"This shall be no effort!" Spindarella held her hands in front of her face, preparing one of her signature moves. As the entity approached, she pulled her hands away, revealing a balled up string of high-tension silky web, which shot out of her mouth like a cannonball on a rope. The ball exploded in mid-air and attempted to swallow the entity whole, but as it connected, the entity's body incinerated it, sending a bright flame up the failed net.
Camille transformed into her Chameleon Armor and cut the web with her sai right before the fire reached her mouth. Spindarella summoned her leather belts to rise up from her suit.
"Wait!" Camille said, quickly taking a defensive pose. "We might want to save that for a last-ditch effort. Who knows if we can penetrate that aura…"
"Wow, that was pretty awesome…" Fran said over the microphone.
"RJ still not there yet?" Theo asked, getting annoyed.
"I'm afraid he's not." Fran replied.
"Well, RJ's not one for noticing the outside world when he's meditating…"
"You're telling me." She replied, sitting down in front of the television setup after finding the bag of tortilla chips. They closed the transmission again, and she watched the fight intently.
The entity launched itself at Spindarella, who once again prepared her second specialty.
"I won't lose to you!" The belts around her body pulled away, floating as if possessed. The eight straps launched out and shot through the aura, smashing the entity through its face, back and chest and sending it flying back into a barrel roll, stopping several yards away from the Rangers. They cowered behind the bushes as it looked back at them while shrugging off the blows.
It acknowledged their existence, then charged at Camille as if they weren't important.
"That was too close." Casey commented.
"Well, it's either not interested in us, or it's saving us for later." Lily spoke up. The boys looked at her with a looming feeling of malice. "What?"
Camille stood out in front of Spindarella. "I'll take care of this thing." She spun her sais around and charged at the entity. She slashed at the entity, passing cleanly through the aura, and it headbutted her, then followed up with a pair of swipes at her chest, sparks erupting from the clashing auras. She stumbled back and growled, which made the entity growl with her.
Camille spun her sai, then sent it straight down through the entity's left shoulder. She finally struck something solid and pushed through, feeling tendons and muscles give way under the blade. The entity gave a wicked howl that pierced the ears of all who stood witness, one that echoed pain and suffering.
Camille smiled and stabbed again, this time at the base of its neck. Delighting in the pain she was causing after almost being humiliated, she tried to repress a chuckle as the entity cried out again. As she went to pull the blade out, the handle became snagged. She twisted the blade and yanked it out, snapping off the offending object and sending it flying into a set of bushes nearby.
The entity stumbled back and whimpered, letting a little puddle of blood and rain form around its left front paw. The rain began to cut through the aura and pour into the wounds, irritating the already painful injuries. The entity's size dwindled by half as it began to retreat, and the Rangers sensed their cue to jump out.
"Stop right there!" Casey shouted, leaping completely over the entity as he made his way to the battlefield.
"It's about time you children stopped hiding." Spindarella taunted. "I've been waiting for you to show yourselves!"
"You knew we were here?" Theo asked, a little shocked.
"Well, I sensed a trio of weak auras in the area, so I assumed it was you three."
"Weak?!" Casey and Theo took a simultaneous offense to the sentiment.
"We'll show you weak!" Casey threatened. He summoned his Jungle Chucks and took to the offensive.
"Casey! Get back here!" Lily demanded.
"Casey, watch out!" Fran shouted, trying to block her eyes from watching what could happen to him.
Casey began spinning his nunchucks around, swatting away Spindarella's belt barrage. "You're fairly strong to swat away my advances, young tiger. But you won't escape my wrath!"
She swiftly summoned up another web trap and shot it at Casey, ensnaring him and encasing him in her tight grip. She began to draw him closer as Theo and Lily ran out to save him.
Camille jumped out in front of the duo and blocked their advance. "I don't think so!" She fired a barrage of poisonous darts from her mouth, which were quickly knocked aside between Theo's Jungle Tonfas and Lily's Jungle Mace.
Lily spun the meteor hammer around for a few moments, then let it fly, smashing Camille in the face and knocking her to Spindarella's side.
The arachnid Rinshi growled and swung the web containing Casey twice around her head, then slammed him into Lily and Theo, knocking them all out of transformation. "They even look like children!" Spindarella taunted as Lily and Theo tried getting up. "I can't fathom how they defeated my dear cousin in battle."
"They're as lucky as they are young." Camille quipped as she got up.
"Well, I grow bored of fighting these children. I wish to pursue the other Pai Zhuq!" Spindarella commented. "Come, General Camille! There are bigger bees in this web!" With a quick twirl and a crouch, she jumped high into the air, with Camille hot on her trail.
Casey squirmed about, his shouts muffled by the webbing. Lily and Theo panicked, then began to claw at the casing to free him.
