Zoorangers

by Bionichute

When a group of mysterious creatures start wreaking havoc across Zootopia, Nick and Judy find themselves thrust into a legacy of heroes they never knew about, and must use new powers in order to save not only the city, but their whole universe. Features numbers of characters from across Super Sentai history. (Updates whenever I finish an episode)

38. Episode 37 - Toxic Thoughts

Episode 37 – Toxic Thoughts

The metallic monster stomped down the walkways of the sewers. Dark, dank, the pipes lining the walls reminded him of his home. Following behind him was the fox yokai, whose foot steps were much lighter.

"Why are we going down here?" Kyuemon asked. "I'm assuming you have a reason."

"Oh, I do." Yogostein said, stopping for a moment. He turned to one of the pipes on the walls, and started to examine it. "Hm, not good enough." He muttered, before beginning to walk again.

"That's the fifth time you've done that." Kyuemon said, starting to get a bit frustrated.

"I need to find the perfect pipe for my new monster." Yogostein explained. "Once I create him, I can give him my new invention to play with!"

"Your new invention, what exactly is it?"

The robot turned to the fox, giving him a confused glare. "You knew I had a new invention, but didn't know what it was?"

"I'm a magic kind of guy, your science is rather abstract to me." Kyuemon said.

Yogostein grunted, and pulled out a small test tube of purple liquid. "This is my Coma Liquid." He said. "If any living being touches it, they'll be put into an indefinite coma. I'm going to have my monster spread it around and contaminate the water supplies!"

"That's incredibly devious." Kyuemon said, slightly surprised. "I didn't know you had it in you."

"Hah, you don't know how evil I can really be!" Yogostein said, slapping his chest. He quickly turned to one of the pipes. It was rusted, leaking, utterly useless for its original purpose.

It was exactly what he needed.

He grabbed onto the pipe, and pulled it from the rest of the pipes, causing water to start pouring out of it. He pulled out a gear, and jabbed it into the pipe, which started to glow.

The robot tossed it forwards, the pipe bursting into a flash of light before it could hit the ground. It had formed into a new monster right in front of their eyes.

The Banki let out a roar, or perhaps a yawn, and stomped forwards. "Yo, boss, what's up?"

"I need you to take this." Yogostein said, pulling the tube of dangerous water out again. He pulled the cork from it, and held it forward. "Drink up, you'll need all of it!"

"Oooh, looks yummy!" The monster said. It lifted a metallic tentacle into the air, which creeped into the tube. It began to suck up the water, which was gone in only a few seconds flat. The monster started to glow purple in the darkness of the sewers, illuminating it slightly.

"Go to the water filtration plant." Yogostein ordered. "Then infect the water with my tonic! Just follow this sewer path, and you should be able to get there."

"Aye, sir!" The monster said, before running down the walkway.

"Do you think this will work?' Kyuemon asked.

"Well, the plan comes down to you, doesn't it?" Yogostein asked.

"I suppose you're right." The fox yokai said with a chuckle.

---

The door creaked open, and the wolf stepped back into the house. He rubbed his eyes, he had just woken up, after falling asleep in the car.

"Yo, wolfsbane." Nick said from the couch. "Have a good sleep?"

"Noooo." The wolf moaned as he walked into the house. How could he have had a good sleep when he was being insulted the entire time? He walked into the kitchen, preparing to get something to eat, but then he spotted something.

Standing in the corner of the kitchen, right behind the table, was ZooSilver. The figure was standing completely still, arms crossed, and staring directly at him.

Max hesitated for a moment, but quickly headed back to pouring a bowl of cereal.

Judy was sitting at the table, and was watching as Max unsteadily prepared the breakfast. He was jittery, shaking as he poured the cereal from the box, and breathing very heavily.

"You feeling alright?" Judy said, a bit concerned.

"I'm fine." He said, flatly, as he placed the box on the counter. A deep, electronic voice spoke up, saying a single word.

"Liar."

The wolf's eye twitched as he grabbed the cereal, and brought it over to the table. ZooSilver was still standing there, looking at him, not doing anything else.

"Seriously, are you feeling alright?" Judy said, taking a sip of her coffee. "You really don't look alright."

"No, really, I'm fine." He said, letting out a weak laugh. "You don't need to worry."

"You really think they'll fall for that?" ZooSilver said. "Nobody ever does. Just admit it to them."

Max opened his mouth, preparing to say something.

"Wait, if you say what's wrong, they'll think you're even more pathetic than you are now." ZooSilver mocked. "Don't want them to think that, do you?"

Instead of saying anything, Max's jaw quivered, before he brought a spoonful of cereal up to his mouth.

"Well, if you're feeling fine," Nick started, walking to the table. "That means you're up to talking about some important business, right?" He finished, hopping up onto one of the highchairs.

"Uh," He muttered, before clearing his throat. "Sure."

"You know where this is going, don't you?" ZooSilver said, his voice scratchy.

"Is this about ZooYellow?" The wolf asked.

"Yeah, it is." Judy said. "After what happened yesterday, we were kind of thinking we should make him a member."

"Why?" Max asked. "You don't know him that well, and what makes him so capable?"

"He managed to fight off a general on his own, I'd say that's something." Nick said.

"And we barely knew you when you joined." Judy said. "I don't see a problem with letting him join."

The wolf paused for a moment, and let out a sigh. "Alright, you guys have points." He admitted. "I just…"

He let out another big sigh, and went quiet.

Judy glanced over at Nick, who glanced back at him. This entire thing was getting a bit awkward. The fox hopped down from the chair. "We're probably going to go get him today." He said. "Good thing we decided it after a monster attack, right?"

"Yeah, that means he'll be able to train without worrying about any weird nonsense going on." Judy said.

"Yeah, we'll all be able to get buddy-buddy with each other for the next week." Nick said. "With absolutely nothing to worry about-"

There was a sudden loud beeping noise from their Zoolizers. A monster was attacking? Today?

"Haven't heard that one in a long time." Nick said, shaking his wrist. "Guess that kind of ruins our plans for today, huh?"

"If a monster is attacking today, that must mean something's going on." The rabbit guessed. "We should probably head out before anything terrible happens."

"Oh, I'll follow you guys in a sec." Max said. "Just go on without me for now."

"Uh, okay." Judy said, hopping down from her seat. "Seriously, is there something wrong, Max?"

"Nope, perfectly fine." He said, leaning back in his chair.

The rabbit looked at him for a moment, before rushing off alongside Nick, both out the front door. Max slumped down in his chair a bit, and glared at ZooSilver, who was still standing in the corner.

"You knew this day was going to come." It said. "You've known it for a month."

"Yeah, I know." Max said. "I just…"

"I didn't realize it would be this soon."

---

Blue and Red pulled their bikes up to the water filtration facility. It was a massive, grey building, very obviously designed purely for function rather than looking decent. Thankfully, this eyesore was located in a fielded area where not a lot of mammals lived.

"Gotta love industrialization." Red said as the two hopped off their bikes.

There was a sudden crash behind them, shocking them both. They turned to see Silver, who seemed slightly unsteady as he walked towards them.

"Ugh, could've stuck that landing better." He muttered, shaking his head. He steadied himself and placed his paws on his hips. "Alright, lets go fight that monster!"

"Right." Blue said. "But we need to be careful, there could be workers inside."

"Whatever's in there could be playing hostages with us." Red continued for her. "We gotta play it safe."

Silver nodded, before the three ran into the building.

They emerged on a series of catwalks, overlooking three massive tanks full of water. Besides them, there were a bunch of Ugutz wandering the catwalks, none of them seeming to have noticed the Rangers yet. Max gripped onto the railing, and looked down. He quickly spotted a group of mammals, knocked unconscious, located in a corner.

"Yep, definitely hostages." He whispered.

"What's wrong with the water?" Blue asked.

The wolf looked over at one of the tanks. The water had turned a deep purple, and was now almost completely solid in color.

"Maybe they put food coloring in it." Red joked.

"We should get those mammals out of here." Blue said. "Hopefully before-"

An Ugutz lifted its head up and pointed towards the Zoorangers, letting out a series of angry beeps.

"-We get spotted."

The robots started beeping loudly, and rushed down the catwalks towards them. Without hesitation, Blue and Silver leaped down. Red did hesitate a bit, but quickly made the leap down before any of the monsters could reach him

The three ran towards the group of mixed mammals, Silver getting on his knees to shake a pig. "Hey, wake up!" He said, before slapping the pig on the cheek. "He's not waking up."

"That's not good." Blue said.

"I'll tell you what's not good!" A screechy voice yelled from behind them. They turned to where it was coming from, directly between two of the tanks.

It was a monster, as they were expecting. It was mostly bronze, mostly due to the fact that almost its entire body was covered in brown tubes, most likely pipes of some kind. Most of the pipes were coming directly out of the torso, and leading upwards, curving like a neck. The pipes seemed to meet at one place, behind the beast's face. Its face was more like a hockey mask, several holes poking out of it, but several chunks seemed to be missing. It had slanted yellow eyes with beady pupils, and a mouth full of sharp fangs behind two strands of the metallic mask.

The beast's body, in turn, was a greyish-blue color, marked with several brown pieces and more tubes. Larger pipes were sprouting out of the monster's shoulders, both of which opened at the end. The monster's upper body also had the end of two more pipes poking out of it. Its shoulders also had three other pipes poking out of them, a large one forming the arm, and two smaller ones connecting to the forearms. The forearms themselves were rather bulky, and had several bolts and ridges on them. Both ended in a different appendage, the left arm ending in a serrated blade, and the right ending in a whip made of pipes.

More pipes extended down from the monster's torso, forming the legs, which both ended in pointed, metal feet. The monster let out another groan as it stomped forwards.

"What isn't good is you guys showing up so soon!" It growled. "How's the mighty Pipe Banki supposed to work like this?"

"Well, guess we shouldn't have been something threatening." Red mocked.

"Are you saying I'm not a threat!?" Pipe Banki yelled.

"You don't really look that threatening, no." Blue followed. She quickly shook her head, and stomped forward. "What are you planning? What have you done to this mammals?"

"I gave them some of THIS!"

The monster whipped its pipe whip forwards, shooting out a burst of purple water. It sprayed all over the three, causing sparks to burst from their suits.

"Ugh, wet!" Red shouted, before shaking his body off. Silver quickly shook the water off, and Blue shook the liquid off her foot.

"Hmm, guess it doesn't work on you when you're in your suits." The monster said, a bit disappointed. He quickly raised his blade up. "Guess I have to do this the violent way!"

The pipe monster dashed forwards, and slashed at the Zoorangers. Red and Blue leaped out of the way, as Silver pulled out his blade and locked it with the monster's. He pushed back, and then quickly delivered a punch to the monster's chest, knocking it back.

Red and Blue leaped back in with their bladed weapons, slashing at the monster again and pushing it back. The Banki Beast quickly started to spin around, shooting the purple liquid out of the pipes on his chest. The impact of the water pushed all three of the rangers back, Red taking an unlucky hit and being sent flying into one of the tanks.

The fox slid to the ground after taking the hard blow, which Pipe Banki decided to take advantage of. It brandished its blade, and stomped forward, preparing to strike down the vulnerable ZooRed.

Silver watched on as he regained his bearings. He watched as the monster prepared to slice its blade through the fox. With a growl, he rushed forwards, slashing at the monster with his own blade. This gave Red enough time to run over to Blue, and the two watched as Silver slammed his blade into the monster's repeatedly.

"What's with him?" Red asked.

"Uh, not sure." Blue replied. She quickly pulled out her blasters. "But I'm gonna go help him."

"Cool does that mean I can use my cannon?"

"What? No!"

"How come you get to use guns inside!?" Red shouted as the bunny dashed into the fight. He pulled out his blade, and dashed in as well.

The rabbit leaped up, landing on Silver's head and stunning the two. She bounced off the wolf and kicked the pipe monster in the face, kicking off of it again and flipping through the air. She rapidly fired her blasters at the monster's feet, causing it to stumble back.

Red quickly followed up by leaping up and slashing at the monster with his sword, before hitting the ground and whipping it at him. The cord extended as Red lashed the handle back and forth, slicing through the monster.

"Alright, Silver!" Blue said. "Finish him off!"

Silver paused for a moment as Red leaped away. He gave a quick nod, and spun the guard of his blade around, switching it to Sun Mode.

"HOT HOT SUN"

He thrust the blade forwards, firing off a flurry of fireballs at the monster. They crashed into its body rapidly, causing it to be pushed back. However, instead of the Banki Beast flying off, it did something else.

It laughed.

"Seriously?" It shouted, the fireballs continuing to hit its body, with seemingly no effect. "What are you, an idiot?"

Before Silver could realize what had happened, the monster whacked one of the fireballs out of the way with its whip, causing it to fly into the tank beside it. Water flowed out onto the floor, as Silver realized what had happened.

"Oh, god damn it-"

Pipe Banki shot a stream of the purple water out of its chest, extinguishing the fire almost instantly. It quickly pushed to Silver, and sent him flying across the room.

"Hah, lame!" The monster shouted. He glanced at the tank, and then at the other two tanks. "Two is good enough!" it laughed. "Not like the water there's going where it needs to anymore!"

The monster leaped through the air, crashing through a window. It had managed to escape.

"Max, you okay?" Judy asked as he and Nick ran up to help him out. He quickly untransformed, and slammed his fist on the concrete ground.

"Water beats fire." He muttered, standing up.

"Why did you use the fire attack, then?" Nick asked, confused. "You have like, two other things on there."

"I…" He paused for a moment. "I got nervous."

As he finished speaking, he glanced up, spotting ZooSilver once again. The suit shook its head. "No, you just weren't thinking." It said.

Judy quickly checked up on the unconscious mammals. None of them were awake, even after all that racket. She hopped up onto a bear, and felt at his chest. He was breathing slowly, slower than bears normally breathed.

She turned back to the two, and hopped over to the spilled water. It covered most of the ground, but thankfully there was enough room to get close without stepping in it. If she was correct, stepping in it would only mean bad things.

