AUTHOR NOTE: ALL TRAKEENA'S ACTIONS TWORDS NARUTO LAST CHAPTER WERE JUST TEASING. ALSO, I THINK WITH HOW SHREWD HE WAS, ITACHI WOULD HAVE TAKEN WHAT COULD HAPPEN INTO ACCOUNT IF NARUTO EVER LOST HIS MEMORY SEEING AS HOW GOOD MADARA IS AT MANIPULATING PEOPLE.

Also, check out the story "Revival of Zen-Aku" on digisovereign's profile!

The rangers were all grim as Alpha-6 busied about treating their wounds. Who WAS that guy?

When Alpha asked who beat them sensless, all they'd said was "evil green ranger".

Alpha went to check on Leo, who was in the intinsive treatment ward due to having taken the worst beating, and a second laater came running out shouting that Leo was gone.

Hearing that, the others all got out of their beds and took off, looking for him.

After hours of serching through Terra Venture, they found Leo in the Forest Dome, morphed and preforming vaious katas, both unarmed and with his weapons.

If he noticed his friends, Leo didn't aknowlge them, the words of that wicked green ranger just kept repeating themselves over and over again, pushing everything else out.

"So you stand! Good, good. Let's see what you've got, Red Ranger!...Christ kid. You're gonna have to try harder if you want to even scratch me," Naruto uttered. "So this is the extent of the abilities of the ones chosen to wield the legendary Quasar Sabers? Ha!Over 3,000 years awaiting the chosen ones of legend and this is all that those "chosen ones" can do? I'd gotten a harder fight from a Sting winger!...You were never trained to actually use a sword, were you?...You really are weak, you know that? When I was given this mission, I expected you to be good sport. Yet now, it seems you aren't fun at all. Just...boring, I hope the others aren't this dull when I hunt them down and waste them...How pathetic...What's with you guys? I thought this'd be tough, but you can't even scratch me!...little red riding hood's still got some bite!...Good! Show me that fire and fight me with everything you've got before I snuff it out and crush your skull in after I force you to watch as I slaughter your friends!...You've got backbone, Red. So that means you just stepped up to the front on the line with who I beat into the ground!...You are determined, I'll abmit I admire that...but what good is that alone, you need to put everything you have into gaining experience and getting stronger. While it's vital to have a reason to fight, without devloping your skills, you can't improve and its harder to protect what you care about. Even in the face of certain death, you can't back down. You've got to get as strong and as skilled as you possibly can along with that kind of courage. If you really are ready to comit to that path then those are the things you need. Without strength you cannot protect anything, let alone yourself. Weapons like the Quasar Sabers can't make up for your weakness, it all depends on the one using them."

Out of all of what he'd said, it was that last one that bothered Leo most. Psycho Green had been sadistic and somewhat cocky the whole beating, yet right at the end he'd almost seemed to become someone else...like an advisor or teacher and was pointing out how he needed to improve. Why did he say that? It was as if he were speaking from experience the way he'd said it. Leo didn't know who that ranger was, but he didn't really care. If the guy hadn't zoned out at the end, Leo would be dead now, no way around it. That evil ranger...Leo swore he'd beat him and protect no only his friends, but all of Terra Venture as well from that guy. But it was painfully clear that the canyon between them was too far apart. So as soon as his legs could support him somewhat steadily, he'd thrown himself into training furiously, never mind he was still injured.

That Psycho Green...Leo didn't care who he was, al that mattered was he had to be stopped or who knew what would happen!

What was worse was that he felt the guy was right. He'd come to Terra Venture because he felt he was needed...because he felt he could make a diffrerence. But he'd been beaten down that easily. Had he just been lucky in those other battles? He couldn't save Mike...now he wasn't strong enough to protect his friends...what was the point of his even being a power ranger if he couldn't keep anyone safe?

Mike would have most likly been able to stand up to that guy but all because Leo was too weak to keep a grip, his brother was gone...now this happened. It frustrated Leo to no end! Why was he so much weaker than that Psycho Green Ranger?

When he thought of that vile ranger, Leo felt his blood boil. It was as if he were looking into the face of his own personal enemy. He swore that when next they met, the red would triumph over the green.

Leo staggered as he felt his wounds become aggrivated by how he was pushing himself and he fell on all fours before his arms and legs gave out and he landed on his face, passed out from pain.

Seeing this, the other rangers ran up to him and carried Leo bck to the medical facility.

Naruto sighed, hating the universe, everyone and everything in it at the moment. Trakeena had ordered him to teach her to fight. As his new role as her guard, he really had no say in the matter, but he just knew Scorpius wasn't going to like this. Naruto found it absurd in a way...how Scorpius could go from being a tyrant to a dotting father at the drop of a hat. Then again...Naruto wasn't a parent.

He understood how Scorpius wanted Trakeena to have the very best up to the point where she had the entire universe in the palm of her hand just to be sure she got it. But all his actions seemed to do was cause more people to want to kill her as a result of his antagonistic deeds...if what he'd litterally beaten out of Treacheron about some guy called the Magna Defender was any indication. What could he say? Naruto loved pissing Treacheron off by giving the guy a good beating.

