Chapter 3
Sky stood, tense and angry, inside an elevator that wasn't moving anywhere near fast enough. Bridge was beside him, apparently the only one not taken by surprise when he'd turned and walked out of the command center without being dismissed. Everyone else's eyes had been on Sam and Nova, disappearing into the timestream, when Sky's anger finally began to win out over his shock.
He'd just seen Jack. Or he should have. He'd been planning to, but Jack hadn't shown at breakfast and they'd all been called to Command before Sky could go looking for him. Jack hadn't even come back to his room the night before--which Sky knew, because he'd fallen asleep there waiting for him. Just a few more minutes, Jack kept saying, his voice distracted over his morpher.
In Kat's lab until who knew when, and then mysteriously gone this morning? What the hell was that? He was holding Jack's morpher in his hand, so that was proof Jack had been around long enough to give it to Cruger. He couldn't have dropped in on the rest of them long enough to say, "Hey, by the way, I quit?"
He quit? He'd turned in his morpher and walked away? What happened to "together or not at all," "I won't leave you," and "Oh, Sky, I'm so different from Dru!" Because Dru was a fluke, a bad apple, the one guy in a million who wouldn't appreciate how much he was giving up by letting Sky go.
Yeah, Sky thought with a sneer. Jack seemed really fucking different right now.
He strode off of the elevator before the doors were all the way open, not caring if Bridge followed or not. His roommate had been smart enough to keep his mouth shut this far. And frankly, Sky didn't think there was much anyone could do to piss him off more than he already was.
Jack's door opened for him, unlocked and un-knocked-upon. Nothing had changed in the last hour. The room was exactly as he'd left it on his way to breakfast: Jack's stuff everywhere, Sky's things folded neatly at the end of the spare bed.
Which told him exactly nothing. Jack had joined SPD with two shirts, a pair of pants, and some old sneakers, all of which he'd been wearing at the time. It was entirely possible that he'd left SPD without much more.
"Sky?" Bridge's voice was quiet.
Sky glared down the hall at him, but Bridge just jerked his head at their own room. "What?" Sky demanded. He was already walking, faster, hurrying, trying not to think that maybe Jack was in his room.
He's gone, he chanted silently. Jack's gone, he left, they always leave, grow up already. He's gone.
Jack was in their room. Sprawled across Sky's bed, one pillow under his head and the other curled loosely in his arm, he was wearing a black t-shirt with his canvas jacket and jeans. He'd kicked off his shoes before climbing onto the bed, but he hadn't made any effort to pull the covers over him. He was, to all appearances, sound asleep.
"Jack," Sky said, and he'd meant it to sound stern and unforgiving but even to his ears he sounded pathetically grateful.
"He wasn't here when I left for breakfast," Bridge said, still quiet and maybe a little puzzled. "I'm sure I would have noticed someone who isn't you sleeping on your bed."
"Jack," Sky repeated, louder this time. "What are you doing?"
"Huh?" Jack bolted upright, staring at him in total non-comprehension. "What? What time is it?"
"It's eight twenty-three," Bridge offered.
"What the hell is this?" Sky demanded, holding up the Red delta morpher. He tossed it in Jack's direction, but Jack didn't make any effort to grab it. Instead he just watched, blinking, apparently baffled as the little device landed on the bed next to them.
"It looks like my morpher," Jack said after a moment. "I thought I gave that to..."
His eyes widened, and Jack lifted a horrified gaze to Sky's. "Tell me Cruger didn't give you this."
"Well, I could tell you that, but then I'd be lying," Sky snapped. "Not only did the commander give me your morpher, effectively promoting me to your position, he also told the entire team that you'd left SPD. He went so far as to imply that we'd never see you on base again."
"Actually, he just didn't answer when Syd asked why," Bridge pointed out. "Which I guess did seem kind of ominous. But he didn't really have time, because she was kind of upset that you hadn't told us, and Z was trying to calm everyone down--"
"No, look--" Jack swung his legs off of the bed, surprisingly coordinated for someone who had looked as confused as he had a moment ago. "This is my fault; I wanted to catch you guys before he did, but you must have already gone to breakfast and then I fell asleep..."
"What the hell happened?" Sky interrupted, only slightly mollified by Jack's obvious distress. "Were you in the lab all night?"
"Yeah." Jack blinked at him, the stream of words stopping just like that. "Sorry."
"Kat's lab?" Bridge repeated. He said it like he knew it was true but it didn't quite make enough sense to be a statement. "What were you doing there all night?"
"Trying to help A Squad," Jack said, lifting a hand to rub his eyes and push his braids out of his face. "I called Hope, you know, from the Kerovan Rangers? But I couldn't tell her exactly what happened to them, and she couldn't tell Kat exactly what to look for, or something... so she's on her way here."