She quickly pulled out some rubber gloves from her pocket, and a small cup. She scooped it through the water, collecting a tiny amount of it.

"What are you doing?" Nick asked, confused. "And why do you have those?"

"I'm taking a sample." She said, walking over to him. She quickly put a lid on the glass container. "I think this water has something to do with those mammals. And I have this test tube and rubber gloves because I carry extra equipment with me just in case."

"You know that's weird, right?" Nick said.

"Yeah, but its helpful sometimes."

They both turned to Max, who was staring into the distance, distracted by something. "Max, we're going to make a detour over to the station." Judy said.

He didn't respond.

"Max?"

"Hey, you awake?" Nick shouted, snapping the wolf out of his daze.

"Oh, sorry, I was just… thinking." He said. "What did you guys say?"

"We're dropping this sample at the station." The rabbit repeated. "Come on."

Judy and Nick quickly ran off, Max trailing behind them. As they exited the building, he found that someone else was walking next to him.

"Now you're just becoming a nuisance." ZooSilver said, marching in lockstep with the wolf, copying his motions exactly. "You let the monster get away. Who knows what kind of trouble will happen because of you?"

"Just… shut up."

"Did you say something?" Judy asked, turning around to face the wolf.

"No, just… talking to myself."

---

"He should be finishing right about now." Yogostein said as he stomped around the cavern. Kyuemon waited at the other end of the table, while Sambash sat between them.

"What exactly are you guys planning?" The biker asked, putting his feet up on the table.

"Something big." Kyuemon replied, with a slight chuckle.

"Big, huh?" Sambash said, dismissively. "How exactly is attacking a water plant that big?"

"This is just the first step of the plan!" Yogostein declared. "Once the plan gets going we'll have the Zoorangers, and the entire city, in the palm of our hands!"

"yeah, sure, whatever." The biker monster asked, getting up from his seat. "If you guys'll excuse me; I have my own 'big' plans to focus on…"

He walked off down one of the tunnels, leaving the two monsters alone. Almost as soon as he left, something stumbled through the main entrance. The two looked to see Pipe Banki, the purple water in him lighting the cave up slightly.

"Phase one of the plan complete!" He declared, though he seemed rather unsteady. "Though, I wasn't able to infect all the water, the Zoorangers showed up and wrecked one of the tanks."

"Hah, who cares?" Yogostein laughed. "By the time they got there, it was too late!"

"But won't the poison take a while to get to where it needs to?" Kyuemon asked. "It seems rather too soon to move on to the last phase."

"You're right." Yogostein said, slamming his spear against the ground. "It will take approximately thirty hours for the poison to meld with the water completely." He continued. "I was hoping to get it done by the morning, but luckily, I considered this possibility…"

He slammed his spear on the ground again, causing two Ugutz to run from one of the tunnels. They were carrying multiple… things. They were rounded on one end, but flat on the other. Purple liquid seemed to be sloshing about in them. Both Ugutz were carrying two each.

"What are those supposed to be?" Kyuemon asked.

Without a word, Yogostein pulled out a remote control, and pressed a button on it. Instantly, the objects exploded into bursts of liquid, instantly destroying the Ugutz and soaking a large part of the base in water.

"They're bombs!" Yogostein said, proudly. "Me and Pipe Banki are going to plant them around the city, and then threat to blow them up. That should buy us enough time."

"And meanwhile, I can start to mingle with the Zoorangers, correct?" Kyuemon asked, the robot nodding.

"This plan is completely, one-hundred percent perfect!" He declared. "I'll whip up a few more bombs, and the plan can really start!"

"I'll head out now." Kyuemon said. "Better to get this… connecting, done with quickly."

He quickly waved his arm, causing a burst of purple energy to swarm around him. It cleared in a flash, leaving nothing behind. Yogostein started to stomp off to his lab, but was distracted by a voice speaking up.

"Um, sir?" Pipe Banki said.

"What is it?" Yogostein growled. "We have important stuff to get started on!"

"Well, I was just wondering… how am I supposed to plant bombs without hands?"

---

The three walked up to the driveway of the house, making a quick shortcut through the lawn. "Hopefully the lab boys can work out what that stuff is soon." Nick said as they climbed up the stairs.

"Might take a few hours." Judy said. "But I wouldn't expect anything more than that."

"Think if we payed them, they'd speed it up a bit?"

Max unlocked the door, and the three walked in. "I just need to grab my phone." Judy said, hopping over to the table.

"Oh, you guys are gonna go pick up Kyle now?" Max said, sitting down.

She gave a quick nod. "We just need to figure out where he lives." She continued. "I'll give you a call if anything comes up, alright?"

"Yeah, good luck." The wolf said, a bit dour. He leaned back into the couch as the two headed back out, the door shutting behind them.

"Too scared to face him yourself, huh?"

Max looked across the couch. Sitting across from him was ZooSilver, one leg crossed over the other, and elbow resting on the arm rest.

"I'm not scared." Max said. "I just didn't want to go pick that kid up. This whole thing was their idea, not mine."

"Hm, and I wonder who caused them to make that decision?" The copy said. "Oh yeah, you."

"It wasn't because of me; it was because of…" Max paused for a moment. "It was because of the monsters. We need more help."

"Weren't you supposed to be the one helping them?" ZooSilver asked. "That was why you were given this job, wasn't it?"

"Well, yeah, but things were different back then." Max said. "They weren't as strong."

"You don't even need the extra help, do you?" ZooSilver continued. "Nick and Judy could just use their super forms, and take all of the monsters down."

"That's not true."

"How do you know it isn't?"

The doppelganger continued, as Max closed his eyes, party because he was tired, and partly because he wanted to ignore the words streaming through his head. In a few minutes, he had fallen asleep.

---

"Max, put that away and get to work."

The wolf pup looked up, way up, at his teacher, a giraffe. He glanced down at the paper. He was doodling something, a crude robot. "Sorry." He muttered, grabbing the paper and putting in the desk's storage.

The teacher walked away with a huff, as the pup looked at the other sheet of paper. It was a math sheet, basic multiplication. Multiplication had been gone over for the last month, and it made his head spin.

He understood how it worked, but writing down the equations seemed like nonsense to him. Still, he started to write it all down, as the teacher wanted.

He couldn't wait to go home.

A while later, the bell rang. Recess time.

The other kits ran out the door, excited for the quick bastion of freedom they were granted every day. Max walked out last, and sat right down next to the door as it closed.

This is what he did every day. He was too shy to try and make friends. For all he knew, they all hated him, and thought he was a loser. That's what he thought, at least.

"What're you doing, wolfy?" Said a brutish voice. The wolf glanced up to see a rhino, nearly twice his size, though still around his age. It was the schoolyard bully. He was bigger than nearly every other kit at the school, which he took advantage of.

"I'm just sitting." Max said, coming out as a slight mumble.

"Don't you have anything better to do?" The rhino asked

The wolf shook his head.

"Loser." The rhino snorted. "No wonder you have no friends, you just sit around and do nothing, like a weirdo."

"Can't you just leave me alone today?" Max asked.

Without a word, the rhino stepped forwards, and kicked the wolf in the side, knocking him to the ground. "Freak." The rhino said, stomping off.

There was no one around, everyone was off playing. Max rubbed his arm as tears started to stream down his face. By the time recess was done, he had recovered, but his arm still hurt.

He didn't tell anyone.

---

Max opened his eyes, them almost seeming to open automatically. All he could see was white.

He rubbed his eyes with his paws, and blinked a few times. Nope, he wasn't blind, wherever he was, it was just… pure white. He glanced around, getting a slightly better look at his surroundings. It seemed to stretch on forever, but he could see glimpses of broken pillars and columns.

He started to walk forwards, though, he couldn't really tell if he was actually walking. The entire thing felt like a dream. A lucid dream.

He walked for what felt like a few minutes, not getting anywhere. He paused, but a voice from behind him said something.

"Hello there, Wolford."

He spun around, and saw…

"Mikoto?"

It was the white figure that had helped him train before. Abarekiller. He was sitting on a broken pillar that Max swore hadn't been there a moment ago.

The Legendary Ranger got up from the pillar, and started to walk over to the wolf. "I hear you're having a bit of trouble right now." He said. "Maybe you could use a bit of a hand."

"I don't need any help, sorry." Max said, almost reflexively. "I can work out things for myself, and-"

"Don't be an idiot, we both know how you feel." Mikoto said. The wolf's ears drooped in response. "I've been working on something for you for the last while."

His ears popped right back up. "Really?" The wolf said, excited. "What… what is it?"

"You'll find out when you get it." AbareKiller responded. "I can't just give you something like this. You'll have to work for it."

The Ranger raised his arm, and pointed off into the distance. Max looked over to where he was pointing. It was a pedestal of some kind, only a few feet away, and it was marked with an odd claw symbol.

Before Max's eyes, distance seemed to grow between both him and the pedestal. In a matter of seconds, it had gone from being a few feet away, to easily one-hundred feet away.

"You must reach that pedestal without being injured." AbareKiller said, lowering his arm. "That is your test."

"Wait, really?" Max said, surprised. There wasn't anything between him and the pedestal besides the… loose concept of the ground he couldn't really see. He glanced back at Mikoto, and then started to walk.

He walked for a few seconds, expecting something to pop up and try to hurt him, but nothing happened. He continued to walk, confidence starting to grow in his body. But he froze as a familiar, mechanical voice spoke to him.

"It can't be anything that special."

Max turned his head, coming face to face with the masked ZooSilver. He nearly jumped in shock at it.

"Especially not when its this easy." The doppelganger said. "If it is something worthwhile, then you definitely don't deserve it." It finished with a chuckle.

"How do you know I don't deserve it!?" Max shouted at the copy. "I deserve this as much as I deserve anything."

"And what do you think you deserve?" ZooSilver laughed.

Max opened his mouth to speak again, but there was a sudden jolt of pain through his arm. He lifted it up, staring at it as his digits started to move on their own.

They were moving backwards, away from his face. He felt a sharp crack and a burst of pain as they bent fully back, something that shouldn't have been physically possible for him to do. He tried to brace himself for the pain, grapping onto his wrist with his other paw.

There was another crack as his digits started to bend backwards even more, the middle joints bending in the complete reverse direction. Max let out a yell of pain as he fell to his knees. He glanced up, ZooSilver was still watching him, looking down on him.

There was a final crack, the tips of his digits bending backwards. He let out a full scream, as AbareKiller walked up to him.

He shook his head.

"You failed."

---

The wolf woke up with a yell, shocking the rabbit and foxes in the living room. He gripped onto his paw as he continued to yell.

"Oh god, what happened?!" Judy shouted, jumping up onto the couch. She grabbed onto him, trying to calm him down.

Max fell silent for a moment. He gazed at his paw, and moved it around. It was back to normal. He couldn't even feel any pain in it.

But it felt so real, he…

"I, uh, just had a bad dream." He said, clenching his paw. He looked around the room, realizing that Kyle was here.

"Must've been really bad for you to wake up like… that." Nick said, a bit concerned.

"Yeah, maybe this was a bad time for me to come…" Kyle said, tapping his claws together.

"No, it was nothing." Max said, getting up. He looked outside, the sky was still blue. "What time is it?"

"Its been like, twenty minutes since we left." Nick said. "We ran into Kyle… really quickly."

"Yeah, weird, huh?" The younger fox said, a bit nervously. "I was just walking to the store, and I happened to run into you guys when you wanted to talk to me! Coincidences, am I right?"

"Yeah, really… coincidental." Max said, giving the fox a side glance. He could swear that something weird was going on but…

He gazed over, ZooSilver suddenly appeared by the TV.

"So, now you're trying to make up conspiracy theories to discredit someone you don't like." It said. "How petty."

Max walked up to the window, and sat on the sill, silent.

"So, why did you guys want me over anyway?" Kyle asked. "By the way, this house is very nice. I only live in an apartment with my parents, its not that great."

"Kyle, this is something incredibly important." Judy started. "We've considered it for a while-"

"A day." Nick corrected.

The rabbit shot the older fox a glare.

"…We've considered it for a while, and we think that you should be the last member of the Zoorangers." She finished, quickly.

"Wait, seriously?" Kyle said, surprised. "Is this because I helped you guys out yesterday?"

"Yes, actually." Nick said. "We saw how you handled that clown creep, and you did it better even we could, so, hey, why not."

"We need some extra mammal-power to deal with all of this." The rabbit continued. "So, do you want to join us, or…?"

"Um, sure?" Kyle said, not sure what to make of this. "I just wanted to help when I fought that monster yesterday, you know." He said. "I didn't even realize that guy was supposed to be more of a threat."

Max squinted a bit, glaring at the fox. Didn't he say he couldn't fight monsters yesterday? Wasn't that the entire reason he needed help being saved? The wolf placed a claw to his lip, and started tapping his leg against the wall.

"So, does that mean I get one of those cool wrist devices?" Kyle asked, holding his wrist up.

"Not yet, tiger." Nick said. "We're in the middle of something right now, and it might be too dangerous to put you into harm's way when you don't have any training."

Judy nodded. "Plus, we need to give you our rules, so you don't get hurt or cause any damage."

"Oh, alright." He said, a bit disappointed. "So, next week then?"

"Yeah, probably." The red fox replied.

Suddenly, there was a loud buzzing noise, shocking all four of them.

"What the!?" Judy said, looking at her wrist. "Another monster attack, already?"

"Obviously." Nick replied. "Hey, how bout we bring little boy yellow along with us?" He suggested. "He can see how we do things up close!"

"Ooh, yes please!" Kyle said.

"Mmm, I dunno." Judy said. "Might be too dangerous."

"I can just sit on the sidelines and watch you guys!" Kyle suggested.

"bring him along." Max said, walking away from the window. "It might be good experience for him."

"Fine." Judy said. She looked the fox in the eye. "But if you get hurt, just know that we're not responsible."

