Rocky and Adam broke into a run when the small ship that had brought them into this nightmare came into sight. Wes tried to keep up with the others, but was weighted down by his charge, and soon fell behind.

"Wes, run!"

He heard Rocky screaming at him at nearly the same time he heard the howl of rage behind him. He stopped, despite the others screaming at him, and turned around. There stood the towering black monster, its red stained claws outstretched, and its mouth curling up into a sneer. Without thinking, he turned and ran, clutching the girl as tightly to his chest as he could. He heard heavy footsteps as the monster chased after him and his blood ran cold. There was no way he could make it to the others before that thing caught him. Breathing hard and pushing himself to the limit he threw himself towards his friends, he hit the hard metal ramp and felt pain flash through his ankle as the monsters claws rip through the tender flesh. He began to crawl up the ramp, dragging the unconscious girl, and firing wildly back at the monster as he went.

"Help him," yelled Andros, as he too fired at the advancing creature.

Adam, Rocky, and Jason moved forward to drag Wes on board and shut the door. Wes moaned in pain and clutched at his leg as the small vessel shot out of the hanger bay to safety. Blinded by pain he reached out and grabbed the girl's arm, just to reassure himself that she was safely on board.

"Wes, lay still. It's gonna be ok," said Adam from a great distance away. His words were slow and drawn out and Wes wasn't sure if he was real as images and faces began to blur around him.

"Don't worry man, we'll be back soon."

Wes shook his head trying to clear the pain. As the voices faded away he heard a loud thump on the outside of the small ship.

"Whawastha?"

Looking confused Adam turned to Jason, "what did he say?"

Jason shrugged, "he's probably just hallucinating."

--- --- ---

Tommy lay still on the cold table, not daring to move for fear that the pain would return. The lights above him made his eyes water and incessant scratching sound made his head ache. He moved his right arm and placed it over his eyes in an attempt to block out as much light as possible. Man this is worse than that last hangover, he thought dryly as a familiar voice drifted across the room.

"He'll be ok," he heard Andros say to the crowd gathered around Wes' bed.

"What abut them?"

Tommy uncovered his eyes and slowly moved his head to look at the occupied beds beside him. He immediately recognized the uniforms of the Cremean rangers, bloodied and torn; they looked nothing like the people he remembered. He counted them and came up two short, frustrated he counted again, but again he only saw four rangers. Where are the other two! We are going to need ALL of them for this mission.

"Andros…"

"No, Tommy," said Andros stopping at his bed and pushing him back down. "Lay still, you're not well."

Tommy shook his head and immediately regretted it as a wave of nausea swept over him. "Andros where are the others and WHAT is that noise," he asked as the scratching sound continued overhead.

The space rangers' brow dipped in annoyance, "I don't know, probably just feedback or something, and don't worry about the others Tommy…"

"But we need ALL of them!"

Andros shook his head, "we couldn't find the green ranger and the black ranger….well, you found him under that pile of debris, and he…didn't make it."

Tommy closed his eyes; that was it then. They couldn't save Kimberly and the others without all of the rangers.

"Don't worry Tommy, we're still gonna find them," said Adam, misreading Tommy's reaction as fear instead of resignation.

"No," he said, "it's over. We need all of the Cremean rangers to save them."

"I never thought I'd see the day when Tommy Oliver would give up," said Rocky.

Tommy sighed, "I'm sorry guys, but it's impossible."

"Nothing's impossible Dr. O," said Conner appearing at the foot of the bed. "Besides, you've got all of us," he motioned around at the crowd of rangers. "We're here to help, and we're not leaving without our friends!"

A round of agreement swept through the room but Tommy didn't join in, he couldn't believe that they would succeed this time. The odds were stacked heavily against them.

--- --- ---

Jason watched the young woman in front of him cautiously sit up on the bed and look apprehensively around.

"How are you feeling," he asked.

She turned her yellow eyes on him and smiled weakly, "you're Jason right? Tommy told me all about you when we met before."

"That's right. I'm sorry to say that he's told me nothing about you."

"I'll live," she said in answer to his first question. "I'm called Jessa." She looked around and spotted two empty beds, but didn't say anything.

Jason ran a hand through his hair and eyed her, wondering if he should tell her that one of her teammates was dead, but she beat him to it.

