Author's Note: All good stories must at some point come to an end .Sorry for not updating this story sooner. I've been dealing with school and I just had midterms so I haven't had much time to devote to writing my stories which irritates me because there's so many stories that I need to be writing.It took a little longer than I expected, but here it is the final chapter in this story. Once again, thanks so much for the support. I hope you will be just as supportive of all my other Tommy and Kat stories.
PrettyDiva: I left you hanging on that cliff a little longer than I intended to. Thanks so much for the support that you continue to give me it means a lot.
HarryPassionFan: Read on to see what happened to Kat. Sorry for the long wait, I hope it's worth it when you read the ending.
Purple Strobe: I hope you really didn't leave your mouth in the shape of 'O' because I'm sure it probably started hurting with the time it took for me to finally get this chapter out here. Yes, there will indeed be a mission to find Kat. Thank you so so much for your reviews especially the long ones they really helped me in developing this story. So much so that I'm afraid this ending may disappoint you.
Purpleranger76: I hope this ending lives up to the rest of this story, if not I just may have to write a sequel to redeem myself. And yes, I think it's safe to say that we all now what happened after that kiss in chapter 26.
REEFSIDE: a few hours before the prom.
Katherine walked out of her bathroom wrapped in a towel and walked into her bedroom. She smiled as she glanced at the short pink dress that lay across the bed. She didn't know why but she felt just as nervous as she had years before when she had attended her own prom in Angel Grove. She sat down in front of the mirror on her vanity and started apply her makeup, once this was done she did her hair and finally it was time to put on the dress.
Some time later, Katherine walked across the hall to Will's apartment and knocked on the door. He answered it wearing black slacks and a white t-shirt and he was in the middle of shaving.
"I'm sorry but last time I checked I was the woman, shouldn't you be ready by now," she said as she stepped inside.
"I got a little held up, Logan called and wanted to make sure that we had everything set for when we bring in Mercer, I just spent the last few hours redoing our report," Will explained.
"Why didn't you call me I could have helped you," she told him.
"I know but you were so happy about going to the prom with Tommy I didn't want to bother you and you look great by the way," he said.
"Thanks," she said.
"Tommy Oliver's won't know what hit him," Will replied.
"Well Hayley won't be doing so bad with you on her arm, I guess I'll see you later," Kat said as she walked towards the door.
"If you run into Hayley, tell her I'll be there as soon as I can," Will called as she walked out.
Katherine walked downstairs and got into her car. She started the engine and then took off in the direction of Reefside High. Halfway through the drive, she noticed a black van in the rearview mirror. The van turned in every direction that she turned and for a moment Kat got an eerie feeling that she was being followed. Of course I'm being followed; it's probably just some kids going to the prom. She thought as she pulled into the school parking lot and the van went around her and found a parking space of its own. The parking next to the building where the prom was being held was packed and she was forced to park at the very end of the lot.
She got out of the car and didn't bother to see where the van had parked as she started on the long walk through the parking lot. Kat heard footsteps behind her but instead of turning around to see who was there she decided to keep walking as she prepared herself in case the person turned out not to be a student. Then something strange happened, the footsteps stopped and Kat heard a familiar whistling sound. Before she had time to react, she felt a dart hit her in the back of the neck as everything faded to black.
Katherine awoke sometime later and realized that she was unable to move. As she slowly opened her eyes and became alert she realized that she was sitting in a chair and that her hands had been tied behind her.
"Hello Kitty," a man said as he entered to room and stood before her.
"What are you going to do to me?" she asked as she looked up to meet the eyes of Li Chang.
"Oh come now Kitty you don't really need an answer to that do you?" he asked.
"If you were just going to kill me then why didn't you just have your men shoot me back in that parking lot," Kat replied.
"And miss the opportunity to say goodbye to you in person, besides I wanted to make sure you knew exactly who was responsible for your death," he said with a laugh.
"If I turn up dead, you're the first person the CIA will come after," she told him.
"Who said I'm going to give them the chance to find your body, you see you're about to go missing Agent Hillard and where I plan to put you, no one will ever think of looking," he told her.
"It doesn't matter, if they can't find me, they'll know who to blame," Kat said.
"I'm really going to miss playing this game with you but I promised your partner David Reed moments before I shot him that I would make sure his precious kitten would soon be joining him in the afterlife, goodbye kitten," he said as he walked away.