Back at the loft…
Fran slowly closed the door behind herself, feeling a sense of dread wash over her. She wrapped her arms around herself for comfort as she dashed down the stairs and grabbed her notepad and pen, quickly scribbling down a note on one paper, then tearing it off and setting it on top of the TV sets. She then scribbled down another note for herself before stuffing the notepad and pen in her apron, then grabbing her umbrella and leaving.
Ten minutes later, the Rangers ran up to greet Fran, but found the entire loft shut down and empty. Theo turned on the lights and frowned. "Everyone's just disappearing on us now, aren't they?"
"Hey guys, she left a note." Casey picked the paper off the TV set. " 'Dear guys, family emergency, had to leave. Sorry. Hope Casey is okay. –Fran.' Huh. Hope everything's alright."
Theo walked upstairs and gave an interested hum. "I don't think it is." He muttered.
Meanwhile…
Spindarella and Camille entered the wooded area outside Ocean Bluff, searching for whatever the entity was. "It has grown considerably weaker. I have completely lost its trail." Spindarella bitterly commented. "You wounded it too greatly. I hope it's not dead. It'd be a shame to lose a worthy opponent."
"I still don't understand why we didn't just kill the Rangers when we had the chance. Master Dai Shi will be greatly displeased by this."
"Why would he want three worthless brats when he can have the head of something much more formidable?" Spindarella pensively replied. "Besides, what is the use of fighting infantile and flavorless prey already too weak to escape the web, when the challenge of ensnaring something far more mature, and therefore tastier, lies within your grasp?" Her lips quivered in bliss.
"I would rather get what Dai Shi wants right now, to make him favor…us. Don't you want to be on his good side?"
"You aren't worried about the fact that this one is stronger than those three? Wouldn't Dai Shi be happy if we brought this one to him in his honor?"
Camille thought for a moment, then smiled. "You have a point. Now, try to find it."
Back in town, Fran softly jogged in the pouring rain, her umbrella providing little help or shelter in the weather. It seemed as if the rain was getting worse, not better.
She approached the plaza and looked around, slowly trying to remember the prior events as the images raced through her head.
She ran the image of the foreign object flying through the air into the…bushes. Of course, because if it was just sitting around somebody would've noticed it, particularly Theo.
Shouldn't Theo have noticed this, or was he too busy watching the fight? It wasn't much like her to notice the little things in movies or TV shows, and all those detective shows always threw her for a loop, but she was desperate to know what was going on.
She had begged her friends at one time to tell her exactly why it was that they kept disappearing, and they told her. Now she wanted to know something else of importance that, to her, had a simple answer, and nobody had the answer. She was told that if nobody had the answer, to find it herself, and now was as good of a time as any to do just that.
She walked over to the bushes sitting in front of a trendy café and rummaged through them, finding the now familiar trinket nestled at the bottom of the bush closest to the fight. Her stomach turned, and she stood for nearly a minute, stunned. Her heart pounded in her chest, and she frantically tried to think of what to do.
She slid the trinket into her apron pocket and looked around. "If I were badly hurt, and if I were very secretive, and I didn't want anyone to know what happened to me…" She turned to face the direction which the entity ran off in. "I would go as far away as I could. At least…I would if it were me. Not that I wouldn't try to go to my friends for help…but then again, this sort of thing would require a lot of question answering that I wouldn't want to do." She began walking away from the plaza, following the little spots and tiny tributaries in the blacktop that ran red with the entity's blood. "I hope I find him first."
RJ's eyes shot open, and with it, the realization of his surroundings…and the sharp screams of pain racing through his body. He suppressed his screams and tried to focus on what he had woken up to.
Dripping water, outside…cold rain. Leaves, trees, dirt, rock he was using as a pillow apparently…wooded area outside of town. Throbbing pain in his forehead and chest…he'd gotten into a fight and lost to some degree. Burning shoulder, lack of feeling in his neck…he'd lost badly. Same sensation throughout his arm…he'd lost really badly.
He tried to move his left arm and failed. He realized that he'd have to move it manually later. First task, to sit up.
His face was half-planted in the crevice of a large rock, and his right arm and leg were pinned underneath his body. The way he was laying, he figured that he had collapsed of exhaustion. Given that he had already assessed that he'd been used as a mop during some sort of fight, it made plenty of sense to him.
He slid his right arm out from under him, followed by his left leg. The subtle movements of his torso caused his neck to bitch and whine at him, so he decided upon letting his head jostle about instead of trying to lock it in place as he tried to get up.
Getting in a bowing position, he shifted what remained of his strength to his right arm and pushed up against the ground, then against the rock, eventually arching back on the balls of his feet and forcing himself into a squatting position which quickly dropped down to a sitting position.
He grabbed his left arm and pulled it closer to his face, turning it so he could see his watch.
Thirty-five minutes.
He sighed, knowing that this was probably the shortest blackout he'd ever had, which was always fortunate, a lot could've been done in that time, especially considering that he had started out in his room in the loft.