"I guess you found Corin, the black ranger."

"Yeah, listen I'm real sorry but there was nothing we could do…"

"I know," she said softly. "I was there when it happened. He sacrificed himself to save us; otherwise we would all be dead right now.'

She looked away, unable to meet Jason's eyes, and continued. "They must have taken Emerson," she said noting that the green ranger was not among her wounded teammates.

Jason sighed, "Look I hate to be so cold, but we have a big problem right now, and we need you to tell us everything you know about this…what ever it is that's taking all of our friends. We're gonna stop it, but we need your help."

Jessa looked up, startled by the conviction in Jason's voice and distracted by the scratching sound above.

"They're called the Niar. Terrible creatures who never sleep, and feed off the fear of their pray. They revel in carnage, and only answer to one, Darkmoth the Destroyer. Darkmoth has no competition, and his only goal is to destroy the universe and everything in it, including himself."

"Wait, he doesn't want to rule it?"

Jessa shook her head, "no, he wants to completely obliterate it. See Darkmoth was once a human serving in the peace corps of the Cremean brigade, but he wasn't a very successful solider. He was teased mercilessly by his peers. One day he snuck into the DNA lab and stole a contaminated vile of strength potion. He thought that he was going to teach his tormentors a lesson, but his plan backfired. He turned into a hideous creature and went into hiding, vowing vengeance against the universe for allotting him such a wretched existence. He was consumed by hatred and eventually became one with the darkness. Now he's so close to achieving his goal, I don't think there is anyone strong enough to stop him."

"That's why were here," declared Jason, "We are going to stop him."

Jessa shook her head, "no, you don't understand, there's more to it than that. Now that he has your friends, it's only a matter of time before he destroys everything. They are the keys to ultimate destruction."

Jason's mouth fell open, "what? How do they play into all of this, exactly?"

"He needed four humans to complete the ritual. One had to be pure of heart and untainted by evil, which was Emerson. He needed one of them to be tainted by evil but redeemed, Kimberly. One who had once been under the spell of evil but never fully tainted, Ashley."

"Ok, what about Kira," he asked, horrified.

"Kira is just his blood sacrifice; she must have been a choice of convenience. Wrong place wrong time sort of thing."

Jason shook his head, "this is crazy."

"He's trying to open a portal between this world and its alternate realities. If he succeeds he'll have more than enough power to destroy the entire universe."

"How?"

"There is a weapon on an alternate Earth that can wipe out everything. It was developed in one of our labs, and he almost got his hands on it once before, but we stopped him and hid it. We never thought that he would find out where, there are thousands of realities out there…but we should have known. It was all in the scrolls."

Jason was tired off all the riddles and short answers, "what scrolls, what weapon?"

"The Cremean scrolls…look I could spend all day telling you all of this, but we don't have the time. Suffice it to say that if we don't find your friends soon and stop Darkmoth from opening that portal, we are all doomed. I'm not talking about some crackpot with cliché plans and a few half-baked bad guys at his disposal. I'm talking about the epitome of evil hell bent on destroying everything. If we are going to stop him we have to start right now."

Jason blinked at the girl's sudden change in attitude. "We are but we don't want to go into battle unprepared."

"Fine, but while were sitting here discussing the past, fate is rushing your friends toward their deaths, and the rest of the universe towards the apocalypse."

Tommy who had been listening to Jessa's tale finally spoke up.

"She's right Jase. We have to act now. "

"But Tommy, we don't have a clue…"

"I have a plan; go get the other rangers, quick. We're going to save Kimberly and the others, and we're going to start right now."

"No," Jessa shook her head, "it's already to late."

"What do you mean?"

Jessa looked up towards the ceiling. "Don't you hear it? They're already here."

"What…who?"

"The Niar and they'll destroy your ship like they destroyed ours."

"There's no way that they could have gotten on…" Jason broke off as the scratching stopped and ceiling collapsed under the weight of five Niar, who fell heavily to the floor, their crimson claws glaring oddly in the light, their teeth gnashing angrily.

Jessa covered her head with her hands as they advance on the small group, she glanced sideways at the brave red ranger as he strode forward to meet them, placing himself between his friends and the inevitable. Then she closed her eyes as the monstrously deformed creatures let out a bloodcurdling shriek and rushed towards the lone unarmed ranger.