Chapter 5

Dark Ranger

"I still don't get it." Syd shook her head. "So, Camila's parents are an ex-ranger and an ex-evil space ninja?"

"Apparently." Z shrugged. "You know you've been a ranger too long when hearing something like that doesn't surprise you."

"Well, I just want to know when Sky, Kat, and Cruger will be done talking to Joe ... I mean Dustin." Bridge stared at the door into the conference room that was attached to the cadets' common room. "Dustin's aura was really blue and black. He's really worried."

"You would be too if your daughter was brainwashed and kidnapped by an evil space ninja warlord." Sky groaned as he walked into the silent room. "This is a huge mess and we're going to need more man-power than we have if we want to have a chance to save Camila."

"Meaning ... what exactly?" Z asked, abandoning her usual tone and attitude.

"Cruger, Dustin, and Kat are working on locating the other ex-Ninja Storm rangers. They'll be the best to help us, since they've already dealt with Lothor and his dirty tricks." Sky's steel-blue eyes showed the guilt he felt.

"Hey ... uh ... you gonna be okay, Sky?" Syd asked gently.

"Yah ... I'm just tired ... and worried." Sky glared at the floor as if it was its fault. "I can't help but think that I'm responsible for this in some way. If Camila hadn't run off on her own, Lothor wouldn't have been able to zap her."

"You couldn't have done anything. Lothor would have caught her alone sooner or later." Bridge was starting to feel the effects of Sky's attitude. Negative feelings were rolling off of their squad leader in huge tidal waves, and Bridge wasn't sure how much more he could take. "She'll be fine."

"Yah, she's tough ... you have to have faith in her will to break free." Z added.

Sky's shoulders sagged in defeat. "I'm going to go for a walk to clear my head. Let me know when there's news." His teammates' heads bobbed up and down. "Thanks."

In Lothor's space ship, orbiting earth

"You should have let me kill them." Camila snarled as she used dark ninja magic to heal her ankle.

Lothor chuckled. "I assure you that you will get your chance when we rule this planet. Imagine, Camila, taking revenge on all who have hurt you and murdered your mother. All of those brats at SPD for example. Oh look, there is the red ranger ... all alone." Sure enough, the screen on the consol in the middle of the room showed Sky wandering through one of the city's parks.

"Let me go!" Camila begged and demanded eyes burning and hungry. "He's the reason I was hurt ... I want to make him pay ..."

Lothor smiled darkly, glancing at the small black device on Camila's arm. "Of course ... you know what to do ... "

The park he'd come to had been his favorite as a kid, and it meant even more to him now. It was where a monument to all rangers had been created when he was twelve. The names of all rangers in the planet's history had been carved into the granite base. Glancing over the words, he noticed the one name he'd never been able to match a face to. Dustin Brooks ... aka: Joe Jones, the yellow Ninja Storm ranger ... Camila's father ... what forced him to leave Blue Bay Harbor, the ninja academy, and most of all, the people he'd fought next to when protecting the world? He doubted Dustin would want to talk about it, and chances were, that the other Ninja Rangers wouldn't be able to tell much about it either ... but now ...

Sky sighed and sat down on a concrete bench, head in his hands. Camila's capture was his fault, no matter what everyone else thought. In turn, it was his responsibility to make sure that this story ended happily. "Camila ... I'm so sorry ..." Something that looked like a black bolt of lighting crashed down into the ground, creating a huge cloud of dust.

"You should be ... and will be ... starting NOW!!!" Camila growled as she leapt out of the cloud and at at the red ranger. He ducked and Camila went soaring over him. She landed on her feet and shot three python-sized snakes out of the palm of her right hand toward the red ranger. As the serpents coiled around his body, Sky noticed a second of hesitation, followed quickly by a tight contracting of the telekinetic bodies.

"Camila ... you don't really want to hurt me ... do you?" Sky asked, using what breath he could muster.

"Yes!" Camila shouted as she swung her prey against a tree and dropped him. "It's all your fault! You're the reason I ..." She dropped to her knees, clutching her head and crying. "No! I don't want to do this ... stop it ... augh!!" She screamed in pain, nails digging into the palms of her hands. "What did I do?"

"Camila?" Sky cautiously approached the sobbing figure, but his morpher beeped urgently. Knowing what ignoring it would do, Sky answered the call.

"Get back here right now, Sky. Camila is too dangerous in this state." Dustin's voice ordered. "Lothor's going to be sending another mind-erase beam soon, and then you'll be easy pickings."