"Trakeena...I sure hope he's in an understanding mood or you'll bw needing a new bodyguard..." he muttered to himself as he entered the command bridge.

"Scorpius..." he said, dreading what he'd have to say next as said bug turned to him.

"What is it Psycho Green?" he asked.

"Well...you know how you said I was Trakeena's personal bodyguard and that I was to obey orders solely from her? Well... hypothetically speaking...what if she wanted me to train her to fight?"

Naruto winced as the kage bushin's memory of Scorpius's responce to that question hit him...no wonder people didn't like bugs. How the hell had he gotten that one clone to leave blood and gore over every nook and cranny of the Scorpion Stinger like that...shadow clones couldn't even bleed! At the moment, Naruto had his ship landed on the planet Mirinoi with Trakeena waiting for him seeing as she'd teleported there after telling him where to meet her before he had a clone go ask her father about the fighting lessons. Something Naruto was glad for based off the clone's memory, that way he was already gone by the time the clone asked.

Once he landed, Trakeena entered Naruto's ship and noticed he'd had it somewhat redone to include a solid-hologram room for training.

Beside Naruto stood a Zedd-series Putty. Naruto had gone with this brand of Putty for a reason. He wanted to test Trakeena's skill level to see how much she alrady knew about fighting, something this type of Putty was perfect for seeing as striking the large Z emblem on their chests caused them to explode into pieces. it was theoretically possible to defeat a Putty with a single blow, rather than gradually beating them into submission over a protracted fight. Perfect beginner level training dummy.

"Ok Trakeena...come at this guy with everything you got. The weakspot on this guy's pretty obvious and if you hit it right away, you've got an instant win, this guy's here to help judge how much work we'll need to do." Naruto said, jerking his thumb at the Putty, which stepped forward and faced her.

"Sending that thing to face me first...you're going to get hurt if you don't take me serious." Trakeena said. Naruto just shrugged at her warning, why should he take it seriously since she didn't know how to fight at all?

"Really now? Prove it." he said and she rushed the Putty and what followed was a beat down too patetic to be woth talking about. Less then five seconds into the so-called "fight", Trakeen was face down and moaning in pain.

Naruto sighed, Trakeena had no fighting skills or any special powers other than teleportation and the ability to summon her special battle armor and while she would have been able to use her staff as a weapon, she had no training what-so-ever...she couldn't even handle a Zedd-Putty!

He had a LOT of work to do.

Taking out the Psycho rod formally used by Psycho Black, he set it aside for later if they ever even got to the point to where they began wepons training seeing as Trakeena used a staff. then walked up to the Putty and wacked the emblem on it's chest and it fell apart.

Trakeena glared at him as she pushed herself up and snarled at him "I thought you were going to train me to fight, not beat me into the ground!"

Naruto glared right back at her "Trakeena...with all due respect, you wanted me to teach you to fight, I am. And the only way to learn combat is by doing, if you don't like it because you could end up breaking a nail or something, don't waste my time since there's no way I can show you how to fight without it being hands-on, so if you're gonna complain everytime you get hit or knocked you over, shut up and get out of my sight. You wanted this, so you'll have to accept everything that comes with it, that means you WILL be risking getting knocked around. If you're mad at me for saying this, then there's no real point to me listining to you since YOU were the one who ordered me to train you. So it all comes down to you wanted something and then made it impossible to get."

Trakeena stared at him in shock then she felt herself get angry at him. He was her bodyguard, vassel, and pet! She owned him! How dare he speak that way to her!

"If you're so ticked off...why not put me in my place right here and now with your own two hands...or is running off and whining to daddy-dearest all you can do?" Naruto taunted.

Her blood boiling, Trakeena planed on doing just that, she'd show him his place alright! She'd show him she wasn't so weak that she had to hide behind her father all the time. She'd leave him beaten and broken, begging her for mercy and yet she'd give none. She stood up and glared at him.

Seeing the anger, and more importantly, the resolve in her eyes, Naruto nodded in approval.

He was relaxed, his body slouched leaving him completely open and a humorous smile tugging on the corner of his lips, resembling that of a three year old who just been secretly told who was sneaking into the cookie jar.

Trakeena rushed him with a fist held high. She swung in a right hook, amazed at how he subtly leaned back to avoid the blow. The momentum carried her into a spin, and Naruto dropped and swept her legs out from under her and she fell flat on her face.

"How did you do that?" Trakeena asked, pushing herself up. His smile faded as he took note that she had gone into a stance that made the overly crude, patchwork stances he'd used before becoming a Genin look flawlessly elegint.

"Two reasons, one is that your anger makes too tense, its resolve you're after in battle. Two, a beeline frontal assult like that one will get you killed if do it." He replied.

"You had your guard down the entire time..." She pointed out the fact.

He let out a chuckle, "Maybe, but then again, I'm not necessarily trying to stop you."

"Huh?"

