she loved was a fantasy of her own creation. She could admit that now, because of Miss Yuri. Miss Yuri, who was real. Yuri…why her very name proved how she felt. She felt Kaorin was worth something, worth protecting. Not like Sakaki, who always seemed to pay little attention to her, who just stood and let Kimura harass like all the rest.

Who did Sakaki think she was anyway? Just because she was cool she was allowed to treat Kaorin like garbage? She must love it, she thought. She loved seeing her act like a lovesick fool, making an idiot out of herself. She and that little group of hers, they must get a real kick out of it. She could imagine them after school…

"Hiiiiii, I'm Kaorin, I'm a smelly little lesbian. Hey Miss Sakaki, would you like like to hang out with me and a bunch of other nerds looking at stars instead of getting into street fights with boys?"

All of Sakaki's friends laughed.

"Garsh Miss Sakaki, your Kaorin impressin' always gets mah knees a-slappin hyuck hyuck hyuck hyuck hyuck" said Osaka as she fiddled with her banjo.

"I don't know why she's always running from Kimura, it's not like she's going to do any better" said Yomi.

"Well remember, this is someone so dumb that they still believe us that's it's a 'coincidence' we go to my summer home while she's at her nerd camp."

"Man, I can't wait for graduation when you finally tell her what you really think of her, she's going to cry so much!" said Kagura.

"Oh yeah guys, look at the clock, it's time for our sex orgy" said Tomo.

They all excitedly took off their clothes…

Kaorin wiped away her tears. Well, Sakaki could go to hell! Now she had Miss Yuri, someone who actually cared about her.

She looked at her first portrait of Sakaki, adorned on her wall for over a year.

She reached out and tore it off with a fury.

Osaka rushed into class, panting.

"Sorry ahm late, Miss Yukari, ah-"

She stopped when she saw the classroom was completely empty.

As she wondered whether she had gotten her days mixed up again, she realized there was one other person there. Tomo was at her desk, hunched over and working on a test, although she was dressed in her winter coat instead of her uniform.

"Tomo? What's going on, where is everyone?"

"I can't talk now Osaka, I really have to work on this."

Then Osaka realized there was something different about her friend: Chiyo's pigtails were attached to her head.

"You heard her, dummy, buzz off!" said one.

"Yeah, make a tree, and leaf!" said the other.

Before Osaka could respond, something large shot through the wall, crashing onto a desk.

It was a short, squat robot.

"HIIII-AYAAH!"

Bruce Lee leapt in, striking a pose against the robot. Four other monsters followed him: a red bird person, some kind of frog man, a walking statue with three faces covering all side of its face, and some kind of one eyed guy in a red and black suit.

"EXPLOSIVE SOAP BUBBLES!" yelled the frog man, who let loose a string of bubbles from his mouth.

When they connected with Bruce, they exploded. But before the smoke cleared, he leapt out, and began to battle the monsters all at once.

"Can you guys keep it down, I'm trying to concentrate" said Tomo, not looking up from her desk.

"PSYGORN IMMOBILITY KINESIS!" called out the statue.

It held out a wand, and Bruce suddenly levitated into the air, repeatedly hitting the ceiling as the monsters laughed.

A series of yellow blasts hit the monsters, causing them to stagger. Bruce was released from their hold and landed on the ground.

A new arrival floated down. It looked like that odd looking cat plush she had gotten Chiyo for her birthday.

Moving swiftly, the cat creature reached into the bird man's mouth and tore out its tongue, then cut off the head of the frog man right above his mouth.

"I'll hold them off, Bruce, you warn my daughter's friend!"

Bruce leapt to Osaka.

"Ayumu, this is important, your friend's mind is being clawed at by evildoers!"

"FOR THE PIGTAILS!" yelled the remaining monsters whilst raising a salute with their arms, as they launched their attacks at the cat thing all at once.

The cat creature's expression remained serene, but it was yelling in pain and swiftly changing colors.

"Not only her but our entire universe is at stake! You must-"

The cat exploded, and the fireball rapidly expanded through the entire room...

"Osaka, wake up, class is almost over."

"Oh, Tomo, yir okay" said Osaka as she returned to consciousness and saw the face of her friend.