"I'll morph if I have to." Sky replied with a snap.

"Return to base now, cadet." Cruger demanded. "There's a power signature from a morpher other than your own where you are. Camila has a morpher, no doubt given to her by Lothor. You are to return, now."

Sky snapped his morpher shut and replaced it in his belt with a huff.

"Leave." Camila shrank away as Sky came closer to her. "I don't want to hurt anyone. Do anything you have to do to stop me ... please." Hazel eyes met blue as she pleaded.

Sky's breath caught in his throat. The mental image of pulling the trigger of his laser blaster with Camila facing him was too much ... he'd never be able to do it. "Hurry, let's go." Sky pulled her up from the ground, supporting her weight with an arm around her waist.

"What, are you stupid?! Let me go!" Camila tried to pull away, but Sky was stronger.

"When Lothor tries to fire another beam, this will deflect it." Sky replied, using his free arm to put a force field over both of them.

"You don't understand." Camila insisted. "It's not something you can block ... I can't stop it ..." She clawed at the small device on her forearm as it seemed to spark to life. "You can't save me. Dark storm, ranger form, ha!" Black spandex appeared and clothed Camila's body. In the center of the suit was a sliver crescent moon with a teardrop hanging from the top point. The visor of the black helmet was outlined by a silver bat. On her back, she wore a long silver bo staff.

"Camila, you need to snap out of this!" Sky's hand reached instinctively for his blaster. "We can help you."

"Go, before it has total control over me." Camila's hand made a quick, diagonal, slashing motion and the next thing Sky knew, he was in the SPD command center.

"What happened?" Sky demanded.

"It was Camila, not us." Kat explained. "She used some sort of teleporting ability."

"Actually, it was a rip in the 'fabric', if you will, of reality that allows Camila to transport herself or someone else almost instantaneously to any other place in the universe." An Asian man in dressed in green, who appeared to be about Dustin's age, spoke up from a group of adults in a corner.

"Haha ... sorry about him ... unfortunately, the doctors were wrong. Geekdom isn't a curable condition." The darker man next to him, who was in red clothes, laughed good naturedly. He also appeared to be around Dustin's age.

"Shane ..." A blonde woman in light blue warned. "Global emergency ... if you've learned anything since 2003, it should have been that times like this need you to be serious and other times you can be ... you."

"Heh ... sorry, Tor." Shane chuckled and ducked away from the ex-blue ranger's wrath.

Two more men stood a bit off to the side of the others. One was a tall blonde in crimson. The other one was shorter, with darker skin and hair, and was dressed in navy blue.

Hunter ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "Guess we should have known that Lothor would come back with better toys ..." He growled. "Some kind of friends we were, letting Dustin and Cammy take off after ... after the accident. We shouldn't have let them go it alone ... we should have at least tried to keep in touch ..."

Blake shook his head. "Dustin might've still been pretty flakey, but he had a good plan. His head is almost as hard as yours ... none of us would have been able to stop him."

"So, you're all of the former Ninja Storm rangers?" Sky asked. When they nodded, Sky posed another question. "What were you talking about when you mentioned an accident?"

"Camila's mom died during the 'Alien Expulsions' a few years after we teamed up with the Dino Thunder rangers. That's when Lothor resurfaced again and started to hunt down Camila. He thought that it was our fault that her mom died." Cam explained. "Even though he's evil, Lothor is still very loyal to his family ... well ... excluding my father and I from the list."

"He thinks Camila belongs in what's left of his army, but I refuse to let them take her without a fight." Dustin announced as he entered the room. He was wearing his ninja training outfit instead of his SPD janitor's ensemble. "My guess is that Lothor wants to use her rage that's built up ever since she was younger to advance his plans for taking over the world. The fact that he got her to attack you, Sky, is enough to prove that he's got her entirely under his control ... at least for now."

Alarms began to sound and red lights flashed, signaling an attack was taking place. "Dr. Manx, report!" Cruger demanded as the other three rangers entered the room.

"Sir, it's Camila." Kat paused. "She's at the harbor."

A/n: Don't kill me because I haven't posted for so long ... I'm sorry. The future chapters will have a lot more to do with Camila's past and other things discussed in this chapter ... hopefully you'll continue to read and review.

PS: I know Lothor isn't supposed to be around anymore, but I just liked the feel of it, and he's got a new, lower-tech ship now, since the first one self destructed.