"Oh, I won't!" Kyle said.

"Alright, good." Judy replied. "Oh, one more thing before we head out."

"What is it?" Kyle asked.

"Do you have a bike helmet?"

---

The four arrived to a nearby sewage plant at the outskirts of Savannah Central. It was much larger than the water filtration plant, and was almost entirely outdoors. They drove in on their motorbikes, Kyle riding on Blue's, and Silver riding on the back of Red's.

They parked in the middle of an open lot, a field of pools sitting in front of them. They quickly got off the bikes, and started to look around.

"Alright, Kyle," Blue started, turning to the young fox and pointing towards a small building. "Go wait over there. It should be safer." She continued. The fox nodded, and ran off, hiding behind the building.

Red, Blue, and Silver headed down the lot, preparing to head into the main pool areas in order to look for the monster. However, they didn't have to look very far, as the monster quickly leaped from behind one of the pools landing right in front of them.

"Alright, that's one down, time to move on to the next." It muttered to itself as it started to walk away.

Though, it didn't seem to notice them.

"Hey, drain brain!" Red shouted, catching the monster's attention.

"Gah!" It yelped, stumbling back a bit. It quickly pointed its blade forwards. "I don't have time to deal with you freaks, I have places to be!"

"Yeah, like we'll actually let you go." Silver joked.

The three pulled out their melee weapons, and rushed at the monster. Red and Blue leaped up to strike at the monster, while Silver rushed in from the ground. All three of them struck the monster at the same time with their weapons, causing sparks to burst from its body and sending it flying.

The monster crashed into the ground, but quickly got up. It brought its whip arm to its chest, and then thrust it forwards, causing water to fire out of the pipes on its chest. This time, the water was normal colored, but still managed to push Red and Blue back a bit, but Silver was knocked to the ground.

"I seriously don't have time to deal with this." The monster said, surprisingly candidly. "Now if you excuse me…"

Suddenly, something caught the monster's eye. It glanced over at a small building. Standing by the corner of it was a fox, eyes glowing purple.

"Oh, now he knew what to do.

"Actually, I think I'll leave you with some friends of mine!" The monster said, before whipping its pipe whip forwards.

A stream of nuts and bolts flew from it, and landed on the ground. They started to glow, and in a few seconds, a small group of Ugutz had been formed.

They cilicked and buzzed for a moment, before rushing at the Zoorangers. "Now, I'm outta here!" The monster said, before leaping off.

"Oh, come on!" Red yelled. "He can't just do that, can he?"

"I'm pretty sure he can." Silver said as he got back up. "Didn't that seem weird to you guys, though?" He continued, quickly slashing at one of the Ugutz, sending it stumbling back. "He seemed to change his mind about something…"

"Yeah, that was pretty weird." Blue said, leaping up and kicking an Ugutz away. "Maybe he just didn't want to deal with us himself?" She guessed, slashing at the legs of another Ugutz.

"I think you're just, you know," Red started, leaping up and slashing through the middle of a Ugutz, before landing back on the ground. "Overthinking it a little? The guy doesn't seem that smart."

"I've just had this weird feeling all day." Silver admitted, slicing through another of the robot minions. He glanced around for a moment. "Hey, weren't there a few more of those guys…?"

"Oh no!" Blue shouted, pointing one of her daggers at the building where Kyle was. Five of the robots had swarmed in on it, and were preparing to strike, presumably at Kyle.

"Oh god, we need to go help him!" Red said, the three quickly starting to run towards him.

Before they could even reach there, the yellow fox leaped out from behind the building, delivering a diving kick to one of the Ugutz, knocking it out. He landed back on the ground, but then leaped back up, punching another of the robots in the head, strong enough to knock it completely off. He continued by tripping two more of them as they approached, and then finishing by grabbing one of their weapons and throwing it at the last one.

"Uh, wow." Blue said. "That was something."

"Oh, did you guys see me?" Kyle said, scampering up to them, excited. "Bet you guys didn't know I was that good at fighting, huh?"

"Well, we had an idea." Nick said, the three untransforming. "Just… not a very clear one."

"I didn't realize you were that good." Judy said. "How'd you get those… skills?"

"Oh, my dad made me take them as 'extracurricular'." He explained. "He's a bit… stern, about me going out and doing things."

"Sounds like he's a tightwad." Nick replied.

"He kind of is, but he's my dad, you know?" Kyle finished, giving a quick nervous chuckle. "He's a CEO at a car manufacturer, you know."

"Interesting." Max said, dryly. "What do you guys think the monster was even here for?" He continued, quickly changing subjects to something more… important.

"Good question." Judy responded. "It doesn't look like anyone's here to attack, even."

"Water didn't change color, either." Nick added. "But he had to have been here for a reason, right?"

"M-maybe he was just on his way back to… wherever he lives?" Kyle quickly suggested. "He seemed to be off in a hurry, so, maybe he just wanted to get home?"

Max rolled his eyes at the young fox's guess.

"Might be possible." Judy said. "I say we still look around."

"Actually, I think I'm going to head home." Max quickly interjected. "I have some things I need to think about."

"That's alright." Kyle said. "I can help instead, right?"

Max gave the fox a quick look, and started to walk off.

"Yeesh, he's in a mood, isn't he?" Nick said, shocked at how the wolf was acting. "Wonder what's got his tail in a twist?"

Judy shrugged. "Let's just let him be for a bit." She said. "We have a… something, to find, after all."

Nick nodded, and the two headed into the field of pools. Kyle slowly followed behind, silently performing a series of gestures with his paws.

"Concealment jutsu." He whispered to himself.

Only a few yards away, behind one of the large pools, was a bomb full of toxic water. In a burst of purple energy, it completely vanished.

The fox gave a quick smirk.

---

"if you think there's something up with him, you should just say it to them." ZooSilver said. The double relaxed on the couch as the real Max paced back and forth in front of the TV.

"I know I should." He said to the copy. "But I just… I don't want to…"

"You don't want to tell them because they'll think you're crazy, right?" The copy guessed. It gave a quick laugh. "If you keep that up, you'll all be dead in no time."

"I know it'll make me sound crazy, but I just don't want to hurt anyone." Max continued. "Like, I could be wrong, and there could be nothing up with Kyle, I could just be some kind of weird asshole."

"You probably are." The double said. "You knew something like this was going to happen sooner or later. It always does, and it always will."

Max opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out.

There was a sudden knock at the door, knocking the wolf out of his thoughts. He opened it up, letting Nick, Judy, and Kyle into the house. They had been gone for a few hours, and the sun was starting to go down.

"Find anything?" He asked the rabbit as she walked by.

Judy gave an exasperated shrug. "There was nothing." She said, matter-of-factly. "We looked over that entire place, we couldn't even find any workers."

"Kyle was right; it was probably just some kind of fluke." Nick followed. "We did get to have some nice talks during all of it though."

"Yeah!" Judy said, quickly hopping up and elbowing Max in his arm. "We came up with some team bonding exercises!"

"Excuse me?" Max said, sounding a bit worried. The last "team building exercises" that Judy had come up with was locking him and Nick in a house together. It worked, but the thought of something like that left him nervous.

"So," Kyle started, nervously as he walked up to the couch. "I saw that you were kind of reacting… badly to me." He continued, addressing Max. "So, we came up with the idea that I'd stay here for the night so we can get to know each other."

Max glared at him for a moment, before letting out a sigh.

"Won't your parents be worried?" Max asked. "You said your dad was a tightwad."

"Oh, I called them already to let them know I was 'hanging out with friends'." He explained. "I'll be perfectly fine."

There went that excuse.

"Fine, whatever." The wolf said. "But you have to sleep on the couch. Mostly because I don't have any more beds."

"It's a pretty good couch." Nick said. "Very comfy."

Kyle took a glance at the couch, and hopped up, planting his butt right onto it. "Oh, yeah, this is pretty good."

"So, me and Nick have to do… things." Judy said. "Things that involve leaving you two alone."

"What?" Nick said, before realizing what she was getting at. "Oh, right, those things." They quickly went down into the basement.

The wolf leaned his head down. "Make sure you clean the sheets once you're done!" Max quickly said.

"SHUT IT!" They both yelled up.

He quickly shut the door, and turned to look at Kyle.

"So, what kind of things are you into?" Kyle asked. "You have a video game console there, do you like video games?"

"I do like video games." He said.

"Oh, what else do you like?"

Max paused for a moment.

"I like sleeping." He said, with an exasperated sigh. "I'm going to bed."

The wolf gave a quick wave, and headed upstairs, leaving the young fox alone.

"Hm." The fox said, his voice getting slightly deeper. "This might be easier than I thought."

---

It was a new school year. Normally, this would be a terrible thing, but things had seemed to be getting better. The wolf's previous year had been fantastic, and he even managed to make a few friends, with similar interests.

High-school was still a nightmare for him. Walking down the halls, with hundreds of other mammals surrounding him, occasionally looking at him even… it made him anxious. He really just wanted to sit in a room for the whole day and do his work.

He had to dress in an uncomfortable grey uniform too. It made him feel constrained.

But, it would be fine. He could hang out with his friends now. He hadn't seen them since the previous schoolyear, he couldn't wait to talk to them, see what they were up to.

The wolf shut his locker, and took a deep breath, before heading down the hall as fast as he could, ignoring any stares.

He arrived outside his first class, which was, fortunately enough, right next to the class one of his friends was in. He spotted him, an antelope, dressed in the school's grey uniform.

"Hey, Greg!" Max said, walking up to him. "H-how's everything?"

"Uh, hi, Max." He replied, not turning to look at him directly. He sounded a lot… stonier than usual. "What do you want?"

"I-I just wanted to say hi." Max replied. "Did you catch the Zoo Rangers finale?"

"Uh, no, I didn't." The antelope said. "I stopped watching it a while ago."

"Oh."

Max felt his heart drop a bit. It was something the two had bonded over across the last year.

"Max, I kind of… don't want to be seen with you anymore." He continued. The wolf's ears drooped. "You're just kind of… embarrassing."

Max just… listened. He had nothing else to say.

"Like the time you brought that toy that made noise into class." The antelope continued, talking like he didn't even know what Morphers were called. "It was just… super uncomfortable. I'll… see you later, maybe."

"Oh. Alright." Max said, quietly.

The wolf would proceed to sit through the class, before it finally hit him. He was distracted for the rest of the day. He had just lost a friend.

It hurt.

The same would repeat with his other friend. And it would repeat for the next few years. No matter what he did, everyone seemed to forget about him, leave him behind, no matter how close their bond had been.

He blamed himself, every time.

---

Max opened his eyes, blearily sitting up in his bed. It was the dead of night, the moon shining through his window.

Something had just woken him up. It sounded like... rummaging? Someone was downstairs, he could tell that. Was it a burglar? Why would a burglar come and rob him when he's publically known as a super-hero?

Kind of seemed stupid to head directly into enemy territory.

He quietly stepped down the stairs, making sure he was absolutely silent. The rummaging got louder as he got closer. He huddled next to the basement door, and heard someone talking.

"It's not here. Maybe I should try the basement."

He waited there for a moment, paw primed to activate the Zoolizer.

Whoever it was walked around the corner.

It was Kyle.

The fox leaped into the air, flailing about. Oddly enough, Kyle seemed far more surprised than Max himself was.

"Kyle, what are you doing?" Max said, walking into the living room. His eyes widened as he looked around.

The place was… well, not trashed, but definitely messed up. Objects from the TV stand had been taken down or removed from shelves. The furniture itself had been moved around, so that someone could reach underneath them. It was definitely a strange sight. There was also an odd, familiar smell that made his nose itch a bit.

"Did you do this?" Max asked, confused. He quickly scratched at his nose

"Uhhh, yes." Kyle admitted. "I was going to put it all back, I swear-"

"What were you looking for?" Max asked quickly.

"A-a charger." The fox sputtered. "A charger for my phone."

"We…" max shook his head, and went over to a pile of wires on the ground. He grabbed them and held them up, showing them to Kyle. "We have chargers right here."

"Oh, those are chargers?" Kyle responded with a laugh. "I… couldn't tell… in the dark."

"You're nocturnal." Max quickly said.

"Just because I'm nocturnal doesn't mean I have good night vision."

Max continued to stare at the fox for a moment, placing the cables back on the ground. He was fairly certain he was lying, but he couldn't be entirely sure just yet.

"Put all this stuff back, and then go back to sleep." Max said, sternly. "If you want to find something, just come and wake me up, alright?"

"Uh, yes, Max." The fox said as he quickly started to put the chargers back in the drawer.

Max quickly headed down the hall, and back up the stairs, quickly pausing the scratch his nose. That was certainly, absolutely suspicious. That smell was definitely the strangest part. He's smelled it before, and it wasn't a very pleasant stench.

Back in the living room, the fox's eyes narrowed as he heard the wolf's bedroom door shut. He quickly placed a video game controller back onto the TV stand, and performed a series of gestures.

A large sphere of energy appeared before him, showing a window into a dark cavern. With a yawn, Yogostein walked into view.

"Kyuemon, why are you calling me at two in the morning?" He asked. "I had a pretty long day planting bombs, you know!"

"The wolf showed up while I was looking for the Zoolizer." Kyuemon explained. "I think he knows what's going on… or at least, thinks I'm up to something."

"That's not good!" Yogostein said. "That could jeopardize the whole plan!"

"When you prepare the bombs tomorrow, make sure you send Pipe Banki to attack him." Kyuemon instructed. "We need him out of the way, at once."

"Normally I'd get angry at you trying to order me around, but I also agree with you." Yogostein said, surprisingly candidly. "I'll just steal credit for your idea later!"

"Fine, whatever." Kyuemon said.

"Also, I know you hate this entire thing, but stop trying to speed the plan along." Yogostein said. "You'll have the Zoolizer by the end of the plan, I can guarantee it."

"Fine." The fox said, snapping his claws and breaking the connection. He hopped back up onto the couch, and layed down.

It was actually a pretty nice couch.

