Chapter 5: Making new friends… sort of

"Future?" the Rangers echoed in unison.

"How could we have managed to do that?" Madison asked curiously. "All we did was save your life."

Sky sighed. "My life didn't need saving. If anything, you may have just ruined it by doing what you did."

"I'm still very confused here," Xander said, scratching his head. "Who exactly are you again?"

"Besides the red ranger?" Chip added.

The other rangers looked at him in shock.

Chip, ignoring the shocked looks from his friends, turned to face the young man, "That is what you are, aren't you? I heard Troblicon call you ranger a bunch of times during the battle. And it was you he was talking to when he left, wasn't it?"

Sky's face was grim as he faced the rangers. Hmm, that one is smarting than he looks. And he's right. I guess there's no point denying it now. "Yes it was."

"So who are you and how are you ranger as well?" Vida inquired, getting restless from all the word games people seemed to be playing.

"My name is Sky, and I'm from the future. As for how I gained my ranger powers, I can't really explain that without giving you too much information about the future. Your just going to have to trust me when I say I'm on your side."

"How far in the future are you from?" Xander asked curiously.

"Only about twenty years. But they're a critical twenty years which is why I can't risk contaminating the time line while I'm here. It could change everything for the worse."

"What's so critical about the next twenty years?" asked Madison.

"I can't tell you that. It could change things too much if you knew. This is why I have to find Troblicon fast so I can take him back to the future with me."

"And how do you plan to do that?" Nick asked suspiciously.

"The same way I got here," Sky said bending down to pick up a stone. He tossed it to Xander who stared at him curiously. "Throw that at me."

"What?" he replied, a little confused by the request.

Sky rolled his eyes, "Just trust me. Throw it."

"I don't want to hurt you,"

"Trust me, you won't."

Xander shrugged and began to wind up to throw the rock. While he was doing this Sky quickly waved his arm around in a circle, his hand shimmering with blue light. When Xander released the stone it ricocheted off Sky's shield, barely missing Xander's helmet as it flew by.

The other rangers stared in shock.

"What the heck was that?" Vida asked.

"Some thing I was born with," Sky replied coolly. "Using my psychic energy I can sustain small force fields. When I was battling with Troblicon earlier something about Troblicon's energy from his sword and the energy from my shield reacted and that was how I was transported."

A realization dawned on all the rangers. "So when you were fighting earlier with Troblicon and you were just standing there," Madison said, "you were actually-

"Trying to recreate the accident from earlier," Sky finished.

"And I messed that up," Madison said, her voice lowering in shame as she realized her mistake.

"Hey," Vida said, noticing her sister's change in attitude, "There's no way anyone could have known that. You were just doing what your heart told you to.

"We wouldn't want you reacting any other way Maddie," Xander added.

"Thanks guys," Madison replied appreciatively, "But I still did mess things up."

"Yeah, you did," Sky replied, cutting into their heartfelt moment, "Which is why we're going to have to work twice as hard to catch Troblicon soon before he does anymore damage. Troblicon may be ugly but he's not stupid. He's going to realize pretty soon where and when he is and he's not going to want to go easily. Also, if he figures out how he got here, just as I did, he's going to make it that much harder for me to get close enough to him to take us back. It took a direct blow from his sword to my shield to send us back and he doesn't need to get that close to attack me."

"Well, there's not much we can do about all of this right now," Nick said, finally deciding to take charge of the situation. "We should head back to root core, and see what Udonna has to say about all this."

"What about him," Vida said, indicating in Sky's direction. She had obviously didn't trust him, and certainly didn't like him after the way he had been treating his sister. Nick didn't like him much either but they certainly couldn't just leave him stranded here in Briarwood. They'd just have to keep an eye on him until they could be sure.

"He should come along too. So long as he promises to not make any trouble," Nick said, staring directly at Sky.

Sky met the red ranger's cool gaze (through his helmet of course) and nodded, "I always play by the rules."

"We'll see," Nick replied. "Come on," he said, heading off towards the nearest tree.

For once Sky was actually shocked as he saw the ranger walk right into the tree and disappear into a flash of light. The other rangers followed suit one by one. Madison, who was the last to go noticed the surprised look on Sky's face and laughed.

"Here," she said holding out her hand, "It's easy. Just take my hand."

Sky looked at the blue ranger warily.

"Listen, I'm sorry about before. If I'd known… well, I'm sorry."

Sky shook head, "No. Don't be. You did exactly what a ranger should do. You've got ranger instincts and that's not something to be sorry about. Besides, I probably would have done the same thing."

"So no hard feelings?" Madison asked, holding out her hand once more.

Sky took her hand firmly, "I won't hold it against you if you don't hold it against me."

"Never," Madison replied with a smile, "Now come on," She said dragging him forward.

Sky was hesitant as he looked at the seemingly solid tree. "You guys travel this way often?"

"All the time," Madison replied cheerily.

Sky paused as he thought this over. "You've never gotten stuck half way in a tree or something, have you?" he asked cautiously.

Madison just laughed. "No, not yet. Although did Xander get turned into a tree once before."

Sky's eyes widened in fear at her comment but she just grinned behind her helmet.

"Relax. I've got you and I'm not letting go. Just follow me and hang on," she said heading straight for the tree. Sky, though hesitant, followed her into the tree and suddenly felt himself being sucked forward in an array of roots and dirt. Though quite intense, the feeling only lasted for a moment as he was thrown slightly forward from another tree.

As Sky looked around he suddenly realized he was in a new location, obviously somewhere in the forest, although he had no idea where. While looking around, he also noticed that the rangers had all demorphed. What was more surprising though was that he recognized them.

"Hey, you're those teenagers from that music store," Sky announced slightly surprised. He would have never pegged them as the warrior types considering how young they were. Particularly the blue ranger, who was revealed to be a petit dark haired girl, fairly pretty, but not exactly ferocious looking. Then again, neither was Sydney, and he knew better than most people how not to under estimate her. Just because her favourite colour was pink and her favourite hobby was shopping, didn't mean she couldn't kick the snot out of any guy who might pin her down as the weak, girly, princess type.

"Come on," Madison commanded, still pulling Sky along by the hand, "Root core is just up this way."

"What exactly is Root core anyways?" Sky asked curiously.

"Um," Madison said, smiling sheepishly.

"It's probably best you see it for yourself," Chip cut in.

"If you want to classify it as anything," added Xander, "Then I guess you could call it our base of operations."

"Our home away from home," replied Madison.

"But like I said," added Chip, "It's best you see it for yourself."

After walking for a bit they were met (to the surprise of Sky) with a very large stone Dragon's head that had begun to open its mouth.

"In there?" Sky asked suspiciously.

"Yep," Madison replied dragging him along. "Don't worry. It's much nicer once you get inside."

Sky raised an eyebrow. "I guess I'll have to take your word for it," Sky replied as the rangers all disappeared into the darkness of the closing entrance.

To be continued…

Yeah! A new chap! This would have actually been posted sooner but for some reason the site wasn't letting me upload files. I don't know why but the problem is fixed! Yeah! Hope you enjoyed the chap! More will be coming quite soon! Thanks and please review!

P.s. Thanks so much for all the lovely feedback so far! I really appreciate as a writer just to hear what people think, even if it is to say that they don't like it. It really helps with the writing process! So Thanks a million!