It took Sky a second to get it, but Bridge understood right away. "Hope's coming to help Kat?" he guessed.
"Yeah." Jack was frowning. "I told her to call me when she got in, not the base, 'cause Cruger was on a tear even before the whole morpher thing. I didn't really count on that," he added, glancing down at the morpher still sitting beside him on the bed.
"Guys?" Z's voice came from just outside in the hall. Bridge turned automatically, but Sky didn't take his eyes off of Jack. He heard Z call, "They're down here!" and then she and Syd were squeezing into the room with the rest of them.
"What's going on?" Syd wanted to know, looking around at all of them as she pushed her way past Sky and Bridge. "Jack! Why did you give Cruger your morpher? Are you really leaving SPD? Why didn't you tell us?"
This last question was punctuated by a punch to Jack's shoulder that was hard enough to make him wince, and Sky didn't think he was playing it up. Syd's fists were a bitch when she was mad. It was some small amount of satisfaction by proxy, since Sky couldn't think up a rational excuse for socking Jack himself.
"I'm sorry, okay?" Jack held up his hands to defend himself, but Sky saw his gaze go to Z when he was satisfied that Syd wouldn't hit him again. "I screwed up. We played chicken and he won. It was really late, and I guess I just dozed off before I could find you guys."
"What happened?" Z asked. Weirdly, the note of sympathy in her voice made Sky bristle almost as much as the way she slipped past him to join Jack on his bed. She picked up the Red morpher before she sat down, studying it for a moment before handing it back to Jack without so much as a glance in Sky's direction.
Jack took it, but he did look at Sky. "Cruger stormed into Kat's lab at... I don't know, say six-thirty," he said. "He wanted to know what we were doing, running tests on A Squad when the base is a mess and the city is full of Grumm's leftover lackeys."
"Is that where you were last night?" Z interrupted, and now she looked over at Sky too. She'd come looking for Jack just before midnight and found Sky instead. "Working with Kat?"
"Yeah," Jack said with a sigh. "I feel like it's my fault, you know? For letting the commander dismiss us as soon as we got back. Kat thinks they were programmed, some kind of subconscious trigger that didn't kick in until they were alone with Cruger--and we just walked out. We let A Squad capture him."
"First off, that's ridiculous," Syd said, folding her arms. "We didn't know. And second, how come we didn't know? Why didn't we find anything like that when we were running a bajillion tests on them back at the outpost?"
"Well, if it makes you feel better, Kat hasn't found anything like that either," Jack admitted, putting his hands on the edge of the bed and bracing himself as he leaned forward. "They look perfectly normal to her too. But she says it's the only thing that makes sense."
"Maybe it is," Bridge said slowly. "I mean, they seemed normal enough when we picked them up. But as soon as we got back here... I thought there was something weird about them as we were leaving the command center."
"Should have listened to you," Jack said, shaking his head. "Turns out it was our problem after all."
"What happened with Cruger?" Sky hadn't forgotten the point in all of this. "So he's got something against A Squad now; who's surprised? I'm not too thrilled with them myself."
"They didn't turn on us, Sky." Jack was giving him a look that left no room for doubt, a look that said Sky was the disappointment here for not believing. "Not willingly. Not ever."
"Rangers can turn bad," Sky snapped. "They're only human."
"Or whatever Miguel is," Syd added.
"Hey, I've got an idea," Jack said sarcastically. "Let's re-enact my entire morning, only this time I'll be me and you can be Commander Cruger."
Bridge appeared to take this suggestion seriously. "Wouldn't that be kind of a waste of time?" he wanted to know.
"What did he say?" Z insisted, leaning over to bump Jack's shoulder with her own. "Did he kick you out or what? He can't think you had anything to do with A Squad going crazy on us."
"Nah." Jack nudged her in return, an affectionate if somewhat distracted gesture. "I think he came by to chew out Kat, actually. But when he found out I'd been there all night, he implied that I was sabotaging my own team for the sake of people who are basically traitors.
"I told him I'd give up my morpher before I let him accuse another Ranger of treason," Jack continued with an offhanded shrug that hid more than it revealed. "He called my bluff."
Syd was frowning. "What, just like that?"
Jack snorted. "There was a lot more shouting than that. I'm hitting the high points. Which, by the way, include Kat standing up for me and Cruger threatening to fire her for--" He paused, lifting his gaze to the ceiling as he recited, "Insubordination, inefficiency, inconsistency, and... some other 'in' word that I can't remember. He was very alliterative."