---

Morning came sooner, and Max headed back downstairs. As was the norm, Judy was up before anyone else, though this time she was alongside Kyle and Nick. The duo was having their morning coffee, while Kyle was seated on the couch, eating a bowl of cereal.

"Good morning, grumpus." Nick chimed, without turning to look at the wolf. "Heard you didn't wanna play nice with the new kid."

"Don't treat him like a child, Nick." Judy said.

"Well, he's acting like one." Nick said. "Aren't you supposed to treat guests nicely?"

"You guys got it all wrong." Max said as he walked into the kitchen to pour himself a cup of coffee. "I just had a rough day, I needed some rest. Didn't really mean any offense."

"I didn't mean to make it sound like I was upset, either." Kyle chimed in. "I just wanted to tell you guys what happened."

Max sat down at the table, and leaned in. "Did he tell you about how I found him messing up the room, looking for something?" He whispered

"What?" Judy said surprised.

"What was he looking for?" Nick whispered back.

"He said he was looking for a charger, but he had already found the drawer they were in." Max continued. "Listen, I think we might need to talk about-"

There was a sudden buzzing noise. Judy's phone was ringing. She reached over and grabbed it, reading the ID. "Oh, it's Clawhauser!" She said. "He might be calling about the water we sent in!"

She quickly answered, Ben's chubby face appearing on the screen. "Hey guys!" he greeted. "Listen, this is super important, and we need you to come into work, like, right now."

"Water finished being analyzed?" Nick guessed.

"Well, actually I need you to sign Rhinowitz's birthday card, but the water got finished too!"

Judy gave a quick chuckle. "Alright, we'll be there in a few minutes." She said. She took a quick glance over at the couch. "Mind if we bring someone in?"

"Uh, sure, as long as its not a criminal like last time!"

"Alright, see ya!" She finished, hanging up.

"Are you seriously suggesting we take Kyle to the police station?" Max asked.

"Well, if he is up to something, its better to keep him around." She whispered back. "And if he isn't he gets some experience."

"Good point." He said.

Meanwhile, on the couch, the fox could hear everything they were talking about. He smirked a little bit. "Maybe its time to get everything started…"

---

The four made it to the police station, and after a quick card signing, were told to go to the lab. Kyle, due to not being an officer, was told to go wait in the break room.

The three made it into the lab, where Bogo, Emily, Henry, and a mole scientist were waiting for them. The mole was carrying a tube of the purple water, but had his claw stretched out so it wasn't close to his face.

"Yo." Emily quickly said, giving a quick wave to them. Max waved back at her.

"Took you three long enough." Bogo snorted.

"Hey, I had to figure out the best 'happy birthday' pun." Nick said. "That kind of effort takes a while."

Judy rolled her eyes. "So, what did you find out about the water?" She asked.

"Nothing good." The hyena quickly spit out, causing the rabbit to cringe a bit.

"This stuff is… inexplicable." The mole said, quickly hopping up a set of steps to reach the counter in the middle of the room. She poured the contents into a cup, and carefully placed a cap on it, before hopping back down the steps.

"What exactly does that mean?" Max asked.

"Its… completely unlike anything I've seen before." She said.

"Not much of a stretch." Nick quietly joked, receiving an elbow from the rabbit next to him.

"It somehow keeps the same consistency of water," She continued, jostling the cup around. "But it has elements of chloroform, quinuclidinyl benzilate, and dimethylheptylpyran."

The three looked at her, blankly.

"Those are incapacitating agents." Henry quickly explained. "Chemicals that are used to knock others unconscious."

"Oh, okay." Judy said. "Well, what's so inexplicable about it?"

"Well, for one, the color," The mole started. "But those chemicals shouldn't be able to mix together, let alone with water. I've never seen anything like this, whoever made this must be an expert with chemicals."

"So, if it mixes all those chemicals into it, that means it must be pretty dangerous, right?" Nick guessed.

The mole nodded in response. "If I'm right, the liquid would be absorbed into skin if it touches someone, and that will almost instantly knock them out cold." She continued to explain. "A drop of it could knock a rhino out for hours, a full dose could potentially result in months."

"Oh, that is definitely not good." Judy quickly said. "When we saw the water, it was in-"

Suddenly, the door slammed open, revealing Clawhauser, out of breath. "GUYS THIS IS SUPER IMPORTANT!" He shouted.

"We already signed the cards, and we're in the middle of something!" Bogo shouted back.

"No, this is ACTUALLY important!"

The six headed out, Clawhauser leading them to his computer. Nick and Judy hopped up to see the monitor, while Max and Emily stood next to the cheetah, and Henry and Bogo watched from the front of the desk. The screen, instead of actually showing a computer screen, showed a flickering image, like a TV interruption. It showed a logo, round, and with a character written on it, though none of them could read it. Judy was sure she recognized it, however.

"Got a new screen saver?" Nick joked.

"No, but I have been meaning to." Ben said. "This thing just kind of popped up while I was working! And look at this!" He held his phone up, showing that it had the same image on it. "It happened on my phone at the exact time!"

"Hold on…" Judy said, pulling out her own phone. She turned it on, revealing the same image.

"It's not just me and you!" Clawhauser continued. He pointed outside, towards a large screen on the opposite side of the station. It was displaying the same image.

"Must be some kind of broadcast hijacking." Henry said. "But I don't think it's possible to hijack every device in the city…"

"Maybe it's the same guy who mixed a bunch of disparate chemicals and somehow got it to work!" Emily said, sarcastically. "I kind of see a connection!"

"This symbol was on some of the monsters we fought." Judy noted. "I think I know who's doing this."

Her suspicions were confirmed almost instantly after she finished, as the screens suddenly flickered black, before cutting to a camera shot. It showed Yogostein, standing in the middle of what looked like a cavern.

"Greetings, pathetic organic creatures of this world, and the Zoorangers!" He introduced. "If you don't know by now, I am Earth Pollution Minister Yogostein, master of machines and… other technology related things."

"Sir, are you going to-?" A voice from off camera said.

"I'm getting to it!" The robot said, slamming his spear into the ground. "Now, Zoorangers, and I know you're watching, you've learned of the effects of my wonderful Knockout Water, correct? Well, boy do I have a surprise for you!"

The camera cut to another shot, most likely another camera recording. It was back in the sewage plant that they had fought the pipe monster in. The camera zoomed in on a small, purple device, before Yogostein started to speak over the footage.

"While you idiots were doing… whatever it was, I was busy planting bombs across the entire city!" He declared. "These bombs are filled with my knockout water, so if they go off, the city will be flooded in the water!"

"How did we not notice that!?" Judy shouted, bewildered by the footage. "We looked all over that place!"

"Oh yeah, there will also be untold destruction across the entire city due to the explosions." The robot general continued. "I've set one hundred of them across the city, and you have seven hours to find them all, starting…"

He pulled out a remote control, which only had a big, red button on it, and dramatically pressed it down with his thumb.

"NOW!"

The screens flicked off, before cutting to a timer, which started to count down from seven hours.

"Well, this is bad." Nick said, flatly.

"OH MY GOD!" Shouted someone coming out from the side room. It was Kyle, everyone turning to face him, aside from Judy, who's eyes were locked to the timer. "Did you guys see that!? What are we going to do!?"

"Why did you bring the kid here?" Emily asked, confused.

"Oh, we're thinking of making him our new teammate." Nick said, matter-of-factly.

"What?"

The rabbit let out a quick scream, and then leaped into the air, transforming into ZooBlue before hitting the ground. "WE'RE WASTING TIME, WE NEED TO HEAD OUT NOW!" She ordered.

Nick hopped down and transformed, alongside Max. "Red, Silver, you two split up and check out Tundra Town and the Rainforest district," She said, before Emily and Henry stepped forward. "Em, Henry, you guys check out Savannah Central," The two gave quick nods in response. Judy turned to Kyle before finishing. "Kyle and I will check out the downtown area, alright?"

"Sounds like a plan." Red said, stretching his arms out.

"Good, now let's GET MOVING!"

---

"Hmm, do you think I looked good during that?" Yogostein asked, having just finished the broadcast. He was speaking directly to Pipe Banki, who was standing next to an Ugutz operating a camera. "I didn't overdo it, right?"

"No, sir, you were fantastic!" Pipe Banki replied. "This whole plan of yours is completely brilliant! You're such a genius!"

"Okay, now you're overdoing the complements." Yogostein said, quickly smacking him in the face with his spear. "You did plant the bombs where I told you to, correct?"

"Yep!" Pipe Banki said, trying to perform a salute with his whip hand. Instead, it smacked the Ugutz next to him, knocking it down.

"Good, they should be able to find all of them before they explode!" Yogostein said, cheerily.

"Yeah, there's no way they will wait, what?" The monster said, confused. "Don't we want the bombs to go off?"

"This is just a distraction, pipebrain." Yogostein explained. "We're still waiting for my Knockout Water to reach our REAL goal! We need them to give Kyuemon the Zoolizer before we kill them! And if they don't clear out all the bombs, then that's just even more of a win for us!"

"Oh, I get it!" The monster said. "You're so smart, boss!"

"I know I am!" He said, before spinning around and revealing a red object. "And here's another brilliant idea I had! The wolf seems to be catching on to Kyuemon, which could jeopardize the entire plan! I need you to… deal with him."

"Okay then." Pipe Banki said. "And what's that read thing for?"

Without a word, Yogostein tossed the Chaos Badge directly into the monster's chest.

The Banki Beast let out a yelp as its body started to transform. The Gaiark logo on its chest transformed into the symbol of chaos, before its arm started to twitch. It suddenly burst open, three more identical pipe whips flying out. The monster stretched them out, the whips forming a new hand for him. Its sword arm remained the same, though the sword grew longer, with an added third edge to it. The pieces of its face seemed to fuse back together, giving it a completely smooth face, barring a few holes across it. Its eyes turned dark red.

Its neck stretched out a bit, a top layer of pipes breaking in half and starting to wave around like hair. The halves of the pipes that didn't break off crawled back up and patched the hole in the neck. The pipes that formed its legs suddenly broke off of their feet, forming into new tentacle legs for the monster. The pipes on its shoulders grew out slightly longer, and wrapped around the arms, folding over the shoulders to form cannons, while the pipes on its chest extended out slightly as well.

The monster let out a furious roar, its many legs thrashing on the ground. "Well, that's definitely a transformation." Yogostein muttered. "Uh, go and attack that wolf, Chaos Pipe Banki!"

"Yes sir!" The monster growled, before lifting itself off the ground and walking out on its tentacles.

"Not gonna lie, that's pretty creepy." The robot said to himself.

---

The seven were quickly rushing around the city, as fast as they could. Finding one hundred bombs in a city as large as Zootopia would be an almost impossible feat. Blue had stopped at the sewage plant from earlier, prepared to disarm the bomb.

It took only a short moment to find, considering she had already seen where it was during the broadcast. It was located on the back of one of the pools.

"How did we miss this thing?" She said to Kyle as they walked up to it. It was even glowing and making a beeping noise. Maybe they'd be easier to find than she thought.

"Guess we just… didn't see it." He replied, slightly nervous.

"You alright?"

"I just… don't really want to be standing right next to a bomb."

Blue turned back to the bomb, which was luckily just slightly above her height. She gripped onto the sides of it, and started to pull it off.

It came off almost effortlessly, the beeping and lights shutting off. That must have meant it had turned off.

"That was… really easy." She said, surprised. She looked around for a moment. Wasn't this supposed to be the time the bad guys came and fought her?

"What are we supposed to do with the bomb?" Kyle asked.

"Uhhh…" The rabbit let out, taking a glance at the device. "Maybe we just… leave it here?" She suggested. "We'll come collect it after all this."

She pulled out her phone, opening the calculator app, and quickly jotted down a ninety-nine. "This'll help keep track of how many bombs are left." She said to Kyle, who slowly nodded.

As soon as she finished, her commlink started to ring. "Red?" She said, placing her paw to her head. "You find any bombs yet?"

"Yeah, I did." He replied. The fox was sitting at the base of a large tree in the middle of the Rainforest District. "And by 'any' I mean A LOT."

"What?" Blue said, surprised. "How many?"

The fox looked up at the tree. It had a ring of the bombs planted around the trunk, right before the branches started. "I dunno, maybe like, eight?"

"EIGHT!?" She shouted surprised.

"Yeah, they're all just lumped together on this big tree." Red continued. "Seems kinda weird. Anyway, you know how to disarm these things?" He asked.

"You just need to pull them off. It's insanely easy." Blue said. There was another buzzing noise. "Oh, I'm getting a call on my cell, talk to you in a bit."

She hung up, leaving Red alone. "Alright, time to make this work." He muttered to himself.

He leaped up into the air, jabbing his claws directly into the bark of the tree. Normally, something like this would've worked, and he'd be climbing his way up to the bombs, but this was a rainforest tree. Those things are slippery.

He almost instantly slid back to the ground.

"Guess I'll have to be a bit more… creative." He said, pulling out a red ZooTag, and quickly plugging it in.

"GAO, RAWR!
BEAT THE BEAST
KING OF THE JUNGLE
BRAVE, GAO!"

The Brave King Blades appeared in Red's paws, before he quickly spun them around. He leaped up, and jabbed the blades into the sides of the trunk, which they sliced through almost effortlessly. He climbed up, jabbing one blade in, pulling the other out, and then repeating.

He reached the first bomb, and slashed at the back of it with his free sword. The beeping stopped as it was sliced off the tree, falling down into the mud below.

A few minutes later, and all the bombs were stuck in the mud. "Hmm, that felt too easy." He said. "There has to be something more to this…" He quickly shook his head. "No time, gotta find the rest of them."

Back with Blue, the rabbit quickly answered her cellphone. It was from Pink and Green. "Yo, so, we evacuated the area…" The hyena started up from the other end. She moved her phone to show around a plaza of some kind. She couldn't really make anything out, though. It moved back to Emily's face. "But there's like, fifteen bombs in this plaza."

