Jordan got back to his house. In his hurry to get to the house, he didn't even follow the accepted protocol of teleporting somewhere near his home that he wouldn't be seen, instead appearing right on the doorstep. He was sure that Gosei would probably have something to say about that, but right now he didn't care. A 911 call had come from his house. Only his dad and he lived there, and his dad was the kind of guy that was always trying to prove himself in any situation. He'd once driven himself to a hospital with a dislocated shoulder just so that he didn't have to call anyone for help. If his dad had called 911, then something had to be seriously wrong.

As he appeared, he found the door lying wide open, a troubling sign in and of itself. His dad had spent a fortune on a state-of-the-art security system for the house. He was so intent that no one would make him a victim, and by extension make himself look weak to anyone that he was trying to impress in his obsessive pursuit of personal glory that he would never risk anything like a petty burglary making him look bad. Leaving the door wide open negated pretty much the entire point of all that preparation.

"Dad?" Jordan called as he made his way into the hallway. As he got inside, he found a trail of blood soaked into the carpet. It was a wide, long strip leading from the Living Room. Coming in, he saw a pair of feet sticking out from behind the table there.

"Dad!" Jordan called out, rushing in to find his dad lying on the floor, propping himself up against the wall. He was trying to hold a jacket to a gaping wound in his stomach to stem the flow of blood, but Jordan could see his grip was already so weak that it was barely hanging there. General Edwards' flesh was pale, and his clothing and the floor around him was soaked in blood. Jordan was no doctor, but he didn't need to be to know that this didn't look good; clearly he had been bleeding for some time. He grabbed the jacket and pressed it in tightly, causing his dad to look up at him. "Dad, I'm here..."

"I called the ambulance." He managed to say weakly. "I...I didn't manage to tell them the address..."

"The phone's still off the hook." Jordan told him. "They'll have traced the call. I'm sure an ambulance will be here soon, just try to hold on."

He held his dad's head up as he saw him slumping forwards. He could see that he was faint already.

"Dad...how long since...?"

"I don't know exactly." He replied weakly. "I passed out while I was calling...I only came to when you got here..."

Jordan moved the jacket just enough to see the wound. He could see that it was much too wide a wound to be any mere knife. Seeing his dad starting to weaken further, he held his head up.

"Dad, you have to tell me, who did this to you?" He asked him. His dad's head started to slump again, forcing Jordan to hold up his face. He slapped him gently, hoping to keep him awake. Having lost so much blood, Jordan knew a big danger was that if he passed out, he wouldn't wake up again. The only way to be sure he was alive was if he kept him talking. "Dad, answer me..."

"It was some...some woman...blue with green hair." He told him. Jordan reacted with horror as he heard this. "She...she looked like one of those monsters...but different...like..."

"A robot?" Jordan asked him. General Edwards just nodded. As he did so, he saw the wound in Jordan's side. "What...?"

"It's fine, it's nothing." Jordan told him. General Edwards saw that Jordan was covered in bruises, like he had been in a fight. It wasn't as if he wasn't an active kid, and he did come back with bruises more than a few times.

"It doesn't look like nothing." He said weakly. It was then that he noticed a dark bruise across Jordan's cheek. He suddenly realised something. Jordan knew what his attacker looked like. He had gotten home before the ambulance, even though he knew he wasn't due home for hours. He reached up to touch the side of his son's face.

"You...you still let your guard slip when you throw the reverse." He told him. "That monster...the one that ate dreams...he was telling the truth...he was right wasn't he?"

"Dad?"

"You...You're the Robo Knight." He surmised. "I...I can't believe..."

"Dad save your strength." Jordan told him. "Please..."

His dad pressed the key to his study into Jordan's hand. Jordan just looked up at him, completely stunned. No matter where he had gone, whatever home the military had given them, there was always one room his dad had designated as his study, one room that Jordan had always been told was off-limits. His father had never invited him inside; he had never given him permission to go in...he had never even left the key out of his sight.

"Operation Knightfall." He said weakly. Jordan gulped as he heard this name. Back when Jason and Trini had told him they had pulled strings to get the government agents off their back, he had said that 'Operation Knightfall' had been terminated. Why had it never occurred to him before now? It was shortly after his dad had gotten back into town on what he had termed a 'special mission' that the agents had started turning up at Ranger battles.