"Which is pretty impressive," Bridge commented, "when you consider that English isn't even his first language."
"He threatened to fire Kat?" Z repeated. She acted like this was the biggest surprise of the morning.
"Followed by her threatening to quit first," Jack agreed. "They're not speaking to each other right now."
"Like anyone can keep track of when they're on or off," Syd said, rolling her eyes. "They'll probably be best friends again by lunch time."
"I wonder how Isinia's doing," Bridge remarked.
Sky turned to stare at him, and he wasn't the only one.
"Well, the commander has been under a lot of pressure lately," Bridge pointed out. "A Squad betrays him, he's held captive aboard the Terror, he has to kill Grumm--twice--and he ends up rescuing his wife who's been a prisoner of war for at least a decade. Not to mention the whole suicide Omni mission... thing."
"Hey, the last few days haven't been a picnic for any of us," Jack protested. "We're the ones who had to find A Squad and then fight them. We're lucky we didn't go down with the Delta Squad Megazord. And we're the ones who had to retake the base. It's not like he's got a monopoly on being betrayed and captured, either."
"And we're handling it so much better," Z finished, rolling her eyes.
"Maybe we should all get some therapy," Syd suggested brightly. "We could declare amnesty for anyone who quits or is fired before then."
"Hope for Jack," the Red morpher said, and whatever Jack was about to say went unsaid as he stared at the morpher like he'd forgotten he was holding it. Then he looked up at Sky, like--
Sky raised his eyebrows. "It's not mine," he said sharply.
Jack looked away as he flipped his morpher open. "Go for Jack."
"I'm inbound to SPD," the voice came back. "ETA six and a half minutes."
"Yeah, all right," Jack said. "You got a landing pad?"
"Yeah, but I'm gonna need an escort," she answered. "Unless you want me to pull rank as soon as I set down."
"I'll be there," Jack promised. "The base is still kind of a mess."
"Got it." And she was gone.
"I'm gonna go meet her," Jack said, lowering his morpher. "You guys--"
The alert howled through the residential levels, and he closed his mouth. Z jumped up immediately, but Jack didn't move. They all just stood there, frozen, as he looked up at Sky and offered him his morpher.
"Don't be ridiculous," Sky said, folding his arms. "Contrary to your inflated opinion of yourself, we can go a few hours without a Red Ranger."
"Take care of A Squad," Syd agreed. Her voice was unexpectedly gentle. "Let them know we want them back, too."
Jack nodded once, and Z clapped him on the shoulder. They turned to go, but Sky kept his eye on Jack a second longer. "Stay out of Cruger's way," he said.
Jack tossed off a mock-salute. "Yes sir," he said easily.
Sky frowned at him, but he had to go and Jack knew it. Jack should be going with them. Maybe Syd was right... maybe they would all calm down in a day or two. Maybe a little time was all it would take for things to get back to normal. Or what passed for normal around here.
Unfortunately, the day only went downhill from there. He spent most of it tracking and apprehending "leftover lackeys," responding to two requests for backup from the C and D squads--deployed to assist theirs, and that irony wasn't lost on him--and extracting a group of first responders who had gotten in over their heads in one of the demolished sections of the city. He tried to stop by Kat's lab in between calls.
"What, you skip debriefing?" Jack demanded, the first time he showed up.
"Cruger's on a call," Sky said, tossing him a bottle of orange juice from the mess. "Did you ever eat?"
"Oh, yeah, this is a real popcorn crowd," Jack said. He rolled his eyes at the rest of the lab. "Every time I try to sneak away, they want to pick my brain about the rescue or use me as a baseline for some test or something."
"Any luck?" Sky asked. It was a foolish question, and he knew it. If there were progress, he wouldn't have to ask.
Jack just shrugged, popping his orange juice open as he offered, "Hope's got a lot of experience with this stuff. She and Kat are driving each other crazy--coming at it from opposite directions, you know?"
He didn't know, and he said so. He glanced around as he did it, but no one seemed to be paying any attention to them. Sky was--just slightly--more interested in talking to Jack than in actually finding out what was going on, so he didn't look too closely.
"Kat wants to know what happened," Jack said, swallowing. He gestured vaguely with his orange juice bottle as he added, "Hope just wants to know if it's going to happen again. Doesn't care so much about the cause if we can neutralize the effects."
"Seems like you can't have one without the other." Sky hitched one hip up on a swiveling stool and turned a little, watching Jack take another gulp of juice. He wondered if he'd be subject to mockery from now until the end of time if he brought Jack something to eat.
Jack shrugged again. "Hope's trying to duplicate the situation with Cruger in simulation, so we can find out if the whole squad's gonna go off the deep end all over again. If not, maybe we can at least let them out for a while, see if they can help us figure out what happened."