"Oh my god, seriously?" Judy said, flabbergasted.

"There are a few on a fountain, a few on the sides of building, and just some on the ground." Henry said. "We're going to try and disarm them."

"Alright, good luck with that." Blue responded. "I have my own bombs to look out for."

There was another buzzing noise in her ear piece. "Ack, another commlink call! Talk later!"

She quickly hung up, leaving the armored bull and hyena standing in the middle of a bomb riddled plaza. "Well, this is something." The armored bull said, approaching one of the bombs that was attached to the ground. He leaned down, and effortlessly pulled it off.

"Hm."

The two quickly got to work, removing each and every bomb they could find. They piled all of them at the base of the fountain. "One, two…" Pink said, counting the bombs. "I think that's all of them."

There was a sudden metallic clanging behind them. They turned around to see a sudden group of Ugutz, clanking and stomping towards them.

"Oh, good, we haven't had any action today!" Pink said, pulling out and twirling her guns. Green nodded, and bulled out his cannon.

They quickly rushed in, green smacking one of the monsters over the head with his cannon, causing it to cave in. He quickly spun it over his shoulder, and launched several blasts from it. The shots hit the ground, causing massive explosions that reduced the Ugutz to rubble in almost an instant.

Pink quickly ducked under a swing from a Ugutz' weapon, and then quickly knee'd it in the stomach, before a shooting one behind her directly in the forehead. She spun around, firing shots out and striking the last remaining robots down.

"Underwhelming." Green sighed. "But it's nice to get any action, I suppose."

"I really want to fight a big guy by myself someday." Pink said. "Wouldn't that be cool?"

"Uh, sure."

Back with Blue and Kyle, the rabbit had just answered her commlink. "Lemme guess, Silver?" She guessed.

"Yeah." The wolf said over the speaker. "You get calls from everyone else?"

"Yeah, I did." She replied. "Let me guess, you also found a cache of bombs?"

"Actually, no." The wolf said. He was walking down the street, keeping an ear out for any bombs. "I've only found three so far, and they were pretty spread out."

"Then why did you call?"

"Because being by myself right now is a nightmare."

"What?"

"I just wanted to talk to someone, kay?" He sighed as he stopped on the frozen sidewalk. The place had seemingly been abandoned, most likely because of the announcement. "Listen, you have your own bombs to look for." He continued. "I'll keep looking for the ones here, call me if everyone but me finishes."

"Got it." She said, before hanging up.

"Guess we're not just gonna get to stay here, huh?" Kyle said, with a nervous chuckle.

"Nope." Blue said. "We have bombs to find."

---

A few more hours had passed by, and Silver had still only found a few of them. He was sure that his partners had been finding them a lot faster than him.

Was he just bad at it? Did he just get unlucky?

Maybe it was both.

He walked down the street, still searching. The area of Tundra Town was still abandoned, leaving only the wolf and his thoughts. That wasn't exactly a pleasant experience with his current mindset.

He tried to keep his mind off of what was happening, and just treat this like it was a walk… but he also had to pay attention for anything odd. The whole thing was a lot tougher than he had thought, the thoughts from himself climbing back into his brain repeatedly.

After a few minutes, he got a call through his commlink. "Hello?"

"Hey, Max!" Blue said from the other side. "We've managed to get ninety-three bombs, just calling to see if you had the rest."

"I found six." He said. "That equals ninety-nine. I just need to find one more."

"Great!" She said, chipper. "You have like, three hours left, so you can take your time."

"Really comforting." He sarcastically said. "See you guys in a bit."

He hung up, and continued to walk down the frozen streets. Occasional blasts of snow hit him in his visor, blinding him for a moment. He rubbed the snow off, and started to run for a nearby park.

It was a snowy field, with a few benches and things scattered around. In the middle of it was a large statue of a wolf. The wolf headed towards it, noticing something odd on its nose.

It was one of the bombs!

He pumped his fist, silently, and prepared to leap up and grab it.

"Not so fast, there!" A scratchy voice growled from behind him.

Silver looked over his shoulder, seeing Chaos Pipe Banki. It was holding itself up in the air via its many tentacles, and made several slow, awkward stomps towards him. "You're not pulling that bomb!" It threatened, lowering itself down slightly.

"Wow, you got a lot uglier." Silver mocked.

The monster let out a growl, before thrusting its four pipe tentacle fingers at Silver. The wolf leaped out of the way as they struck through the ground. The beast retracted them, before lashing its blade forwards. The blade came out of its arm, extending via another tentacle pipe.

Silver pulled his own sword out, and started to clash with the monster's blade. He pushed it back up into the air, and stepped back as the pipe monster slashed it back towards the ground. The force of the slash trapped the blade in the ground, the beast struggling to retract it.

The wolf leaped up, landing on the stuck pipe, before bounding off, and delivering a direct strike to the monster's face. The beast stumbled back on its many tentacles as Silver landed back on the ground.

"I've had enough of this!" The monster shouted, retracting its blade and turning to Silver. "Time to finish you off!"

"You know that's just a pipe dream!" Silver joked, readying his blade.

The cannons on the monster's shoulders quickly shot bursts of water out of them. The bursts almost instantly froze into large spheres of ice, and flew towards Silver. He jumped out of the way as they crashed into the ground and shattered.

The monster continued to fire at Silver, who leaped out fo the way rapidly. He quickly switched his blade to Sun Mode, and started to fling fireballs at the ice, melting them back into water. This didn't do much, but it distracted the monster from its attack for a brief moment, enough to give him an idea.

The pipe robot tentacle beast fired two more of the ice balls at Silver. Without hesitating, he switched to Moon Mode, and whipped the laser whip forwards. It lashed around the two ice balls, and pulled them together.

"What are you trying to do!?" The monster said.

"Get you out of the way for a bit!" Silver shouted back. He whipped the ice balls around his head for a few seconds, before flinging them back into the monster's chest.

The balls exploded into ice, causing the monster to yelp in pain. A rather sizable hole had been carved into the monster's chest, and one of its chest pipes had been bent completely.

"AUGH!" The monster yelled again, lowering himself to the ground. "You'll pay for this!"

"The only person who'll pay is you." Silver said. "To a plumber."

"What?"

"You'll have to pay a plumber to fix you." He explained. "Sorry, that one didn't work out that we-"

Before Silver could even finish, a large burst of snow smacked him right in the visor. "SHIT!" He yelped, trying to get the snow off.

"CHANCE!" Pipe Banki shouted in response, firing two more ice balls at the wolf. They struck him before he could clear the snow off, knocking him to the ground, unconscious.

The monster tried to raise itself back into the air, but let out a groan of pain. "Ouugh, this huuurts." It grumbled, feeling at its chest with its tentacle fingers. "I can't do anything with this much pain… I'll just kill him later."

The monster uneasily stretched out its tentacles, and plodded forwards through the snow. "Yeck, I think my joints are starting to freeze over…"

---

The wolf sat on his bed. The past few years had been… trying.

He had attempted to go to college, but found that the whole thing was far, far too overwhelming for him. It was either stay there and have a metal breakdown, or head back home.

He decided to go back home.

He was back, living with his mother because he had nowhere else left. The house would be his in a few years anyway, after she moved out.

He let out a sigh. For the past week he had just been trying to figure out his life. He didn't know what to do, he felt a lot like a failure. His mom had assured him that he wasn't, but he felt like a failure to himself.

The wolf got up, and went downstairs. His mother was sitting on the couch, watching TV. She wasn't elderly, but getting on in the years. She was very kind, and the two were extremely alike… aside from their taste in TV.

"Hey, uh, mom?" Max said, as he sat down on a chair next to the couch.

"What is it, Max?" His mom said back, quickly muting the TV.

"I wanted to talk about… my future." He said, struggling to get it out.

She simply looked at him, waiting for him to continue.

"I just… I feel like I'm not amounting to anything." He said. "I don't know what to do with my life."

"Well, what DO you want to do?" She asked.

He opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came out. Surprisingly, he hadn't thought about that. He had just been going to school because that was what he was supposed to be doing. He never really thought about having an actual goal.

He sat there for a few minutes, trying to think. His mother just waited.

What had shaped him throughout his life? What had made him who he is? He thought for a long while, going over his memories. How he was mistreated by others, and his own views on the world.

"I think I want to help others."

"Very noble of you." She replied with a laugh. "Well, how can you help other mammals?"

"Uh…" Max let out. "I don't know. That's just how I… feel. I know I can't just become a super hero."

"What's the closest thing to a super hero in real life?" His mom asked. "Who helps the weak?"

"Uh, police officers?" He guessed. "But… I dunno, I've seen some awful stuff from officers over the years, why would I want to join them?"

"You can just be you." She said. "If you want to make a difference, you have to do it yourself. Isn't that right?"

"Yeah, I… I guess it is."

---

He opened his eyes again, and let out a groan.

He was back in that… void. The one he had been in looked back down at his arm, it wasn't broken, which he was definitely thankful for. He quickly glanced around, trying to see anything in the piercing white void.

"Mikoto?" He said, trying to figure out where his host was. "Doctor?"

"I see you've come back."

Max jumped up in fright as the legendary ranger suddenly appeared directly behind him. "Don't scare me like that, christ!" He said, catching his breath.

"Are you ready to perform the challenge once more?" AbareKiller asked. "You know what to do now, so it should be… easier."

Max took a deep breath. "Yeah, I'm ready."

He turned back around, seeing the pillar, a few yards away from him. He took another deep breath, and then started to walk towards it. He knew what to do. He just had to ignore him.

"Look at you, think you can do this when you got beaten by a piece of snow." A metallic voice from behind him mocked.

Max continued to walk. It wasn't that far away, he just had to make it without responding to the double.

"You managed to get a lucky hit on that monster." ZooSilver continued from behind him. "You don't even know if it did anything. For all you know, it could still be running around causing trouble, hurting others, all because of you."

Max flinched for a moment, briefly pausing and clenching his fist. He breathed out, and then continued to walk on.

Just… ignore it.

"Look at you!" The double shouted with a laugh. "You think yourself a hero… that bomb is going to go off, and someone will die."

"What would your poor, old mother think?"

Max instantly stopped, and clenched both his fists, an audible crack echoing throughout the void as he did so. "You… leave my mother out of this."

He spun around, preparing to deliver a punch to the double before anything could happen.

As he spun around, he realized something.

ZooSilver was gone.

AbareKiller was standing in its stead.

The white ranger caught the punch effortlessly, and started to squeeze the wolf's paw. There was a crunching sound as a spark of pain went through Max's body. He started to fall over as the ranger looked him directly in the eyes.

He simply shook his head, before delivering a punch to the wolf's stomach.

Max felt a few of his ribs shatter.

AbareKiller let go of the wolf's paw, causing him to drop to the ground. "You failed." He said, solemnly. "But… you did better."

Max let out a wheeze in response. It was hard to breath. Hopefully all this would be gone once he returned to reality.

"For that improvement, I'll give you a bit of a tip." The ranger continued, looking down on the wolf's ruined body. "There's only one true 'fox' on your team. Keep an eye out."

"What does that mean…?" Max wheezed, before everything went white.

---

"Max! Wake up!"

The wolf took a deep breath through his mask, bursting up and quickly hyperventilating. He felt at his chest. No ribs were broken. He quickly calmed down.

He looked next to him. Emily was kneeling there. "Thank god you're okay, you idiota."

She helped Max to his feet, before he untransformed out of his Zooranger form. "What happened?" He asked. "The last thing I remember was being hit by some… a monster attack."

"Yeah, we can tell." Nick said. Max looked around. There were quite a few tentacle-like tracks pounded into the snow.

"we found you laying in the snow, completely unconscious." Henry said. "Luckily, you were right next to a bomb. I'm assuming a monster managed to knock you out before you could defuse it."

The wolf nodded, before glancing up and watching as Judy pulled the bomb off the head of the statue. "This is the second time we've had to deal with bombs, and this statue." She said as she hopped down. "Maybe its cursed."

"How did you guys find me?" Max asked. "I was knocked out for… a while."

"Forty minutes." Judy said. "We tracked you using some tracking stuff in the suits."

"Very specific." Nick joked.

"Glad to see you're okay, man!" Kyle said, quickly running up to Max. The wolf stared at him for a moment.

A few thoughts quickly ran through max's head. The hint, Mikoto's emphasis of the word fox… fox, when not referred to the species itself, meant "trickster". In that case, a real fox would be someone tricking them, potentially for personal gain.

Was he right about Kyle? Did he just get vindicated by a dinosaur ghost super hero from another dimension?

"W-well, we got rid of the bombs, right? That means we can go take a break!" Kyle quickly said, backing away from max.

"Right, yeah." Max quickly said. "We foiled their plans, we just have to wait for something else to happen now."

"After all that running around, I think we deserve a bit of a lie down." Nick said,s tretching out one of his arms. "Why don't we all head home?"

"Oh, I should probably go home." Kyle said, a bit nervously. "My parents are probably worried about me after all this…"

"You need a ride?" Max asked.

"Uh, n-no." Kyle said, still nervous. "I can head there myself, I do it all the time!"

"Oh, alright." Max said. "You go on ahead."

The young fox gave a quick nod, before rushing off through the snow, leaving the five behind. Max quickly turned to Emily. "Hey, you think you can do me a favor?"

"Uh, w-what?" Emily asked, a bit surprised by the question.

"Can you drive Nick and Judy back to my place?" He finished. "I want to go check on some things."

"We can do that." Henry said.

"What are you going to check?" Judy asked, a bit skeptical. "Is this about Kyle?"

"No, no it isn't." Max said, confidently. "Listen, I just… need to do this, alright?"

"I don't see any issues." Nick said. "I kind of just really want to go relax for a bit, though."

"Fine." Judy said with a sigh. She stared at Max as she continued. "But if you do anything weird, I'll make sure you get a punishment."

"Uh, alright, mom." Max said with a chuckle. He quickly started to scamper off, his car parked at the other end of Tundra Town.