Now she remembered. Mr. Kimura was still in the hospital, and the substitute had declared Classics a free study period. Osaka had tried to catch up on some assigned reading, but looking at the open book realized she hadn't gotten very far before falling asleep. And she didn't even get a good dream out of it this time; this one was much too intense for her liking. She preferred when they were nice and calm, like the one she had the other week where she and her friends were squirrels (she chuckled remembering how mad Squirrel Yomi looked after Squirrel Tomo tricked her into giving her her nut.)

Looking around the class, she that new student Sion, who was completely focused reading a textbook. So engrossed in the book was he that he didn't notice some of the other students tying his shoelaces together. When class was dismissed, he got up to go and promptly fell down as many students laughed.

It was funny, Osaka couldn't deny that, but she still felt bad for the new student.

"Hey Osaka, you coming?" asked Chiyo, as she and the others stood by the door.

"Uh, you guys go ahead, ah'll be with ya in a few."

"Uh, all right."

As a rule, Osaka and her friends did not associate with the male students. It wasn't something they ever decided or discussed, it was just how it worked out.

But while Sion was a boy, he was also a fellow transfer student. She had always felt very fortunate that when she arrived at this new school in a new city, the others had quickly welcomed her into their group. As none of the male students had make a similar gesture to Sion, she felt it was her duty to do so.

"Need some help?"

She lent out her hand and helped him up.

"Oh, thank you."

"Ya gotta watch out, some of these fellas are pretty crafty with their tricks."

"Do they do this to you too?"

"Well not here but they did like to give mah the business back at mah old school. Anyway, howdy, ah'm Osaka."

"Osaka? Like the city?"

"Yep, that's what folks round here call me, on count of that's where ahm from."

"Wow...that's so cool."

For the first time, Osaka saw Sion smile.

Yuri was sitting in the teachers' lounge, eating her lunch, thinking about her next move in investigating, when a smiling woman sat down in front of her.

"Hi! You're Miss Yuri, the new history teacher, right? I'm Yukari!"

Yuri was too busy chewing to answer, but this didn't seem to bother Yukari, who excitedly turned and waved at a young blue haired woman who just walked in.

"Nyamo! Come here! We're having lunch with the new history teacher!"

Looking slightly embarrassed, the teacher came over to join them.

"Hi, I'm Minamo."

This caught Yuri's attention.

Minamo. That was the teacher Domon was going on about.

"Nice to meet you both."

"Oh, the pleasure's all mine!" said Yukari. "It's great to finally not be the only attractive young teacher at this school."

Nyamo shot her a glare.

"Anyway, I heard what you did to Kimura yesterday, great job. I would have done it myself but I didn't know we were allowed to."

"We're not" said Nyamo. "But from what I hear, you've scared him so much he won't talk, and I don't think anyone else here will say differently."

"Certainty not us! It's about time somebody handled that creep!"

"I have to admit, I'm surprised he was allowed to operate with such impunity."

"Well, that's just living in our male dominated society. Men just see no reason why they shouldn't be able to do with us as they please."

"So you never tried complaining?"

"Well Nyamo did."

"What? No I didn't, I thought you did."

"No, I remember you saying you did...I think."

"So neither of us ever filed a complaint about Kimura?" moaned Nyamo as she sunk down onto the desk.

"Wow, that's a pretty big blow to your feminism, isn't it?" said Yukari.

"You never did either!"

"Well you're the responsible one, I figured if they didn't listen to you what chance did I have, so I'd better help my students by spending that time preparing for next day's lesson."

"You never spend time preparing for next day's lesson!"

The enraged Nyamo grabbed Yukari's face and started to pull it.

Uncertain how to react, Yuri went back to her lunch.

"All right, that'll be it for today."

Once the Prometheus Ray was shut off, Tomo immediately went to the wastebasket and barfed. She had assumed the immediate effects of the Ray would lessen as time went on, but instead they were steadily growing more intense.

Akayama began writing notes on the latest session.

"Uh, Dr. Akayama?"

"Yes?" he said, not looking up.

"You know, I was wondering, could we, uh, stop this?"

Akayama's head shot up from his papers.

"Stop?"

"Well, I don't think I need it anymore. I ace all my exams, I'm smarter than Chiyo, and I'm sure I can get into whatever college Yomi does so I can keep bugging her, so I don't think I need to use this thing anymore."

"I'm afraid that's not how the Prometheus Ray works; the effect is cumulative. If you stop before we're done, you will revert to what you were before within a few weeks."

"Really? Dang."

"But I understand. The feeble work you are assigned in school bores you. You want a challenge worthy of your intellect. I think I may have what you're looking for."