Kat watched as he walked away and she struggled to loosen the rope that was binding her hands. Moments later, a man walked into the room carrying a needle. Kat immediately felt a sense of dread as she realized that her final moments on earth would be shared with a stranger.
"This won't hurt, much," he said as she stabbed it into her flesh and again things faded to black.
Tommy paced around outside the building where the prom was being held as once again Will tried to call Kat on her cell phone.
"I don't understand why she isn't answering," Will said as he again dialed the number but was greeted with her voicemail.
"She probably turned it off since she was on her way here and didn't want her date with Tommy to be disturbed," Hayley said.
"Yeah but she never made it here," Tommy replied.
"Her car is here," Kira said as she and Trent came running up to them.
"The car was locked and it doesn't appear to have been tampered with," Trent replied.
"So much for the car jacking theory," Ethan said.
"Trent, did you try contacting her on the communicator?" Will asked not caring that everyone was listening.
"Yeah, I did but there's no answer," Trent told him.
"Wait a second that looks just like the communicators Kat and I used when we were in high school," Tommy said as he glanced at the communicator that Trent had on his wrist.
"Don't you mean when you guys were power rangers, and it probably looks like your old communicators because it is, Kat designed them that way," Will replied.
"First, how do you know about our past as rangers and secondly why would Kat have a communicator made for Trent?" Tommy asked.
"That's not important right now," Will replied
"The hell it isn't, I want to know what's going on and I want to know now," Tommy demanded.
Kat was surprised sometime later when she again started to open her eyes. She had been sure that whatever had been in that needle was meant to kill her but here she was alive and surrounded by total darkness. She was lying on her back and felt very stiff as though she had been lying here for hours. Her breathing had become very shallow and she knew that wherever she was the oxygen supply was limited. She instinctively moved her arms that were now free and felt around to reach her communicator until she remembered that she had left it at the apartment. With Mesogog gone, she had decided that it was no longer necessary to keep wearing it.
She was about to give up hope of contacting Will to help her when she remembered that her cell phone that she had stuck in the top of her dress because she hadn't felt like carrying a purse and she was planning on asking Tommy to keep in his pocket for her. She couldn't believe that Chang's men hadn't searched her but she was grateful because it meant that they hadn't touched her when she was knocked out. She opened the phone but no light emitted from it because she had turned it off before leaving her apartment. She felt around the keypad and tried to remember what it looked like so that she could find the power button.
She heard the familiar sound of the phone as she found the right button and a tiny light shone in the darkness around her. Kat struggled to adjust her eyes and realized for the first time that she wasn't alone. There was someone lying next to her. She shone the phone and saw a man there with a bullet hole in his forehead.
"You sick and twisted bastard!" Kat yelled as she realized that Chang had not only buried her alive but he had stuck her inside someone else's coffin.
"Please pick up, please pick up," she whispered as she touched a number on her speed dial and pressed send.
"Oh my god Kat, where are you?" Will asked as he answered the phone.
"It was Chang, he took me from the school, I don't have much time," she replied back as Tommy ripped the phone from Will's hands.
"Kat, are you ok?" Tommy asked.
"Tommy, is that you?" she questioned.
"Yeah, it's me, it's so good to hear your voice, do you have any idea how scared I was, I thought something terrible had happened to you," Tommy told her.
"Tommy, put Will on the phone, I need to talk to Will," Kat said.
"Kat, what's going on?" Will asked as Tommy handed him the phone.
"I don't know where I am, they buried me alive with a corpse, I should have known I couldn't go back to a normal life after wrapping up the case with Mercer, this is my fault," she said.
"Kat, don't talk too much, you need to preserve all the oxygen you can, now I am going to find you, I promise, just hang in there a little while longer, I need to hang up and call Glenn but I promise we'll get you out of there," Will told her.
"Why'd you hang up?" Tommy asked.
"Look Tommy, I know you're scared but right now you just need to let me be so that I can do everything in my power to bring Katherine back to you," Will said.
"But where is she, what's going on?" Tommy questioned.
"Hey Glenn, listen to me very carefully, I'm on my way to the office, Kat's in trouble I need you to call her cell phone and keep her on the line long enough to trace her whereabouts, I need that information as soon as possible, we have to find her before it's too late," Will told him.
"I'm going with you," Tommy said once Will hung up the phone.
"No, you're not," Will said as he started to head for his car.
"Look, you may be her partner but I'm the man who loves her and I say you're not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell is going on," Tommy said as he grabbed Will's arm.