"You probably feel really guilty about lying to them." ZooSilver said, suddenly appearing next to him.

"I don't." Max said.

"Because that isn't Kyle."

---

"Took you a while!" The robot said as the yokai appeared in a burst of smoke. The two were standing outside of a large, stone structure, somewhere in the mountains.

"They took a bit longer than I thought." Kyuemon said as he walked across the gravel. "And it seems your monster didn't finish ZooSilver off."

"Yeah, I know." Yogostein muttered. "He came back, crying about his pain, and I had to patch him up."

"Where is he, anyway?" Kyuemon asked. The pipe monster wasn't anywhere around the mountainous region, by the looks of things.

"He's inside, waiting for us to show up." Yogostein said. "Best not keep him waiting, hmm?"

Kyuemon quickly nodded, and then flicked his hand forwards. Shadowy fox heads formed around him, and then fired forwards into the stone wall, bursting it open. They quickly ran inside, entering a rather industrial, stone room.

There were a few catwalks, connected to humongous generators. As soon as they entered, they dropped down onto the catwalks, several employees, all beavers, running off in terror.

"Oh, of course they're all beavers." Yogostein muttered. "This world loves its jokes, doesn't it?"

Yogostein raised his spear, causing lightning to fire all around. The beavers ran as explosions rocked the stone walls. They all headed for the exit, but were quickly interrupted as Chaos Pipe Banki climbed down from the ceiling.

"Surprise!"

It hovered above the door, before shooting a torrent of purple water at the beavers. In a few moments, all the employees had been knocked unconscious.

"Hah, the dam is ours now!" Yogostein shouted, pounding his chest. "Quick, to the top!"

The three headed for the top of the dam. A massive path of white stone, seemingly indestructible. They looked upon the water, sparkling blue in the midday sun.

"I thought you said the tonic would have mixed with it by now?" Kyuemon asked, starting to become a bit frustrated.

"Give it a second…" Yogostein said.

They waited for a moment, before something started to kick in. Slowly, the water started to shift colors, going from blue to a still rather clear violet. In a few moments, it was colored a full, opaque purple.

"The dam is completely infected!" Chaos Pipe Banki said. "Should I plant the big bomb now?"

"Big bomb?" Kyuemon said, intrigued.

"Yes, plant it now!" Yogostein laughed.

Pipe Banki used its tentacles to pull out a large, black bomb. It was nearly as large as the monster's body itself. It started to climb over the side of the dam, and planted the bomb directly in the middle of it. Four claws detached from the bottom of the bomb, before clinging onto the rock wall of the dam itself.

The monster climbed back up, meeting with its masters. "You know, I was thinking…" Kyuemon said, stepping towards the monster. "We may need something a bit… stronger."

"My monster is plenty strong enough, thank you." Yogostein replied, offended.

"Strong enough for those powered up forms?"

"...Okay, so how do we get something stronger?"

Kyuemon raised up a golden hammer, and thrust it at the monster. A dark aura suddenly surrounded the pipe robot. It let out grunts as it suddenly started to grow, to the point where it was towering over the both of them.

"Well, that should do it." Yogostein said. "Everything's ready, I just need to prepare the message."

"I'll head back and… 'warn' them." Kyuemon said. He quickly vanished in a burst of purple energy.

Yogostein laughed to himself. The plan was almost nearing completion. Soon, the Zoorangers, the city, and any chance of retaliation would be crushed underneath HIS iron foot!

"'Allo."

Yogostein quickly turned around to see the visage of Enter. He was in his human form, most likely because nobody was around, and walked towards the robot.

"Enter?" Yogostein said, confused. "What are you doing here, you creep?"

"Offering my services." He said. "I don't know if you know this, but that wolf is getting dangerously close to figuring out whats going on with your little ruse."

"Yes, I know." The robot replied, rather annoyed. "So what? Not like he can do anything!"

"It could still be a problem." Enter said. "So, why don't I go and deal with him?"

Yogostein paused for a moment. "You're up to something, aren't you?"

"Non non, simply offering my help to make sure your plan goes as smooth… as possible."

The robot let out a grunt, before turning away from Enter. "Fine, do what you want, no steel off my back!"

"Excellent."

---

Max had stopped at the police station to get some info. The location of the Izamashi family. They were located in an apartment, strange for what he had assumed was a decently wealthy family, in the middle of Downtown

This was odd, because Kyle had said his family was located on the edge of the city. In fact, they were remarkably close to the apartment when they were running away from the monster the other day.

Things were starting to add up towards Kyle not being who he said he was. There were too many holes and oddities with him.

Max got out of his car, and looked up at the building. It wasn't a low rent apartment, above middle class, probably. The building was designed for larger mammals, but they were foxes, they probably made use of the extra space.

He headed inside, and up to the floor they were supposed to be living on. Fifth floor.

As he stepped out of the elevator, he nervously walked towards their door. He gazed at it for a moment, and cleared his throat. This was the moment of truth, the moment where he finally figured out what was going on.

He knocked, and held his breath. As he heard the door start to unlock, he took up a straighter, more serious stance. He was an officer after all.

The door opened. A female yellow furred fox popped her head out of the door. She was middle aged, maybe approaching forty.

"H-hello?" She said.

"Uh, hello ma'am." Max said. He quickly pulled out his wallet, showing her his badge. "I'm Officer Wolford, ZPD. I came here to ask you a few… questions." He decided to leave the super hero stuff out of this conversation, though she would probably recognize him if he told her.

"What?" She said, nervously. "What for?"

"I need to ask about your son." Max said. "About Kyle."

She went wide-eyed for a moment, and went back inside, the door shutting behind her. Max let out a sigh. "Try to be a bit more tactful…" He muttered to himself. Before he gave up hope, there was the sound of chains rattling. The door unlocked again, and opened.

The fox walked in from the other side of the door frame. She was dressed in casual clothes. She seemed like a stay-at-home mother, definitely… but Kyle was a bit too old for something like that. "Come in." She said.

As Max walked in, he noticed they had a small set of stairs for reaching the doorknob. Maybe he should get one of those.

He walked farther into the apartment. It was a cozy, modern apartment, a lot less run down than Nick and Judy's apartment had been, no matter how nice it was. Most of the furniture was small, specifically small enough for a family of a few foxes.

Mrs. Izanami sat down on a small couch, Max towering over her by a bit. "Um, where's your husband?" The wolf quickly asked. The place seemed empty, even for an apartment.

"He's at work." She said.

"He's a CEO, right?"

"He… was." She continued. "He quit after…"

"After what?"

"After our son died."

Max felt his heart sink for a moment. He quickly sat down on the floor, legs crossed. "Kyle's… dead?"

The fox nodded, she looked like she was on the verge of sobbing. "He was killed by… some members of a predator hate group." She explained. "It was during the pred-scare, years ago… After that, my husband had a breakdown, and lost his job. He's working at an office right now."

"I'm… sorry." Max said, not sure what else to do. He didn't mean to accidentally brings those memories back to her. It just made him feel worse.

"Why are you asking about Kyle?" She asked, now sobbing.

He needed to spin this without lying. "Someone is… pretending to be him." He explained. "I'm on a case related to it." One truth, one half truth, good enough.

"Why would someone do that…?" She asked.

"That's what I'm trying to figure out." max explained, standing back up. "I'm sorry, I didn't know about your son."

Mrs. Izanami sniffed. "It's alright, I know you didn't mean any harm."

Before the conversation could continue, there was crying from another room. A kit's cries. "You… have another son?" Max asked.

"He's only a year old." Mrs. Izanami said. "I should probably go see what he wants."

"Good idea. I'll let you be." Max said, falling silent for a moment. He quickly bowed. "Thank you for the help."

A few seconds later, he was back outside the apartment, thinking about what was happening. It seemed his suspicion had been correct. He just had to figure out who it was. It was probably a monster, but who could be using that kind of power?

He walked back to the elevator, and entered it. ZooSilver was waiting for him.

"Do you feel good?" The copy asked as Max pushed the button for the main floor. "You made her cry because of your ignorance. Despicable."

Max didn't pay attention. His mind was too wrapped up in trying to figure out who it could be.

"Hello?" the copy said. "Don't you feel the slightest bit guilty about this?!"

He did. But that wasn't important right now. The elevator came to a stop, and the wolf ran back out. He was still trying to piece this together as he ran out of the building. He needed to get back to the duo before anything happened.

But he froze as he walked into the parking lot. Waiting by his car was someone.

A tan cheetah in a longcoat, with goggles above his eyes. He turned to face the wolf, and let out a laugh.

"Bonjour, ZooSilver."

---

"How long do you think until something happens?" Judy asked. Her and Nick were sitting on the couch, taking as much time as they could to relax.

"If everything goes well, then maybe never." He said, the rabbit rolling her eyes in response.

"You think it was right for me to tell Em and Henry to spy on Max for a bit?" The rabbit asked, sounding a bit guilty. "I just wanted to make sure nothing bad happened…"

"Honestly, probably not." Nick said. "But it was probably good, in case something bad does happen."

There was a sudden knock at the door. Judy looked at the fox, who let out a sigh. He slid down from the couch, and walked over to the door. He jumped up and grabbed the handle, doing his best to turn it. After a brief moment of struggling, the door slid open a bit, and he landed back on the ground.

"We need to get one of those stair things for this." Nick said, before opening the door fully.

It was Kyle, and he seemed to be out of breath. "Guys!" He shouted, pushing past Nick and running straight into the house. "Guys, turn on the TV! There's something bad going on!"

"This whole thing again?" Judy said, flicking the TV on.

"Greetings, Zoorangers!" Yogostein yelled from the TV screen. He was standing in front of a large pool of water. "You might have thought you won, but that would be incorrect! You have instead walked right into my plan!"

Nick quickly rushed to the living room to catch what was happening on the screen. The camera zoomed in on the purple water. "While you idiots were running around trying to find my bombs, the dam's water supply was infected by my genius Knockout Water!"

"I knew something was up!" Judy shouted, hopping to her feet. "We were being played by him!"

"And to add an even better cherry bomb on top," Yogostein continued. The camera quickly switched to a view from the front of the dam itself, showing a large round object. "I've planted an even bigger bomb on the dam! In two hours, this thing will go off and cover the entirety of the city in my Knockout Water!"

He started to laugh, before the camera switched back to the robot.

"I expect you all to be here VERY soon!"

The TV flicked off, and the three fell silent.

"...We have a dam?" Judy asked, her ears drooping down.

"Seriously?" Nick said, surprised. "Its been up in the Mountain District for decades!"

"Guys, that doesn't matter!" Kyle said. "This is a super duper big problem!"

"And Max isn't back yet…" Judy said, placing her paw to her chin. She quickly let out a sigh, letting her arm fall back to her side. "Guess I don't have much of a choice right now, though."

She hopped down from the couch, and headed into the basement. A moment later, she came back up, carrying a silver box. She walked right up to Kyle, and looked up at him.

"I wanted to wait a while, until you were ready, before we gave this to you, but…" She opened the box up, revealing the Yellow Zoolizer. "Here it is, you're officially part of the team."

Kyle fell silent for a moment, and gently took the Zoolizer out of the box. "Thank you." He said. "I'm not going to put it on until something really bad happens, though." He continued.

"Uh, sure." Nick said. "Let's just get going before we're covered in purple drank."

---

Max looked on as the cheetah started to approach him. "I see you've figured out what's happening with Kyle, hm?" Enter said. "Pretty surprising, isn't it?"

"I'm not going to let you monsters get away with… whatever you're planning." Max said, quickly transforming into ZooSilver. He pulled out his blade, and prepared to attack the cheetah, but was quickly interrupted by a buzzing noise.

"Uh… can you excuse me for a second?" Silver said.

"Tch." Enter let out. "Fine."

Silver placed his paw to his helmet. "What's happening? Another monster attack?"

"Yogostein is threatening to blow up the dam!" Blue said over the commlink. "We didn't really have any choice but to give Kyle the Zoolizer, we need you there ASAP!"

"Alright, I'll be there in a minute, I just have to…" He paused for a moment. "You did WHAT!? You need to take that away from him right now!"

"Listen, Max, we don't exactly have a choice!" She repeated. "I know you think there's something weird with him, but, being honest, I think you're just being paranoid. Just get to the dam as soon as you can."

"I'm not paranoid, he's-"

The rabbit hung up on him.

"Shit."

"Looks like eeeeverything is going according to their plan." Enter said, rabbing his claws together. "they really thought this one out thoroughly."

"So, I think this is the first time you and I have met." Silver said. "What exactly are you, uh, capable of?"

"I'm capable of destroying you."

Enter held out his paw, as a stream of red pixels flew from it. They quickly formed into a silver fencing sword, marked with an odd black and orange pattern on it. "As you can see, I am also well-versed in escrime."

"Uh, I don't know what-"

Enter quickly thrust the blade forwards, Silver barely managing to pull out a block. He pushed Enter away quickly, before thrusting forwards. The cheetah quickly side-stepped out of the way, seemingly with little effort, and then thrust his blade directly into Silver's arm.

The blade pierced through it, causing Silver to let out a yelp of pain. He shook it off, before jabbing at the cheetah once more, but Enter quickly blocked it, and then effortlessly pushed him back.

"This isn't exactly fair, you know." Max said, clutching at his arm. "We're not even in the same size class."

"You say that like I care in any way."

Enter jabbed his blade forwards again, this time shooting off several lasers. The lasers exploded around Silver, causing him to fall to the ground. The wolf tried to get up from the blow, but fell back to the ground. Silver glanced up, and quickly rolled out of the way as Enter jabbed into the ground.

The cheetah's blade carved through the ground, and he effortlessly pulled it back out. He then prepared to strike again, this time Silver being aware enough to block it with his own blade. The wolf managed to push him back, before rolling away and getting back to his feet.

"You're no match for me, you know that?" Enter said. "Its really obvious. Just let me kill you."

"Yeah, but what about us?"