He went to a cabinet and pulled out a file.

"In the 15th century, Italian mathematician Don Maestrini hypothesized that all of existence could be expressed with a mathematical formula. For decades, he worked on finding one. One day, he vanished, but left an unfinished equation and the words 'it is glorious.' Ever since, learned men have tried to solve the Maestrini Formula, some devoting their entire lives to it, but every one of them failed."

"And you think I'm smart enough to solve it?"

"No, not yet. But with further exposure to the Prometheus Ray..."

Tomo considered this.

"So, you're saying if i solve this, it'll be a big deal, huh?"

"You solve this, Tomo, and your name will be remembered after Einstein, Galileo, Newton, or any other great mind have long been forgotten."

Akayama made sure he was alone as he stepped onto the school field.

He had to admit, Takino's request to stop took him off guard. He hadn't predicted her asking to stop, of not wanting to go as far as they could. But he had dealt with it, he reassured himself. In any case, he had to focus on his biggest problem at the moment.

He reached into his pocket to take out a handful of casings, and threw them to the ground. The impact of collision set off a process, using scientific concepts as yet unknown to this era, win them growing, merging, and changing. When it was completed, there were 12 full sized copper colored robots with a large red eye serving as a face. They were the Junk Droid Zenitts, the backbone of the Londerz Family.

As soon as they were fully formed, the Zenitts began kicking their legs in place while holding up their swords and emitting excited, chattering sounds.

"Stop that, all of you, be quiet!"

The Zenitts promptly did as ordered, though Akayama would have sworn he sensed they had a feeling of disappointment about it.

He would not be like the fools he had been imprisoned with. This would not be some harebrained scheme but a well planned operation that would end the Timerangers in one fell swoop.

Chiyo frowned as she looked over the papers Tomo had given her.

"Gosh Tomo, I can't make heads or tails of this."

Tomo patted her young friend on the head.

"Don't worry Chiyo, maybe when you have the time I can come over and explain it to you."

"Really? How about after the movie?"

"Uh, I'm busy for the next week...What's keeping Osaka?"

To make it up to Chiyo and Sakaki after yesterday, they decided they'd go see Story of an Abandoned Cat 2. With Tomo done with her session, they were just waiting on Osaka.

The Zenitts laid on the ground, obscured by the grass, their rifles pointed ahead. Their orders were simple: wait for the five targets to come into range, and eliminate them. Anyone else caught in the crossfire were acceptable losses.

"I hear this one has an abandoned dog, too" said Yomi to Sakaki.

Sakaki's eyes instantly began to water, and she soon broke down crying.

"Hey, hey, save those tears for the theater, girl" said Kagura as she patted her friend's back.

"Oh, here comes Osaka now" said Chiyo.

"Uh, why does she have that new guy with her?" asked Kagura.

"Hey guys, sorry ah'm late, ah was chatting with Sion here and ah guess ah lost track of the time."

Sion bowed.

"It is a pleasure to meet you all."

"Ah thought ah'd invite him to see that kitty movie with us. That all right?"

The girls all looked at each other.

One target was in range.

Tatsuya, Yuri, Ayase, and Domon were nearbye, also waiting.

"Where's Sion?" asked Yuri, checking her watch.

Tatsuya looked around.

"There he is" said Tatsuya.

"Ooh, look at all those girls he's with. Guess he's been learning more from me than just how to fight, huh?" said Domon.

The others ignored him as they walked to their teammate.

He and Osaka stood as the other girls huddled.

"I don't know guys" said Tomo, "we already have Yomi and Kagura, if we're seen with this guy we're going be known as the loser group."

Before Yomi or Kagura could respond, someone called out for Sion.

"Oh, Tatsuya!" said Chiyo, seeing who it was.

"Chiyo! And Sakaki, wasn't it?"

"Hi guys!" said Sion. "This is my new friend, Osaka. You know, like the city?"

"That's very nice, Sion, but we have to go" said Yuri.

"Wait, what's he doing with all of you?" asked Yomi.

"We're tutoring him" said Tatsuya.

"Really? The janitor is tutoring him?"

The adults stood silent for a moment.

"He's very messy" said Ayase.

All targets were now in range.

Tatsuya averted his eyes from the suspicious girls, thinking of how to get out of this.

As he looked at the grass, he saw the sunlight beam off a metal surface.

"Everyone get down now!"

The Zenitts let loose a hail of bullets…