Sky stared at him. "Let them out?"
"Yeah." Jack eyed him over his orange juice. "They're not weird now, Sky. The whole mind control thing ended when Grumm did. Or it wore off on its own; we're not really sure."
"That's so reassuring," Sky scoffed. "They know how to act non-violent when they're under observation in solitary confinement. Good for them."
"They're not in solitary anymore," Jack said. "We couldn't do that to them, Sky. They'd go crazy. You of all people know what it's like," he added, and his tone sounded more than a little accusing.
"They tried to kill us," Sky reminded him. "And it's not like they're the exception lately. I'm sick of getting screwed over by people I trust."
"Yeah, well, the alternative is not to trust anyone." Jack was studying him with a gaze that demanded understanding. "I've been there, and believe me: it's not worth it. Better a few mistakes than a lifetime of bitterness."
"Whatever," Sky muttered. "You want some lunch?"
As a diversionary tactic, it worked a little too well. He should have realized he was in trouble when Jack leaned back against a lab bench, sliding his hands along it in either direction as he regarded Sky speculatively. Sprawling while standing up, that's what he was doing. It was the look of a man who had never known military posture in his life.
"Sky," Jack drawled, and truth be told, Sky was too busy trying not to stare to notice his tone. "Did you just ask me out?"
Sky blinked, catching his eye in surprise. "No."
"I disagree," Jack said, a smile spreading across his face. "I think you just asked me to go to lunch with you."
Sky rolled his eyes, letting the stool he was sitting on spin all the way around. The split second he spent looking away from Jack gave his brain time to catch up. "I was actually going to bring you something to eat, since apparently you're too lazy to go find food yourself. But if I was asking you out--which I wasn't--I don't know why you'd be surprised."
"Oh, right," Jack scoffed. "Why would I be surprised? Because Sky Tate is such a man of the people. I bet there's roses on Valentine's Day and chocolate on my birthday. We'll probably have to celebrate our one year anniversary.
"Hey," he added, eyes narrowing. "Is that why you asked me to lunch? So we'd have a first anniversary date?"
"For the record," Sky told him, "I didn't ask you to lunch."
"Uh-huh." Jack seemed to agree with this about as much as he agreed with anything Sky said. "So how long do I have to go out with you before one of us is allowed to ask the other on a date?"
"I'm sleeping with you," Sky said. "We're not technically going out."
"Technically," Jack countered, "we've been going out for months."
"Could you two settle your domestic dispute somewhere else?" Kat's voice broke in. "This really isn't as easy as it looks."
Jack grinned at his expression. "Hey, Sky," he said easily. "Want to go to lunch with me?"
It was a good thought, and getting kicked out of the lab, however temporarily, pretty much guaranteed Jack enough time to get some food. Sky, however, had no such guarantees. They were only halfway to the mess when the alert went off again, and B Squad--minus Jack--was back on the streets.
The next time he stopped by, A Squad was there. Sky waited just inside the door, not really wanting their attention, but of course Jack yelled across the room as soon as he noticed him. "Hey, Sky!" he called. "Present for you!"
Sky caught the projectile hurtling toward him reflexively. Plastic cup, cellophane seal. Blue jello.
"Cute," he said, catching Jack's eye as he held it up.
Jack just grinned. "I thought so."
Apparently Hope's concerns had taken priority over Kat's, at least in the short term. A Squad was being subjected to a whole new battery of tests, but they weren't restrained in any way and no one in the room had a weapon that Sky could see. He supposed, if nothing else, Kat had an emergency button that the commander hadn't failed to answer yet.
They were gone when he made it back to the lab that evening. Jack was still there, though, and he couldn't help but wonder what Jack had to contribute that he could spend the entire day with Kat and Hope. Or maybe he was just doing what Sky had told him to and staying out of Cruger's way.
Yeah. That would be the day. Not only was Kat's lab normally the commander's favorite haunting ground, but the last time Jack had done what he was told was--
Well, two nights ago, actually. The thought was as irrelevant as it was appealing.
"Hey," Jack's voice said. "You okay?"
Sky blinked. He wasn't entirely sure how Jack had ended up next to him, and he had enough presence of mind to know that was a bad thing. "Okay?" he said aloud. "Yes. At the top of my game? Probably not."
"Long day," Jack said, not bothering to make it a question. He knew perfectly well the day had sucked. Just because he hadn't been with B Squad didn't mean he couldn't guess what they were going through.
"Yeah," Sky said, looking around for somewhere to sit. He wasn't sure they were done for the night, even now, and he might as well take the rest where he could get it. "For you too, it looks like."