Enter turned around to face whoever was talking, and was quickly met with blasts to the chest from Officers Pink and Green.

He clutched at his chest as he stumbled back. "Ugh, surprise attack." He muttered as they ran in to the fight.

"Yo, Max, you okay?" Pink asked.

"Not really!"

"I'll distract the cheetah, you go help him." Green quickly said, the hyena giving a quick nod.

The bull rushed up to Enter, and quickly delivered a punch to the cheetah's stomach. It only seemed to phase him for a moment, but that let Pink run in and quickly help Silver back to his feet.

The cheetah turned to her and growled, but she quickly retaliated by firing several shots directly at him. With each shot, parts of his skin flew off, revealing red, digital space underneath. It seemed to cause him pain, but the chunks recovered quickly.

"Well, I guess things turned quickly." He chuckled, quickly changing moods. "I'll have to deal with you all… later. But, since it won't matter, I guess I can let you all in on something…"

They three stood there, silent as the cheetah looked around.

"That friend of yours, Kyle, he's actually Kyuemon Izayoi, one of my… teammates." Enter said, a noticeable amount of bile in his voice. "Him and Yogostein set this whole thing up so they could kill all five of you, and take the Yellow Zoolizer."

"What?" Pink said, surprised. "You gotta be lying."

"He's not lying." Silver said, letting go of the hyena and standing on his own. "I just learned from Kyle's mother that he died years ago. It has to be that Kyuemon guy."

"Yes, and if you want to save your pathetic friends, you'll need to get to the dam quickly." Enter continued. "They should be arriving very, very soon."

"Why would you tell us this?" Green asked.

"Oh, I have my own reasons." Enter said. "Now, I bid you all… adieu." He gave a bow, and vanished in a burst of red pixels.

"That creep's up to something." Pink guessed. "No other reason why he'd undermine his own team like that."

"Doesn't really matter." Silver said. "We just need to get to the dam, quickly. Or else…"

"Or else we'll all be dead." Henry finished.

---

Blue, Red, and Kyle arrived at the side of the dam, next to part of the cliff. A massive hole had been carved into the side of the stone structure.

"Alright, that's probably bad." Red said as they approached the hole. They looked down, noticing a squad of Ugutz patrolling the catwalks and ground floor. There had to be at least fifty to sixty of them.

"They really don't want us getting up there." Blue said. "But that's not gonna stop us!"

Red quickly grabbed onto Kyle's paw, and then leaped up alongside Blue. They fell down, landing safely, but clanging on the metal hard enough for the Ugutz to notice them. The robots beeped as theys tarted to rush towards them.

"Alright, you ready to go?" Blue asked, pulling out a moon shaped ZooTag.

"Actually, I wanna try out my new swords." Red responded. He quickly plugged in a red ZooTag as the rabbit shook her head.

"GAO, RAWR!
BEAT THE BEAST
KING OF THE JUNGLE
BRAVE, GAO!"

The twin swords appeared in the fox's paws. "Listen, we'll do the super form thing when we get to the actual bad guys, these guys are just grunts!"

"Alright." She said. "We just haven't really done it in a while…"

The Ugutz quickly closed in on them. Red readied his blades, and leaped forwards, slashing through several of them effortlessly. Blue quickly followed, leaping down from the rafters to attack the Ugutz that were on the floor. As she hit the ground she blasted at them with her Rabblasters.

"Guys, I'll help too!" Kyle said, rushing over to one of the Uguts that Red had left behind. He quickly swept his leg at the robot's feet, causing it to lose balance and tumble over the railing.

Blue quickly blasted at the falling Ugutz, which quickly exploded.

Red rushed into another group of Ugutz, and leaped up into the air. He started to spin around, blades outstretched, turning him into a bladed tornado. He cleave through the group of robots quickly, spare parts flying off everywhere.

"See?" he started, twirling his swords around. "These things are great!"

Unbeknownst to the fox, a Ugutz had survived, and was creeping up on him while his back was turned. Kyle noticed, however, and ran over, quickly delivering a drop kick to the robot, sending it flying off the ledge.

Red caught notice, and gave a thumbs-up to the fox.

"Alright, I think that's all of them!" Bluesaid, leaping up onto the catwalk.

"Great, then lets head up to the top!" Red said.

"Hold it, there's supposed to be workers here." She said. "We have to make sure they're alright, first."

"Oh, I think I saw some in the corner!" Kyle said, pointing over towards the corner near the elevator.

They quickly ran over, seeing a massive pile of knocked out beaver workers. Blue went up and felt at one of their hearts. "Still beating, so they should be alive… for a while."

"If we don't beat that monster, nobody will wake up!" Kyle said. "We need to destroy the monster!"

"I'm with you on that one." Red said.

The three headed up to the elevator, which in turn lead to the top of the dam. A harsh wind blew as they walked across it. On the other side was Yogostein, who seemed to be waiting for them.

"Alright, you bucket of bolts!" Red shouted, pointing one of his blades at the general. "Time to get scrapped!"

"Hah, sure, yeah!" Yogostein said, dismissively. "CHAOS PIPE BANKI! GET THEM!"

The water started to bubble, before the monster leaped out of it, crashing into the walkway. It cling onto it with its many tentacles, towering over the three.

"Prepare to be drained!" The monster shouted, before lashing its four tentacle fingers forwards. Blue and Red leaped out of the way, Blue grabbing onto Kyle as she did so. The tentacles pierced right through the concrete, and then quickly retracted back.

"You deal with them, I have some other business to attend to!" Yogostein commanded. He slammed his spear on the ground, causing smoke to envelop him. It quickly vanished, leaving nothing behind.

"I think now might be a good time to do that whole… super mode thing." Red said, pulling out the sun shaped ZooTag. Blue nodded, and she pulled out her moon shaped ZooTag.

They quickly plugged them both in.

"TAIYO~!
TSUKI~!
CELESTIAAAAAAAL
BODIES!"

The two quickly transformed into their Solar and Lunar forms, and prepared to fight against the monster.

---

"Alright, we're here!" Silver said as he crashed down onto the mountainside. He let of Pink and Green, who were a bit shaken up by his jumping.

"Couldn't we have just driven?" Green asked, clutching at his stomach.

"Yeah, but that was faster." Silver said.

"Idiota." Pink mumbled.

"Should we head in through that massive hole," Silver started, pointing towards the hole in the side of the dam. "Or should we just jump up there?" He continued, pointing up to the giant mechanical monster fighting on top of the dam.

"I don't know if I can take another jump, but that's the fastest way." Green said.

"Actually, how about you all take the SCENIC ROUTE!?"

Before they could figure out who said that, the three were hit by a bolt of energy, knocking them down the hole. The fell, and crashed right through the catwalks, breaking them.

"I see Enter failed to finish you off, you meddlesome little mutt!" The three looked up at the hole, seeing Yogostein standing there. "You're the only thing that can ruin this perfect plan, so I'll have to take care of this myself!"

The three got up, and quickly rushed out of the way as the robot leaped down. He crashed with a deafening clang, the Rangers barely being able to make it away in time.

"Your friends are doomed." The robot said, turning to Silver. The wolf raised his blade, before Yogostein shot out a stream of thunder from his spear.

The electricity wracked through his body, volts upon volts nearly shocking him into submission. With a final push, Silver was thrust backwards, slamming right into a metal pole.

"Time to finish you." The robot grunted as it stepped forwards. Yogostein raised his staff, preparing for a final strike…

Two shots suddenly flew in from behind, striking the robot on the back. He turned around, coming face to face with the SPD officers.

"Max, go on ahead!" Pink shouted. "We'll hold this montón de óxido off!"

Silver got to his knees, and then nodded. Using his remaining strength, he leaped up into the air, crashing right next to the elevator. He stumbled in watching as his friends fought against the monster.

He tried to keep himself steady, gripping onto his weakened arm as the elevator went up.

Hopefully, he wasn't too late.

---

Things weren't going well for the duo.

The monster lashed its tentacles, wrapping around Red's staff. It quickly pulled back, flicking the fox through the air. It slashed at the rabbit with its massive blade. She attempted to block with her own swords, but the sword pressed down hard enough to break through her defenses and slice into the ground, barely missing her.

The pipe monster slammed the fox back into the ground, before firing its cannons at the two. The bursts of water launched them back into the walls of the dam.

"So, should we be struggling with this right now?" Red asked, as they both got up.

"Something's weird." Blue said. "Its a lot stronger than it should be. And… bigger."

They drew their weapons, and rushed back at the beast. With a single swipe of its tentacles, it lashed them into the railings, bending the metal.

"Guys, I'll help!" Kyle said, rushing up from the corner of the dam. He was holding up the Zoolizer.

"Great, get to it so we don't all die here!" Red shouted.

"No, don't let him!"

Red and Blue turned to the exit. Silver stumbled through the door, gripping his arm. "Max, thank god you're here!" Blue shouted back. "Wait, what did you just say?"

"You can't let him use the Zoolizer!" The wolf shouted.

"Alright, I know you don't like the guy, but c'mon!" Red said.

"No, you don't get it!" Silver continued. "Kyle is actually that Kyuemon monster! He's been tricking you guys since day one!"

"What?" Kyle said, dumbfounded. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh, indeed, what are you talking about?"

The four looked up to see… Kyuemon?

"What?" Silver muttered, confused.

The yokai was floating in midair, covered in a dark aura. "As you can see, I'm here." He said. "So that can't possibly be me. Why would I want to disguise myself as a creature like you all anyway?"

"But… but…" The wolf stuttered. His heart was racing. What was happening? He knew that the actual Kyle was dead, and Enter told him that it was Kyuemon… who else could it be?

"But, your friend there does have something I've had my eyes on." Kyuemon continued, glaring down at the young fox. Kyle stepped back, in fear.

"What?" Blue said, turning back to Kyle. She looked back up. The monster's aura was building. He was about to do something.

"KYLE!" She shouted. "GET OUT OF THE-"

"Too late!" Kyuemon interrupted, before thrusting his hand forward. He fired a blast of dark energy, covering the fox in it for a few second.

He let out a deafening screech of pain, before a massive explosion rocked the entire dam.

The Zoolizer clattered to the ground. It was the only thing left.

Blue tensed up for a moment, before letting out a scream of her own. Red ran over, and wrapped his arms around her, trying to get her to calm down.

"Judy, Judy, calm down!" He said to the struggling rabbit.

"I LET SOMEONE ELSE DIE AGAIN!" She screamed. "IT HAPPENED AGAIN!"

"Chaos Pipe Banki." Kyuemon ordered. The monster grunted in response.

It quickly lashed at the two. Both of them only caught a brief glimpse as the tentacles wrapped around them, lifting them into the air. The Banki Beast then lashes the whips at the stone wall above the elevator, and then pulled them back, flinging them into the air. The monster quickly followed by shooting its blade hand up and slashing at the two, before quickly grabbing them again, and slamming them down into the ground.

The force of the strikes, and the stress of the situation, caused Nick and Judy to untransform. They attempted to get back up, uneasily getting to their knees.

The monster let out a roar, before firing a torrent of purple water from its cannons. The two passed out instantly.

Silver was frozen in fear. He had no idea what to do. His friends were practically dead.

And things got even worse.

The door behind him opened, causing the wolf to turn around. He was hoping to see Pink and Green. And he did.

He saw their unconscious bodies being flung through the door, followed by Yogostein stomping out of it.

"You really thought those two weaklings could beat me on their own?" The robot laughed. He quickly glanced up at Kyuemon. "I see you improvised a bit, but everything worked out!"

"Yes, it did." Kyuemon replied, floating down. "I can't believe they managed to fall for it for that long."

"It was you!" Silver shouted. "You were disguised as Kyle!"

"Correct." The yokai said. "I used an energy projection ninjutsu to help with my little… trick."

"And now, you're the only one left." Yogostein said. "Is this what it feels like to win a fight? It feels GOOD!"

Silver tensed up for a moment. He felt his entire body locking up for a brief moment. The pressure of everything was starting to cave in on him. He was the last one. If he didn't beat these monsters, not only would his friends die, but the entire planet would be in danger.

The stress crashed down on him at once, causing him to untransform as well. Everything seemed to go silent for a moment, but he was knocked out of his stress-induced trance by a sound.

The sound of rushing water.

There was a brief flash of purple, before he blacked out.

---

His eyes opened up again. He was back in the white void.

"MIKOTO!" He shouted. "I NEED TO TAKE THAT TEST AGAIN!"

"Very well." The ranger said, suddenly appearing in front of him. "Are you sure you're up to it?"

"I don't have a choice right now." Max growled.

AbareKiller let out a brief chuckle, before the podium appeared. It was still several yards away from the wolf. Almost instantly, the copy of ZooSilver, of himself, appeared.

"Why are you even trying?" It said. "Its not like you can do anything."

Max stood silent for a moment, before walking forwards. The ZooSilver double followed him across the path.

It started to talk, and didn't seem to stop.

"It's all your fault."

"You let them all down."

"You should just die with the rest of them."

"You're a failure in every way."

"A walking piece of garbage."

The words stung. But he kept walking, ignoring the copy's insults. As he continued to walk, without any reaction, the copy started to get… worried.

"Are you listening to me?" It said, almost desperately. "Just give it up! Nothing you can do will help them!"

The wolf continued to walk.

"I'm talking to you!" It shouted. "PAY ATTENTION TO ME!"

Finally, Max reached the pedestal. Floating in it was a coin, similar to the one he used to transform… only this one had the same claw symbol as the pedestal forming a bump in the middle of it.

"Wait!" The copy said, suddenly appearing on the opposite end of the pedestal. "You don't even know if this will help. Do you really want to risk it?"

Max glared at the copy's… no, his eyes. He looked down at the coin.

He scooped it up into his paw.

"Excellent job."

Max looked back up, AbareKiller replacing the copy.

"Thank you." Max said.

"But I'm sorry to say, you aren't done yet."

"What?"