"We don't have time for this, in the time that it would take for me to explain all of this to you, Katherine will be dead, now is that what you want!" Will yelled as he jerked away from Tommy's grip.
"Dr. O, just let him go, he knows what he's doing, if anyone can save Kat it's Will," Trent interjected.
"I'll call you once I know something," Will said as he ran to his car.
"Trent what is going on?" Hayley asked.
"I can't believe that once again you're keeping secrets from us," Kira told him.
"Trent, I think I have a right to know what's going on especially if Kat's life is in danger," Tommy said.
"Ok, I'll tell you what you want to know but not here, it's not safe," Trent replied.
Will arrived at I.D. headquarters and ran immediately into Glenn's office.
"I hope you have good news for me," Will said as he entered and found Glenn busily working at his computer.
"I called Kat's cell and I think I've pinpointed her location exactly," Glenn said as he pointed to a map that was pulled up on the screen.
"How was she?" Will asked.
"Scared, I think, I mean wouldn't you be if you were lying six feet underground next to a corpse," Glenn replied.
"How long will it take to get us to her?" Will questioned.
"About an hour by plane, once there it's a fifteen minute drive from the airport to the cemetery," Glenn answered.
"I better hurry then, I'll contact you once I've landed, I just hope I don't get there too late," Will said.
Back in Tommy's lab, the rangers were reeling from the news that Trent had given about the real reason that Kat came to Reefside.
"I can't believe Kat's in the CIA," Hayley remarked.
"That is so cool, Kat just got a lot hotter in my book," Conner commented.
"So all this time, she was here to investigate your father," Kira said.
"I can't believe she would lie to me like this, this whole time she's known that we were rangers, she even knew that Anton was Mesogog before we did," Tommy said.
"She had no choice, it's all a part of the job, in fact I'm pretty sure her bosses won't be pleased to learn that I've given away the secret," Trent replied.
"Will that really matter if she dies," Tommy muttered.
"Don't worry Tommy, I'm sure Will can find her," Hayley told him.
"Hayley, Trent said that Kat bugged the lab, but what the bug survived the explosion when Zeltrax destroyed the lab, do you think there's a way you might be able to use the link that the CIA had into our computers," Tommy said after a moment.
"Maybe, if I can find the right server, I might be able to tap into their computers they way they tapped into ours," Hayley replied.
"Um isn't that like illegal or something," Conner said.
"They did it to us so I say it's time we returned the favor," Kira said.
"I think I've got something," Hayley said after a few minutes.
"Anything that will help us?" Tommy asked.
"This is flight information that was sent out a few minutes ago, it may be the location of where ever Kat's being held," Hayley said.
"Let's go," Tommy said.
"But Dr. O, that's nearly an hour away from here, by the time we get there, Will may have already found her," Conner told him.
"Hey Trent, still have that communicator?" Tommy asked.
Trent handed the communicator to Tommy and Tommy punched in the coordinates that Hayley gave him. He teleported a few seconds later and arrived in the center of a cemetery.
"This can't be right," Tommy said as he looked around. He took out his cell phone and dialed Kat's number silently hoping that she would answer it.
"Hello," she said and Tommy could barely hear her voice.
"Kat, it's me," he said.
"Tommy, I'm so sorry," she said as her voice began to break down.
"You have nothing to be sorry for," he replied.
"If I had known that our time together was going to be so short I wouldn't have tried so hard to push you away, I would have told you I love you that first day I arrived in Reefside," she told him.
"You make it sound like we're never going to see each other again," Tommy replied.
"Tommy, there's so much you don't know, so much I want to explain to you but I might not ever see you again," Kat said as her voice began to get weaker.
"Listen Kat, Trent told me everything and I'm going to find you, just tell me where you are," Tommy replied.
"Buried alive," she responded.
"Oh my god, Kat hold on, I'm going to get you out, I promise," he told her.
"It's too late, I'm so tired," she said.
"No Kat, don't give up, just hold on a little while longer, I'll get you out," Tommy promised.
"I love you," she said as her voice faded away.
"Kat, Kat talk to me!" he screamed but there was no reply.
He looked down and realized that from the coordinates that Hayley had found, he was standing on top of a grave that looked as though it had been freshly dug. He quickly knelt on the ground and began digging furiously with his hands. Tears were streaming down his face as he continued to dig and didn't stop even when his hands were so caked with dirt that he wasn't making much progress.