"Frustrating as hell," Jack admitted with a grimace. "I hate being stuck in here while you guys are out saving the city. I heard even D Squad was deployed downtown."
"Where we promptly had to rescue them," Sky muttered. The lowest ranking squad had been assigned to base cleanup until it became clear that SPD's regular deployments weren't enough.
"You need real backup," Jack said. Like that was news to anyone. "Hope says we should just turn A Squad loose and cross our fingers."
"Right." Sky didn't have energy to waste on the incredulity that suggestion deserved. "Because we want to fight the good guys when there are enough bad ones out there to overrun the city."
"They're not going to fight us," Jack protested. "Have you even seen them? Have you talked to them? They're just as confused as we are and all they really want is a chance to make up for what they did."
"We can't pretend they're fine!" Sky burst out. "They were POWs, Jack! They were stranded on a planet with a ship that wasn't even salvageable, no civilization, limited defenses, and zero outside contact! That's solitary, and whatever went wrong in their heads, you can't just throw them out on the streets after something like that and expect them to do their job!"
Jack folded his arms, and the sudden quiet in the lab made Sky look around. "What?" he demanded. "There are protocols for this sort of thing! Recovered MIAs have a set readjustment period based on nature and duration of the absence. Former POWs are required to enter counseling and--"
"Sky," Jack interrupted. "Okay. We get it."
"I don't think you do!" Sky exclaimed. "B Squad is it, Jack! You said it yourself, it's all down to us now. Then you go and give up your morpher in some stupid pissing contest with Cruger, and we're down not just a megazord but a SWAT flier and a Red Ranger on top of it!"
In what was just the final straw, the alert started to howl through the base again, and a voice Sky didn't recognize was summoning B Squad back into action. He threw up his hands in disgust. Sliding off of his stool, he headed for the door.
"Sky." Calm and aggravating at the same time, Jack's voice was still enough to stop him in his tracks. He turned reluctantly to see Jack holding out the Red morpher again. "Take it."
He was tempted, just for a moment. Because Jack almost deserved it for ditching his team in the first place. But it was still Jack's Red morpher, and taking it would somehow mean admitting that B Squad was no longer Jack's team.
"Sky," Jack repeated, less patiently this time. "The Battlizer. You look like you're about to fall asleep on your feet. You need every advantage you can get. Just take it already."
"B Squad to Command," the allcall blared. "B Squad, please report to Command immediately."
"We're coming," Sky muttered, snatching the morpher out of Jack's hand before he could think about it any more. "We always come. You don't have to keep calling us."
"You'll have backup," Jack told him. "You will have backup, Sky. Don't lose it out there."
It didn't even deserve a response. Sky waved over his shoulder, on his way out of the lab and back to Command for the fourth time that day. Would they ever be able to save the city and have it stay saved? Just for a few days? A few hours?
He was exhausted. That was the only explanation he could offer when the Battlizer failed him, the ground gave way beneath him, and only his SWAT gear kept him from getting crushed in the collapse. The others were coming. He knew the team would be there. He had even, somehow, believed Jack when he promised the impossible.
That didn't keep him from being surprised when another Red Ranger in modified SWAT gear appeared above him. He was hallucinating. He had to be. Except that his hallucination was reaching out a hand to him and instinct that wouldn't be denied prompted him to grab for it.
The hand was solid. A Squad Red hauled him up out of the pit with a strength that Sky could have summoned one rescue, two fights, and five hours ago. "Charlie," he gasped, accepting the hand on his arm as he tried to find his balance again.
"Nope," Jack's voice said cheerfully. "Good guess, though."
His head whipped around, the Power compensating once again for his increasingly slow reaction time. "Jack," he snapped. "What are you doing here?"
"Saving your butt," Jack told him. "I'll just assume there's a 'thank you' coming at some point."
All of A Squad was there. Green and Blue were arresting the guys who'd given B Squad so much trouble. Yellow was all over the weapons, the equipment that had probably compromised structural integrity for miles around. And Pink was, somewhat awkwardly, picking up the rest of B Squad and dusting them off.
"Jack," Sky said, staring at them with a sort of horrified fascination. "What did you do?"
Jack held his arms out to the sides, and Sky could just imagine the look of wide-eyed innocence under his visor. "I brought backup. I told you I would."
"Sky!" It was Syd who got to him first, although B Squad was starting to pull itself together while A Squad judged and confined their erstwhile opponents. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," he said brusquely. Then, to Jack, he added, "Cruger's going to kill you."
Jack shrugged, and Syd spared him a brief glance. "Who, A Squad? Why?"