"There is another challenge you must complete." AbareKiller continued, the podium sinking into the ground. "You've proved that you can ignore your own baggage when in danger…"

Max felt a breathing on his shoulder.

"But can you defeat yourself?"

The wolf dodged out of the way as the ZooSilver phantom slashed down with his claw tipped gloves. Max gulped, and reached for his wrist, preparing to transform.

His Zoolizer wasn't there.

The copy of himself rushed at him, Max only barely being able to avoid it in time. "You know how this will all end!" The copy growled, its metallic voice growing more distorted. "No matter what you do, you'll be left behind again!"

Max got back to his feet. How was he supposed to defeat himself without any defenses? All he could do was avoid it. Eventually it would overtake him…

Wait, he think he understood.

"So what?"

The copy froze for a moment.

"So what if they end up leaving me?" Max asked, solemnly. "Even if it does happen, I have good memories of them… And that's no reason to just give up either. This isn't just some personal stake, this is bigger than that. Bigger than myself."

"But doesn't that weight feel crushing!?" The copy asked. "There's no way a single mammal like you could do anything!"

"That's true." Max admitted. "But if I don't do anything, then nobody might. Doing something is better than nothing, even if it doesn't work, right?"

The copy stumbled back a bit. It seemed to be confused. "But… you can't… They'll replace you! If you bring them back, they'll replace you with someone else!"

Max sighed. "Well, maybe that's my fault, isn't it?"

The monster recoiled, seemingly in pain.

"If I get abandoned, then there's something wrong with me, isn't there?" The wolf continued. "If someone doesn't want to be my friend, or a teammate, or a partner… I'll just say its alright. Its not like it's the end of the world."

"I'll always feel bad about it…" He continued. "But I can't always just blame others for my shortcomings."

The copy let out a screechy, metallic wail. "NO!" It shouted, its body starting to vanish. "You can't do this! I am you! You can't get rid of me!"

"I'm not planning to." Max continued. "I'll never be able to get rid of you. And I just have to accept that."

"But for right now, you're gonna stay quiet."

The phantom let out a final metallic gurgle before vanishing completely.

"That was exhausting." Max admitted, his ears folding down.

"But you did a good job." AbareKiller said. "You managed to admit your own faults. That's the first step to overcoming any personal issue."

"Did you ever go through something like that?" Max asked the legendary Ranger.

"You could say I went through a bit of a… personal battle."

Max held out his paw, the coin still laying in it. "So, what is this?"

"That is the key to the ultimate power." AbareKiller explained. "It taps into the infinite potential of an energy called Dino Guts. Using it, you'll become more powerful than you ever imagined."

He gazed at it again, and then gripped it in his paw, tightly. "Thank you, Doctor."

"You only have to thank yourself."

---

Kyuemon floated down to the dam, and walked over to the Yellow Zoolizer, which sat on the ground. He reached down and picked it up, raising it to his fox-like face.

"This is the last opposition against us." He said. "Once we destroy this, we will be victorious!"

"Man, I never thought I'd ever get this close to winning!" Yogostein said. "It feels almost unreal!"

There was a sudden grunting noise from one of the unconscious bodies. They both turned to look at the wolf as his body started to move.

"What!?" Kyuemon let out.

"That's impossible!" Yogostein followed, as the wolf got back up to his feet. "No one could have taken that much Knockout Water and still be conscious!"

"Well, guess I'm the first!" Max said. "And now, I'm going to stop you all for good."

Kyuemon let out a laugh. "Please, how can a single, pathetic mammal like you defeat us?"

"Like this!"

He punched back on his Zoolizer, opening the mouth of it, and then closed it. He transformed into ZooSilver, and the repeated the action.

This time, he pulled out a coin. The one he had gotten from AbareKiller.

He plugged it into the Zoolizer, and then closed the mouth.

Almost instantly, an aura of silver energy burst from him as he let out a yell. The monsters were pushed back by the pure force of the aura, before there was a blinding flash of light.

"RAMPAGE"

It cleared, revealing ZooSilver… but he had changed.

While his helmet remained the same, there was now a large armor-piece strapped to his chest. It was shaped like a stylized wolf's head, the snout pointing downwards slightly, yellow markings resembling eyes on both sides, and jagged slits forming the teeth. The ears of the head were sharp points going off of his shoulders. The upper half of the armor was silver, while the bottom half was a dark purple-blue mix.

He had also gained armor on both of his arms and legs. His leg armor was the same blue-purple mix, and was noticeably bulkier, enhancing his feet with large claws. His upper arms were now covered in armor as well. Both arms started with similar bulky silver armor, but at the ends of each paw were completely different weapons.

On his right was a large U-shaped device, resembling a tuning fork. It was connected directly to the armor, leaving his paw revealed underneath it, and the device stretching out slightly past it. Between the device's two points crackled a large amount of energy.

The other arm simply had a massive claw paw. It resembled a normal paw, but much larger, and with much larger claws. The actual claws were the same color as the lower half of the armor, while the paw itself was colored silver.

Smoke was drifting from his body as he started to pant heavily, hunching down slightly. He let out a massive, savage howl, rocking the ground they were standing on and even causing the water to shake.

Before any of the villains could react, Silver raised his right arm up, and fired several shots from the device directly at Kyuemon. They rapidly struck his hand, causing the Yellow Zoolizer to hit the ground.

Kyuemon looked at his hand, which was smoking, and in pain. He glanced back up, just in time to dodge out of the way as Silver leaped through the air, slamming his claw down into the concrete.

He let out another howl, before looking Chaos Pipe Banki right in the eyes. The monster let out a grunt, and lashed its pipe tentacles at the wolf. Silver slashed at the pipes as they approached, cleaving right through them. The beast let out a roar of pain as its tentacles tumbled off the sides of the dam.

Silver planted his feet firmly on the ground, before letting out another howl. The ears of his armor started to light up, and then fired out a stream of fire. The wolf was lifted into the air by the jetpack, grabbing onto Chaos Pipe Banki's neck with his massive claw as he continued.

In seconds the two were high above the dam, Silver still gripping onto the monster. He stopped, and threw the monster upwards. Hovering there, he then unleashed a torrent of fire from his gun arm, large explosions visible from below as the blasts struck at the monster.

The robot continued to fall, and was about to pass directly in front of the wolf. As it fell, Silver slashed upwards with his claw, slashing right through most of the monster's body.

The body continued to fall towards the purple water, and splashed down into it with a heavy burst of water. A second later, there was another burst of water, this one much larger.

"He managed to beat Pipe Banki by himself!?" Yogostein shouted, astonished and a bit afraid. "That thing is… terrifying!"

"But there's no way it can defeat the giant form." Kyuemon stated, confidently.

The water suddenly started to glow, before the upper half of a massive Chaos Pipe Banki burst from it. It let out a roar at Silver, who was still hovering there silently.

The monster used its sword to slash at the wolf, but he deftly dodged out of the way. With a growl, Silver prepared to let out another howl.

This one was loud enough to even cause the giant monster to stumble a bit. Silver then let out a yell.

"HOWLING ECLIPSE CANNON!"

The armor piece suddenly flicked open, like a mouth, revealing a large cannon inside of it. The tip of the cannon started to glow, before firing out a massive silver laser. It sliced directly through the monster's body, causing it to let out a massive wail of pain.

Silver started to tilt his body upwards, bringing the massive beast up alongside the laser. Soon, the giant monster was high up in the air, the beam still piercing through its torso.

It gave out one final cry of pain, before it exploded.

The two villains were stunned silent.

"Well, I'm outta here!" Yogostein said, quickly disappearing in a burst of black smoke.

As soon as the robot vanished, the two unconscious mammals laying on the ground in front of where he was started to get up. Pink shook her head, before looking up.

She saw Silver land back on the ground, in his new, powerful form. The wolf locked eyes with Kyuemon, who cautiously stepped back.

"Fine, you win this round." Kyuemon said, frustrated. "But I WILL get revenge." he quickly vanished ina burst of dark energy.

"I feel like we missed something." Emily said as she got up, her suit retracting. Henry nodded alongside her comment as he retracted his suit as well.

They looked out into the dam. The water started to turn crystal clear again. They then looked up to the body of the fox and rabbit, still laying there. They started to twitch, and regain consciousness.

"What happened?" Judy said as she climbed to her feet.

"I feel like I just got hit by a freight liner." Nick groaned, clutching his head. He looked at the dam, and noticed the water was clean. "Hey, how'd the-?"

"Oh my god, is that Max?" Judy said.

Nick turned to face the wolf. He was facing towards them, his new armor dazzling in the midday sun. "Max, did you defeat all the monsters yourself…?" Nick asked, confused. "How did you…?"

The wolf didn't respond, only breathed heavily.

He suddenly untransformed back into normal, still breathing heavily. "You two alright?" He asked, sounding a bit weak.

"Yeah, we're fine." Judy said, a bit concerned. "Are… are you alright?"

"I'm perfectly fine." The wolf said stumbling forwards.

Suddenly, he started to cough, which quickly turned into a hack. He could feel something come up during one of the coughs.

"Oh god."

He looked at his paws, vision blurred. There was blood on him. It was on the ground.

The wolf started to pant heavier, and heavier, before his eyes rolled into the back of his head. He fell over, unconscious.

"OH GOD!"

---

He had only barely managed to pass through the exam. He didn't have an amazing time at the police academy either, but it was better than any "normal" schools he had been to.

He sat at the near back of the bullpen, waiting for the chief to show up and give the first assignment. It was nerve-wracking. He had no idea what he could be thrown into on his first day on the force.

"Hey, sit up straight, the chief will get mad if you don't." Whispered a tiger sitting next to him.

"Oh, alright." Max said, sitting up straight. "Uh, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"What was your first day here like?"

The tiger chuckled. "You don't have anything to worry about, kid." He said. "It should be something easy. Just go with the flow, and you'll get the hang of it all eventually."

"Oh, alright." The wolf said. "Hey, what's your name?"

"Richard Delgato, been here for a few years." He said. "You are?"

"Maxwell Wolford." He introduced.

"Well, Max, hope you enjoy your time here."

---

Max opened his eyes, and looked around. He was… in a hospital, it looked like. Nick, Judy, Emily, and Henry were there, looking over him as he laid down in bed. It looked like Nick and Judy were standing on a platform of some kind. There was also a doctor there, an antelope.

"Ugh, what happened?" he muttered weakly, trying to get up.

"No, keep laying down!" Judy said, hopping up onto the bed to push him back down.

""yeah, its best for you to keep still." The doctor said.

"What's happening?" Max repeated. "I can't remember anything after…"

"You started bleeding from the mouth, and passed out." Nick said, bluntly. "We had to rush you to the hospital."

"You have heavy internal damages, Mr. Wolford." The doctor said. "We only barely managed to keep you alive."

The wolf layed back down fully. "How long have I been out?"

"A few days." Henry said.

"We're just glad you're alive." Emily followed.

"Don't think you'll be able to get back to crime fighting anytime soon, though." The doctor continued. "With your injuries, it'll take a few weeks for you to fully recover."

The wolf let out a groan, and then a sigh. "Can you leave me and my friends alone for a bit?" He asked.

The antelope nodded, and headed out of the room, shutting the door behind him.

"I need to tell you guys about Kyle." He said. "I went to his home, and spoke to his mother. He died a few years back."

"So, that means we were being played the entire time?" Judy said. "That's… somewhat of a relief."

"It was that Kyuemon guy. He set up a trap for you guys months ago, and this was the culmination o fit." Max continued. "I don't really know what to say. I'm sorry."

"We'll figure that all out later." Nick growled, before clearing his throat. "Uh, I mean, after we figure out what to do about this." He held up the Yellow Zoolizer.

Max was silent for a second. "Hey, can you guys leave me and Nick alone for a bit?" He asked.

"Uh, sure?" Judy said, shrugging.

"Why do you want to talk to me?" Nick asked.

"I dunno." The wolf said. "Just want to."

Judy turned to Emily and Henry, and shrugged. The three quickly headed out of the room.

"I think I just need to get this out to someone I can trust." Max said with a sigh. "You can keep a bit of a secret, right?"

"I'm great at keeping secrets." He said, with a wink.

"So, when you guys were trying to find a new ZooYellow, I kind of started thinking about myself." The wolf continued. "About how much weaker I was than you guys, you know?"

"How are you weaker?" Nick said with a chuckle.

"You got those cool super forms, new weapons, new robots…" Max sighed. "I wanted something like that. But I never got it until just right now. I guess I just felt a bit… useless. And when ZooYellow started coming up, I thought you were going to… replace me."

"Max, that's stupid." Nick said. "Why would we replace you? You're invaluable."

"I know it's stupid!" The wolf shouted. "But its just… its how my brain works some times. I just hated who I was for a while."

"Why didn't you tell us?" The fox asked.

"Because… I thought you guys would think I was even lamer than I was before." He admitted.

Nick took a deep breath. "Listen, Wolfsbane, if there's one thing I know about, its self-loathing."

Max's ears perked up at the statement.

"I spent most of my life hating myself for the choices I made." The fox started. "I made some choices I've considered over the years, and even after all this time, I've still had horrible doubts about them."

"Like becoming friends with a mafioso?"

"Yeah, sure, that one."

"My point is, you should've told us." The fox finished. "We're friends, you can come and talk to us about stuff like that."

The wolf sighed. "Can I ask you one more thing?"

"What?"

"You need to find someone to be ZooYellow." Max said. "If I'm like this right now, I'll be useless when the next monster attack happens. Think you can try and find someone for the role?"

He held his paw out.

Nick quickly gripped it.

"You got it, pal."

---

Ahhh this one took a longer time than I expected!

This chapter feels kind of self-indulgent, mostly because its about my terrible self-insert and his mental health problems. But this, oddly enough, happened at a pretty apt point in my life, and it might've helped me get over some stuff.

We're closing in on the end of this arc. There's like, three episodes left. It's gonna be a lot of fun, so keep an eye out.

Next time, there is no monster.