The morning light shone through the windows of the SPD base. A loud cough echoed throughout the building and Jj's head bolted up from its resting spot. It took him a few moments to realise that the cough he heard was actually his own. The green ranger settled back into his chair once again and closed his eyes. He wasn't a religious person but the situation was desperate. He said a silent prayer that all four of his friends would sound of footsteps grabbed his attention and he was immediately on his feet. He touched his morpher. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw a familiar face of Commander Tate round the corner, "Ah", Sky began, "looks like you didn't get any sleep".
"What are you doing here?" Jj asked with a sigh.
"Now is that any way to talk to your commander", Sky smiled and tapped his hand on an orange suitcase in his hand, "Kat and her team have been working on this overnight".
Jj walked towards the SPD Commander, "A cure?" he asked in hope.
"Possibly", Sky began, he placed the case on the kitchen counter and clicked it open. Inside the case were four phials of a light blue liquid and a set of syringes, "If it works then it should take effect within a matter of minutes".
Jj took out one of the phials and placed it into a syringe, "Thanks Sir", he said and the SPD Commander gave a firm nod in response, "you're welcome, now I need to help distribute the Venomark antidote to the city", he turned on his heel.A few moments later he continued down the hall.
Quickly loading up the other syringes, JJ went around to each of his friends in turn and injected them with the serum. He came to Syd last and sat by her bedside waiting for it to take effect. The minutes began to tick by without any obvious change in their condition and Jj was getting more nervous. Syd slowly began to stir. Her eyelids blinked a few times and her eyes struggled to focus. This quickly passed and her gaze settled on the green ranger, "Jj?" she croaked out and slowly sat up, "why are you staring at me?"
He was about to speak when his morpher buzzed. He inwardly cursed at the poor timing and sighed audibly, "Jj here", he answered.
"Did it work?" Sky's gruff voice came out of his morpher.
"Yeah I think everything's going to be alright".
There was a brief pause before Tate answered, "Dr Manx would like to give them a check over once they're feeling well enough", there was no goodbye as the SPD Commander shut down communications.
"I see some things haven't changed", Syd grumbled.
The serum worked much quicker than anyone was expecting and in just a matter of hours, the rangers were almost back to normal. They still felt a little weak but they could be down to spending nearly 48 hours in bed. Deciding not to put off the visit to Dr Manx for any longer than necessary, Jj filled them in on the virus they contracted and that Kat had created a cure for them.
The rangers were lead to a small lab away from the main science block, Syd looked down at her arm as Dr Manx drew some blood and applied a plaster to the wound. She grabbed her uniform jacket from a nearby table and put it on, "So what's the verdict", she asked.
"I'll need to analyse the blood samples in detail but everything seems to be proceeding like it did in the simulations", she replied, "so I'm confident that you'll make a full recovery".
The rangers breathed a sigh of relief at the news, "Thank you Kat", Bridge began, "I don't know how we can thank you".
"Last night I had a visit from someone representing Hexagon".
"The ranger organisation?" Lina asked.
Dr Manx nodded, "They helped produce the antidote for the Venomark virus but it came at a cost".
"Kat what did you agree to?" Z groaned.
"Technically I didn't agree to anything", she replied, "the head of the Hexagon board, Anton Mercer, wants you to pledge your allegiance to their little project".
"So you signed us up?" Lina interrupted the SPD scientist.
"Please give me a little more credit than that Ms Song", Dr Manx snapped in response, "I haven't been SPD earth branches head scientist for the last 10 years by making rash decisions". Lina mumbled an apology before Dr Manx continued, "I agreed in principle to the project but I told him that I wasn't an official representative of the Rangers. If he wanted a full commitment then he would need to talk to Commander Tate".
The rangers looked amongst themselves for moment, "Off the record, what do you think about this?" Bridge asked.
"Honestly", Dr Manx sighed, "this Mercer character seemed like a good salesman but I was getting some bizarre vibes off him. If this was my deal then I would probably have walked away".
"And yet you still said yes?" Lina raised an eyebrow.
"The city needed that serum", she began, "and it allowed me to focus on your cure. I took a risk that Mercer and Hexagon would follow through on their promise".
" Alright thanks again Kat". Bridge looked at the rest of his team, "We'd better head back". The rangers followed their leader through the door and away from the lab. They wanted to spend the time recovering.