Sky was saved from answering when Jack demorphed, and Syd actually took a step back in surprise. "Jack? What are you doing here?"
"Got tired of sitting on the sidelines," he said flippantly.
A Squad Blue came up behind him--not tall enough to be Miguel--and offered him three containment cards. "Thanks," Jack said, taking them and waving them in Sky's direction with a smug smile. "Oh, and you're welcome. By the way."
"Who are you?" Sky demanded, paying no attention to him.
The Blue Ranger's armor disappeared, leaving a blonde girl blinking at him in its wake. "Hi," she said, smiling uncertainly.
This time it was Bridge who did a double take. "Sophie?"
"Came back to help when she heard about the attack," Jack said, and it said something about the magnitude of Grumm's final offensive that, even after all they'd been through, he didn't have to specify which one. "She happened to wander through the lab at the right time."
Sky couldn't tell whether Jack was joking or not. "Seriously," he said, eyeing Jack with a look that was totally lost behind his visor. "Cruger will kill you."
"I don't think so." A Squad Yellow's voice was disturbingly familiar, and when she demorphed it was Kat Manx standing there in front of them. "The commander said he didn't want to hear another word about A Squad until the Delta base is at optimum efficiency again. We're just following orders."
Z got it before Sky did, which had to be another sign of his fatigue. "Cruger doesn't know about this?" she demanded.
"What is this, exactly?" Bridge wondered aloud. "Is A Squad back in prison?"
"Voluntary rehab," Jack told him. "At least until we figure out that trigger. It was Charlie's idea," he added, glancing at Sky. "It'll give them a chance to re-acclimate to Earth."
"We're just kind of, uh, holding the morphers for them," A Squad Green said. Sky recognized Boom's voice immediately. "Temporary reassignment. Just filling in, really. No big deal." His obvious enthusiasm belied the attempt at nonchalance.
"Who's Pink?" Syd wanted to know. She didn't seem bothered by the idea.
The other Pink Ranger demorphed after only one false start, and a blonde woman with an orange baseball cap gave them an idle wave. "Hey," she said, her gaze on Sky for a long moment before it flicked to the others. "Ally Samuels. Nice to meet you."
Ally. Sky stared back at her for a second too long, and when he glanced to the right he found the rest of B Squad waiting on him. He nodded once. "Power down," they declared simultaneously, and their armor burst into confetti nothingness at the same time.
"Sydney Drew," Syd said, waving at Ally without offering her hand. "You must be Jack's friend. We've heard a lot about you."
"Really, a lot," Z repeated, holding out her hand with a smile. "I'm Z. Good to meet you."
"Same here." Ally shook her hand, and Sky didn't miss the fact that her smile was almost a mirror of Z's. "On both counts."
The similarity between the two was more reassuring than startling. Sure, Jack said he'd had a crush on Z once, but they might as well be brother and sister now. Of course he would befriend someone who acted just like her.
Still. Just when he'd gotten rid of one Sam...
"How long have you been on base?" Bridge was asking Sophie. He didn't seem to be paying any attention to Ally, even when Sophie looked at her uncertainly, until Z nudged him gently and tilted her head.
"Oh, uh, hi?" Bridge lifted one hand in her direction, a sort of absent wave that turned into something else when he used the other hand to point at his gloves. "I don't do the... no. Not so much."
"Introduce yourself?" Ally said, giving him an amused and vaguely skeptical look that made Sky frown. Bridge might not have spelled it out, but he was wearing gloves and the implication was perfectly clear.
"Shake hands," Z jumped in. "This is Bridge. And the unsmiling one is Sky. Nothing personal, he's just mad that you've been monopolizing his boyfriend."
"Sounds pretty personal to me." Ally eyed him with an expression not unlike the one Z had given him the first time they met. Just try it, that look said. Just try to get to me. I dare you.
Sky held out his hand, because what did he care about her challenges. Jack had spent a lot of time off the base during the days following Cruger's offer to promote him. So he'd made a friend--one that he trusted with a morpher. So what?
Ally shook his hand, but of course she couldn't keep her mouth shut. "So are you Bridge's opposite?" she wanted to know. "You do shake hands, but you don't introduce yourself?"
"Even if he doesn't kill you," Sky told Jack, releasing her hand and putting both of his behind his back, "he may kill them." With the possible exception of Kat. "Did you think of that?"
"You don't have to sound so happy about it," Ally muttered.
"No one's going to kill anyone," Jack said firmly. "We're doing a job that needs to be done, and if the commander's got a problem with that, he can fire me again for all I care. Until then--or until Charlie and her team are back on the streets--we are A Squad."
"You can demorph now, Boom," Kat added.