"You?" Jordan asked. With that, General Edwards started to slump back into unconsciousness. "Dad, stay with me, DAD!"

As he tried to revive him, he felt someone gently shoving him aside. He saw a couple of paramedics coming in the door.

"We're here now kid." The first greeted him, putting down a bag and getting to work. "What happened here?"

"Someone attacked him." Jordan told him. "He's been stabbed in the stomach...it looks pretty bad..."

"It looks like they got you too." The other replied, seeing the state Jordan was in. Realising that this was the best way to explain how he had ended up looking like this, he opted just to go with it.

"I...I was just getting back as they were leaving." Jordan told him.

"He's lost a lot of blood." The other paramedic stated. "We need to get him to Central Harwood Hospital, now."

"You should probably get checked out too." The other paramedic told Jordan. "You should lock up while we get your dad into the ambulance."

"Is there anyone you can call?" The first asked him. Jordan just nodded as he pulled out his cell phone and dialled Troy.

Meanwhile, Metal Alice arrived at the co-ordinates Vrak had given her. She found herself in her element, surrounded by technology. For weeks now, Vrak had been assembling the components he needed to build this place. The structure was built, while some loogies were getting to work setting up machinery. Vrak had spent a lot of time preparing for this move. What he couldn't spirit away from the Warstar ship under Malkor's nose, he had been purchasing under the table from his contacts in the intergalactic black market.

As she made her way past some loogies, she stepped over cabling on the floor, making her way over to where Vrak was looking out of a window. They were miles below the surface of the ocean in a new base Vrak had built far from prying eyes.

"I trust it is done?" He asked her.

"It is done Lord Vrak." She replied.

"I trust you had some fun with it." He chuckled.

"I had no feelings relating to my mission. I only had my mission." She told him as she stood beside him.

"It's magnificent isn't it?" Vrak asked her.

"The base is not yet complete." She answered.

"No, not the base...this." He stated, gesturing out of the window. "The Earth...it is quite a world. I swear, at times I can see why the humans fight so jealously to protect it. Still, it will soon be part of the new empire either way."

"The loogies are not working fast enough." Metal Alice stated. "I calculate at the current rate of work, they will only conclude construction within 19 days 21 hours and 17 minutes."

"I've waited this long." He commented.

"I have extensive databases of the software and hardware capabilities you will require for this stage of your plan." She continued. "If I am left to work on this alone, I will be completed within 9 days 3 hours and 12 minutes."

"I knew there was a reason to have you around." Vrak replied, looking to her and smiling. "You'll have your time. I'll just leave you to it. Perhaps if I leave a few loogies...?"

"They would only slow me down." She interrupted him. "Besides, it is tactically unwise to have creatures loyal to Malkor aware of this location."

As she said this, the loogies all stopped working and looked up towards Vrak. He just looked to them thoughtfully.

"Perhaps you're right." He told her. "I'll let you deal with that. I trust it won't add too much time to the project."

"Statistically insignificant." She replied as he teleported away. She converted her tablet into sword mode as the loogies realised what was about to happen and rushed to the attack, fighting for their lives.

Over at Harwood County Hospital, Jordan was waiting outside the operating theatre while the paramedics worked on his dad. The other Rangers got there, after making a token appearance at home so that they could be seen to "hear the news" about Jordan's dad.

"How is he?" Gia asked, sitting with Jordan and taking his hand. He just looked to her.

"They're still working on him." Jordan informed her. "He's...he's lost a lot of blood. The doctors said something about his spleen..."

"They're doing all they can." Troy interrupted as he saw Jordan was having difficulty talking about it.

"So...do you know...?"

"It was that new...thing of Vrak's." Jordan told them. "It was Metal Alice."

Emma and the others just looked around each other. It wouldn't be the first time that Vrak or any of his creations had targeted someone they cared about, but for the most part they didn't bother. The few times they had, it had done little to advance their cause. Usually, threatening or harming the loved ones of the Rangers only served to motivate them and make them more dangerous. It had been quite some time since any of them had suffered any attack like that.

"We should probably get Uncle to do extra scanning sweeps near our homes." Noah suggested, getting up to head out and use his morpher to communicate the message. "If she's willing to go for our families..."

"Jordan Edwards?" A doctor asked. Jordan got up and made his way over.