"Imagine the flow of water. You can never stop it, but if you allow it to flow, you can control it. You flow and I control your flow." He said. "You wear yourself out while I focus on using as little of my own energy as possable while shifting your attacks to become my own so you're beten by the energy you put into your own attacks before I attack you myself."

Trakeena winced at that, she might not know how to fight, but she'd seen what copy of her bodyguard could do in battle. And running out of even the enegry to stand before he'd even started beating on her himself was NOT a good idea.

While she realized how bad an idea that was, Naruto thought up a way to motovate the princess.

"How about we make this a bit more interesting?" Naruto asked.

Trakeena raised a brow "How do you mean?"

"A bet." the blond said simply, "If you can ever mannge to land one solid bow on me...I'll show you my face." Naruto said, tapping his helmet, which he hadn't removed since he'd first morphed and took Deviot's ship as his own.

Trakeena felt her lips twitch, while she could've just ordered him to show her his face, the idea of a bet sounded a lot more fun.

"I'm in."

"Ok...first thing's first, you need a better stance..."

With that, Naruto strapped weights on her arms and legs then began showing her what he knew in the ways of hand-to-hand combat, going through the motions slowly with Trakeena mimicking his movements, albit with some difficulty seeing as she was unaccostomed to the weights on her limbs. When she asked about them, she got a simple answer: if you were too fast to hit, then you wouldn't get hurt in battle, so the weights were there to help her devlop that speed since if she was able to move freely with various weights on, than that would mean she'd be faster when she didn't have them on since she'd have trained to build up her speed like this.

Twelve hours later, Naruto called the training session to a close "Hey Trakeena...we gotta get back to the Scorpion Stinger. Your dad's bound to be looking for you and he's gonna be pretty pissed."

Trakeena pouted as she nodded and took the weights off. She knew that was true. "Hey Psycho...I thought of something. If you're my bodyguard, then why didn't you point out that if I could protect myself, then I wouldn't need you? Even if it was an order I gave you, there'd be no real way to argue that point."

Naruto shrugged "Its to make sure that you know how to fight if I'm not around. I am your bodyguard after all, if you could keep yourself safe, I'd be out of the job. But it'd be best if you knew how to fight without needing to be in a situation where you'd need to."

She nodded, the Just-in-case-senareo. That made sence.

"Ok...we'll resume the lessons some other time. It'll need to be on a diffrent planet or on a moon or something seeing as Scorpius would notice if we kept heading here all the time, but we'll need an excuse for why we're gone at times. Any ideas?" Naruto said.

"We could say that we're looking for the Lights of Orion...daddy's after those, so we could head to the diffrent planets and moons using that we're searching for them as an excuse and no one would be any wiser." Trakeena offered.

"Ah...clever!" Naruto said. Trakeena really knew how Scorpius thought and how to turn that to her advantage.

With that, the two headed to the cockpit of Naruto's ship and headed back to the Scorpion Stinger.

Leo grit his teeth, he had to get stronger!

His Quasar Saber struck Maya's. She'd offered to help him train...but only after all his wounds had fuly healed, something he'd begrudgingly agreed to. He'd explained what had been eating at him so much that he'd snuck out while he was still injured and she'd understood why that was, that guy who'd smacked them around was brutal, and Leo felt he had to get strong enough to protect everyone.

Meanwhile, Alpha-6 and the others all watched from the sidelines, ready to put a tranquilizer in Leo if he started pushing himself too hard again.

"Sheesh...it's Jason and Tommy all over again...the heroic red ranger becomes the rival of the evil green ranger..." Alpha-6 said, while it had been Alpha-5 who had actually been there to see the whole rivalry, Alpha-6 had learned about it in Tommy's video diary.

"This sort of thing's happened bfore?" Kai asked, getting a nod from the robot.

"Alpha-5 knew all the details, I don't. But there was someone that became the first green ranger after they got brainwashed and tried destroying the good rangers, he also devloped a rivalry on a somewhat personal level with the red ranger of the team."

Getting thoughtful nods, the rest turned back to the spar, thinking that over. So...history repeates itself.

Loe snarled under his helmet just thinking about that, another evil green ranger? Guess this one was here to finish what the first one started.

He wnet with an overhead slash only to be blocked and then a fist hit him in the gut, followed by his legs being swept out from under him. He froze as the point of Maya's Quasar Saber was less than a inch from his face.

"Leo...you get too caught up in being upset to think clearly when someone mentions that guy who beat us, it threw off your focus. I shouldn't have been able to land those hits."

Leo sighed in frustration "I know...I know...but when I think of what that guy can do to everyone..." his free hand balled into a fist as he let what he was saying hang.

Kai winced as phantom pains struck him, the couldn't tell which had hurt more...being sent flying and being slammed into the ground or being caught in an explosion, but he saw Leo's point. They were more than a little outclassed with their current level of ability and their latest enemy. That thought caused him to look at the others.

"Why arn't we training too?"

Looking at each other as they wondered that themselves, Damon and Kendrix stood before the three all morphed, and joined Leo and Maya.

The next time Psycho Green showed up, they'd be ready.