"Oh, yeah. Right." The Green Ranger fumbled through the demorphing process, somehow managing to end up with a proud expression at the end of it. "Ready to serve. That's me."
"Jack, they're not even... you know." Syd gave them a sideways look that seemed to be mostly aimed at Ally. "Cadets."
"They've all had training," Jack pointed out. "Except for Ally. And man, you should see what she can do with a coat rack."
Sky snorted at Ally's small smile. Clearly a private joke. "When they start issuing coat racks instead of blasters," he snapped, "that will matter. In the meantime, could we focus on how completely ridiculous this is?"
"Actually, I think it's a great idea," Z remarked. "If we're ever going to have a day off again, we need another squad, and we all wanted to promote Sophie months ago. Kat and Boom know what they're doing.
"Maybe Ally's not SPD," she added, and now she was looking right at him, "but Jack chose her, and this morning you told Cruger you'd follow anyone he chose. Is Jack so different?"
"That's a good point," Bridge said thoughtfully. "I mean, Jack trusts her. And Jack and Z didn't have any training when they became Rangers either."
Sky's biggest problem with Z was Bridge. He was perfectly aware that her biggest problem with him was Jack, so maybe that made them even. He didn't know. But he was pretty sure that, even or not, stealing each other's best friends meant that she didn't expect anything but the worst from him.
He was oh so happy to disappoint her.
"Your squad," Sky told Jack, because he was not involved. He held up his hands to show how not involved he was. "Your decision."
"Hah," Jack said. "Someone write that down. Sky just said I'm allowed to make decisions for my squad."
"Actually, when he said 'your decision,'" Syd put in, "I think he meant 'your career.'"
Sky snorted, because that was exactly what he'd meant. Jack already knew and probably didn't care. Which in many ways made him the perfect person for this particular problem: SPD did need A Squad, Charlie's team wasn't duty-ready, and the other squads weren't currently promotable. For a variety of reasons.
Enter Jack's temporary A Squad. Sophie was even qualified, at least for B Squad, and there was no real reason she couldn't fill in. Kat was actually overqualified. Boom shouldn't have been let anywhere near a morpher, in his opinion, and Ally was a variable he'd rather not know too much about. But as teams went, it wasn't the worst he'd seen.
"My SPD 'career' has always been so much more important to me than the safety of the city," Jack was saying. "In fact, just last week, I accepted an award for how well I follow rules at the expense of my friends' well-being. I hung it on my wall; I'll show it to you when we get back."
Bridge was giving him an odd look. "Really?"
"No," Jack told him.
What Jack should have gotten an award for was his attitude. He made things happen just by assuming that they would. He didn't stop to ask, either for permission or for help, he just went ahead and did whatever he thought was right. Sometimes it blew up in his face. Other times he won the day.
It was impossible to tell which of those times this one was going to be. Cruger was gone again when they returned to base, off to debrief at some Galaxy Command meeting, so Kat took the opportunity to requisition Jack's new team some uniforms. Sophie, Boom, and Ally went with the rest of them to the mess hall.
After dinner, which was late but mercifully uninterrupted by urgent summons, Z offered to show Ally around the base. Sophie disappeared with Boom and Bridge to do whatever geeks did in their downtime, and Sky headed for Command. Syd offered to keep him company, but Jack waved her off.
"I got it, Syd," he said, in the tone of voice that meant, really, go away.
At least Jack waited until they were alone in Command to confront him. "Talk to me, Sky. You got a problem with this?"
"I said I didn't," Sky reminded him evenly.
"No, you said it was my decision." Jack watched him fold his arms, but his own expression was inscrutable. "And before that, I believe the word 'ridiculous' was mentioned. So. What?"
"What do you want me to say?" Sky demanded. "I'm mad at you, jealous of your little friend, feeling betrayed because you put together a squad SPD desperately needs and apprehended gunrunners who were kicking our butts in the process?"
"If that's how you feel, then yeah." Jack's gaze didn't waver. "I want you to say it."
"I just did," Sky snapped.
"Okay, start with betrayed." Jack braced one arm on a control console and stared him down. "Why? Because you wanted me to stay with B Squad? Or because you wanted to be on A Squad?"
"I don't care about A Squad!" Sky shouted. "You fucking left us! After you promised not to! Together or not at all, you said. We move up together. And now Cruger's getting exactly what he wanted: you leading his front line team!"
Jack had the nerve to laugh. "Sky, you're leading his front line team. I'm gambling Charlie's reputation and Kat's charm that Cruger will be too embarrassed to disband us when he gets back. If the most effective thing we do is keep SPD from getting ideas about making Charlie's team quietly disappear, then we've served our purpose."