"Is it about dad?" Jordan asked him. The doctor looked to the others.

"I think you should come with me." He told him. "There's something important we need to talk about."

Jordan just looked to the others, before following the doctor away. As they left, Emma sat with Troy, holding him closely.

"I'll put in that call to Uncle." Noah told them. "He can watch our folks tonight. After that...I'll figure out something."

"In the meantime, we'll all have to be ready." Jake stated. "If anything happened to my folks..."

"We all feel that way." Troy answered, looking to the door. "I don't even want to think what Jordan's going through."

Back in the underground base, Metal Alice stood, surrounded by fallen loogies. She folded up her sword, turning it back into its tablet mode as they all exploded, leaving nothing behind.

"Inferior workmanship." She stated as she went to the console, looking over the progress they had made. "Such meagre understanding of technology...it is amazing those loogies haven't been destroyed long before now."

She started to get to work, shaking her head in disbelief.

"By the time I have this base of operations up and running, the Rangers won't know what hit them." She stated. "As for the Robo Knight, I think I'll take care of him myself. It should be...fun."

Back at the hospital, Jordan came back to the others, looking decidedly pale and disorientated. They were over to meet him quickly, helping him to a seat.

"Jordan, what is it?" Emma asked him.

"It's...It's my dad." Jordan told them. "They...they need blood, a lot of it."

"So, what are they waiting for?" Troy asked him.

"I can't." Jordan told them. "They...um...they tested my blood against his. They say it isn't a match."

"So they need blood from somewhere else?" Jake asked him. Jordan just nodded.

"There's more to it though." He continued. "My blood type...it...it doesn't match mom's either."

"I don't..."

"That's...that's not possible." Noah interrupted Jake. They all looked to him as he said this.

"I don't understand." Troy stated.

"It's possible for a kid's blood type not to be a match for one parent, but not both." Jordan answered, looking like he was going to be ill. He looked up to them. "And since there's a reason we can pretty much take it as read that mom is my mom, there's only one explanation."

"Your dad..."

"My dad isn't my dad." Jordan confirmed. Just then, a doctor came out of the operating theatre. As the team got to their feet, he approached them, removing his mask. He looked to Jordan sadly and shook his head.

"I'm sorry; there was nothing we could do." He told them.

"Oh my God." Noah muttered. The Rangers all gathered around Jordan, who just looked like he'd been hit by a truck.

"He's..."

"He simply lost too much blood." The doctor informed him. "Maybe if we'd gotten to him sooner, or there had been some more compatible blood in storage..."

Jordan just walked away as the doctor's words tailed off.

"Mr Edwards...!"

"Can you just give us a minute?" Jake asked him.

"There are some forms that need to be signed, and some procedures..."

"Can't all of that wait?" Troy asked him. The doctor just nodded.

"Is there somewhere your friend can go?" He asked. "He probably shouldn't be alone."

"He can come to my place." Troy told him. "We'll be back for the paperwork later."

As they made their way out of the hospital, they found Jordan outside, just staring into space.

"Jordan..."

"Why's it so hard to get a cab?" He asked.

"A cab?" Jake asked. "Jordan..."

"I've got to get home somehow." Jordan stated. "Gosei's already bound to be pissed about me breaking the rules about teleporting..."

"UNCLE!" Noah rushed out, looking around for anyone that might have heard Jordan forgetting the code they used.

"You know what Noah, right now I don't give a SHIT who knows!" Jordan snapped at him. "I just...I just want to go home, I just..."

"Jordan!" Troy stated, looking to him. "That's not a good idea."

"Please Jordan, we just...we don't want you to be alone." Emma told him.

"I'll call my folks." Troy told him. "You can stay with us."

Jordan didn't have it in him to argue. He had no idea where he wanted to go or what he wanted to do. He just nodded as Troy flagged down a cab.

"We'll call in the morning." Emma assured him. "I'm really sorry."

"I'll take care of him." Troy assured her, kissing her cheek. "Just...everybody stay safe."

With that, the cab took them away, leaving Emma, Gia, Noah and Jake outside the hospital. He looked to Jordan, seeing him staring wordlessly into the night. He couldn't even begin to imagine what was going on in his head right now, and by the looks of it, he wasn't sure he wanted to.