"Trent told you didn't he," Will said as he spotted Tommy.
"We have to get her out," Tommy said as he continued to dig.
"You might have better luck with this," Will said as he handed Tommy a shovel.
They both began digging with all their might and after what seemed like hours finally reached the bottom of the grave.
"Kat, can you hear me?" Will asked as he scraped the dirt from the lid of the coffin.
"Please be alive," Tommy said as both he and Will opened up the coffin and prepared for the worst.
They looked down to see Kat lying there next to a dead body. She was unconscious and held her cell phone tightly in her hand. Tommy reached down and lifted her out of grave and then laid her on the ground.
"She still has a pulse," Tommy said gratefully.
"Yeah but a weak one, we need to get her to a hospital," Will said.
Hours later, Kat was still unconscious as she lay on a hospital bed with Tommy at her side. Tommy was holding her hand when he felt her body jerk as she sat up screamed.
"Kat, it's ok, you're safe now, you're safe," Tommy said as he pulled her into a hug.
"I couldn't breath and I thought I was just going to die in that coffin and that I would never see you again," she said as she began to sob.
"It's over, I promise, nothing like that is ever going to happen to you again," he said as he held on to her even tighter.
"You really gave us a scare," Will said as he entered the room.
"Will, we have to go after Chang, we can't allow that monster to do to anyone else what he did to me," Kat replied.
"That's actually the reason I'm here," Will said as he sat down in a chair.
"What's the mission, and don't tell me that I'm not going," Kat told him.
"There's no mission, we got him, we finally got him," Will informed her.
"What are you talking about?" Kat asked.
"We had some of our people following Chang's men and apparently one of those men slipped up and led us right to him, Chang's dead, he was killed during the shoot out when the agents were trying to apprehend him," Will explained.
"I can't believe that after all these months he's finally gone, it seems a little too good to be true," Kat remarked.
"I know but just be happy that monster is finally in hell where he belongs, I am so glad we found you before it was too late because I really didn't want to have to get another partner," Will said with a smile before giving Kat a kiss on the cheek and giving her and Tommy some time alone.
"I'm really sorry for lying to you, but I had no choice, I knew when I signed on for the job that I would have to lie to the people that I loved but I never thought it would feel so bad," Kat told him.
"It's ok, I understand and I'm not saying I'm not angry about your lying to me especially about the whole Anton situation, but right now, I'm just happy that you're alive," he said as he kissed her.
"I love you," Kat said once they broke apart.
"I love you too," Tommy said as he kissed her again.
A few days later, after Katherine's ordeal, she was back on the job as she and Will walked up to the door of the Mercer mansion.
"Isn't there anything I can say to make you change your mind?" Will asked.
"No, this is my last official duty as a CIA agent, I finally have a second chance with Tommy and I'm not letting anything stand in my way," she said as they rang the doorbell.
"So this is it huh," Trent said as he opened the door and saw them standing there.
"Hello Trent, we need to speak with your father," Will said.
"Do you really have to do this, my father's not the same man anymore," Trent pleaded.
"I'm sorry Trent, I really am but you knew this day was coming," Kat told him.
"Anton Mercer, you're under arrest for breach of contract with the United States government," Will said as he and Kat entered Anton's office followed closely by Trent.
"Dad, I'm so sorry, this is all my fault, I should have never agreed to help them," Trent said.
"No Trent, this has nothing to do with you, I'm responsible for my own actions and it's time I paid the price for what I've done," Anton told him.
After Anton's arrest, Kat walked into the cyberspace where she was meeting Tommy.
"So what's going to happen to Anton now?" Tommy asked.
"They made him a deal, Mercer Industries now belongs to the government and Anton works for them now, any discoveries he makes will be credited to the United States and he won't receive any recognition for them at all," Kat replied.
"He can't be too thrilled by that," Tommy replied.
"No but at least he's not going to prison," Kat said.
"So now that you're officially a free woman, what do you want to do?" Tommy asked.
"Oh I don't know, I was kinda hoping to settle down to a nice quiet life with a certain handsome paleontologist," she said with a smile.
"You know something, settling down sounds like a pretty good idea to me," Tommy replied as he leaned in to kiss her.
So what's the verdict, did this ending totally suck. It was so hard to think of a great ending for this story because so many great things have already happened. Hey, at least Tommy and Kat got their happy ending. Please hit the button and review this story one last time. It really has been my favorite fic to write and I'm really grateful for all of the support.