"So, what, arresting criminals is just a bonus?" Sky demanded.
"If we have the morphers, we have a duty to use them," Jack pointed out.
"You had a morpher," Sky growled. "You had a team."
"Nothing lasts forever," Jack told him. "You said it yourself."
"You said you wouldn't leave." He didn't want to think about how it sounded: petulant, desperate, the voice of someone who'd already lost whatever he was fighting for. But he couldn't help shoving it in Jack's face.
Jack straightened up, throwing his hands out to the side in a gesture of ultimate surrender. "I'm not leaving, Sky! I'm right here, I'm trying to stay here, and this is the best way I can think of to do it!"
"Here's a better way," Sky said, yanking the Red morpher out and thrusting it at Jack. "Maybe if you could keep your mouth shut around Cruger for two seconds--"
"Like you don't mouth off every chance you get." Jack didn't even wait for him to stop, just talked over him. "It's a Red Ranger thing, Sky, just accept it already. We all think we know best, and no one's gonna tell us otherwise. You should have had that morpher from the beginning."
His eyes narrowed, because that was a backhanded compliment if it was a compliment at all. "Maybe I don't want it."
"Maybe I don't either," Jack said, and his tone made Sky shut his mouth. That tone was dead serious. This wasn't what Sky wanted to hear at all.
"You're right, you know," Jack continued. "I didn't want to be a Ranger. And to be totally honest, I still don't. But there are people here counting on me. Charlie's team needs someone to speak up for them. Sophie and Boom need someone to take a chance on them. And B Squad needs backup that isn't orientation level cadets.
"You don't need me," Jack said bluntly. "But I want you. I know how much SPD means to you, and frankly, I'm scared I'd never see you if we didn't work together. So I'm still here. Almost a year later."
Sky transferred his stare from Jack to Jack's morpher. To the B Squad Red morpher, because it was easier than looking at Jack right now. To the morpher Jack had given him, twice now, because... because he thought Sky should have it. Because he wanted Sky to have it.
Jack knew what Sky wanted, and he was willing to compromise what he wanted to get it for him.
"One year doesn't guarantee another," he said. Trying to pretend he was talking to himself. He meant Jack to hear. He wanted to hear Jack promise.
Instead, Jack chuckled. "Sky," he said, and his voice was full of an affection that could have been there all along. "I'd propose right now if I thought it would help. But I don't. Because when it comes down to it, there are two ways of looking at the world."
Jack paused, then prompted, "Don't you want to know what they are?"
Sky sighed. "Not really," he said, which was only partly a lie.
"You can either assume everything's going to go wrong," Jack told him, "or you can assume everything's going to work out. Neither one gives you any control over what actually happens. But assuming everything's going to be fine is a lot more fun, so. Maybe you should try it."
He supposed he should consider himself lucky that Kat showed up just then. She walked into Command wearing a bright yellow jacket over her... whatever passed for a uniform in the lab these days. And she tossed an equally bright jacket on the console beside Jack on her way to her station. "Squad gear," she said as she passed.
Jack looked from her to the jacket in surprise. "That was fast."
"I know all the supply officers," Kat said over her shoulder.
Jack picked it up, shaking the jacket out and raising his eyebrows as he studied it. "It's very red," he said at last.
"A Squad, Jack." Kat had turned around to watch him, smiling at his surprise. "Get used to it."
"Whatever you say, Number Four," Jack teased.
Kat's smile didn't fade. "You should be nice to me. I'm the one who's going to keep you from getting fired. Again."
"Says the woman Cruger threatened to fire three separate times this morning," Jack added.
"He can't fire me," Kat said with complete assurance. "I have seniority."
They exchanged glances and Sky shrugged once. "She's got a point there."
"Huh." Jack swung the jacket over his shoulders, shrugging into it and holding out his arms to study the sleeves. "Okay."
"Okay?" Sky repeated. "You're A Squad Red. You're the highest ranked person on this base right now."
Jack grinned. "Does that mean I can do whatever I want?"
Sky raised his eyebrows. "Has that ever stopped you before?"
"C'mere," Jack said, waving for Sky to follow him across the room. "I have a thing about you and the commander's chair. This might be my only chance."
Kat cleared her throat. "I think I'll go now," she said, to no one in particular.
"Thanks, Kat," Jack said cheerfully. "You're the best."
Sky was right behind him, but he kept his voice down even as Kat disappeared into the hallway. It wasn't like the doors were closed. "What about me and the commander's chair?"
Jack was beaming at him, happy and mischievous and maybe whatever promise he wanted was right there on his face. "Guess you'll never know if you don't sit down, will you?"