Obviously, somebody had taken notice of him, or vice-versa, and something had happened. He hoped it wasn't his students.
His wounds seemed unusual, considering how useless and aching the areas around them were. He ripped off some of his shirt sleeve and pressed it against his shoulder wound, inspecting the blood after a short time had passed.
Blood wasn't tinted purple.
His fingers that sat under the material began to tingle, which made him drop the cloth piece entirely. His fingertips went numb and began to gain a soft purplish hue. Some sort of paralysis toxin, apparently. He winced and stood up, getting his bearings completely in check, despite both his body and spirit feeling completely drained.
He could have slept for days and it wouldn't have mattered at this point. It had to be the reason his tirade only lasted thirty-five minutes; he just completely lost all of his ability to do anything.
He looked around, trying to figure out where he was. Sure, he was in the wooded area outside of town, but how far away? Was he close to the dam, or closer to the lake? He began to recognize the clearing and tried to not laugh at the irony.
These trees were so familiar; he could remember that they once bore leaves that brightly shone in shades of maroon and orange that heralded the end of the warm and secure season they were desperately escaping from. Now they were spindly and bare and soaked in rain, somehow mimicking his own disposition as they had before like it was their job to do so. He turned around and could faintly recall the last time he had been here…
Ahead of the young master dressed in rather mismatched purple civilian wear stood his own master, cloaked in an orange suit and matching hat.
"You kick me out, and now you won't stop following me. What more do you want from me?" The younger male shouted.
"I came to make sure that you've been working on the nasty temper you've developed. I can see that you haven't done much."
"Well, I would meditate if there was a bare surface to do it on. I would light incense and try to rest if I had incense and a blanket to lie on. I'd eat something if I was allowed to take something to eat with me. You kind've left me with little more than what I'm wearing." He had felt physically cold until the older man arrived, when a spike in internal temperature surged through him. Blind rage threatened to crush his sense of reason and take the older male with it.
"Our policy is to not give those we depose more amnesty than they need. Besides, if you had spent more time walking and less time sitting and complaining, you would've made it into town by now, and you could've already been in town eating, meditating, and relaxing in a rest house."
"With the shitty severance pay I got? The cost of living is a lot more these days than what I got from you." The younger man stood up and grabbed his backpack, preparing to leave the older man alone.
"That was your father's idea, to give you something to live off of. You should thank him."
"He voted me out of the temple. I won't be thanking him for anything for a very long time." The younger man began to walk past the older man.
"You're young and vivacious, but still immature and unable to handle your own situation. As much as you think we're doing this out of malice, we're doing it out of compassion." The younger man looked at the older man, trying to figure out where he was going with his sudden speech. "You've always been an independent and solitary student, wise beyond your years. It's why you are already a master, and why we had even allowed you to take on a student of your own."
"You're telling me stuff I already know…why?"
"You've gone too far this time. You used a restricted technique, and your lack of experience nearly killed ten students, including your own, and caused extensive damage to the front wing of the temple that will take us years to repair." The younger man found himself looking at the leaf-covered ground beneath him, feeling like more of a sheep than a wolf.
"So I messed up, and instead of helping me, you're kicking me out when I could use your guidance the most?"
"You've learned most of what you know on your own. You'll certainly do it now, because I have faith that your wisdom shall override your instincts." He reached into his coat and pulled out a small orange sealed envelope. "This shall help you focus on your center." The younger man took it with an air of suspicion and looked it over before finding it to be of worth and sliding it into his backpack. "I will keep in touch with you."
"Good luck finding me." The younger man chided bitterly before departing.
RJ frowned at the mental reminder of his former naïveté and reached for his neck to try and secure himself. As his fingers set against bare skin devoid of threads and charms, he panicked. His focusing charm necklace, and his personal choker he made out of his old uniform cords were both missing, and the feeling of completely losing his security blanket set in.
"I lost it…as if I wasn't having enough bad luck…" He grumbled to himself. "I guess I have to try and retrace my steps…" He went to walk and found himself swaying, a move which forced him to lean against a tree. "I get the hint…I can go slowly…" He rolled his body away from the tree next to him and pushed himself off it towards the next tree.
Back at the loft…
Theo held up the broken incense stick. "Fran left in an awful hurry, didn't she?"
"You saying that she broke into RJ's room?" Casey sounded heavily confused.
"Yes, I am. This was lying right by the door, and RJ's door is unlocked. I just checked it."
"Do you think he got mad at her and chased her out?"
"Fran? No. He's more likely to crush an ant than scare Fran enough to make her leave. If you meant you, me, or Lily, that would be another story entirely." Casey began following Theo downstairs.
"'Out of service range'?" Lily asked her phone, giving it an odd look. "What do you mean, 'out of service range'?"
"What's wrong, Lily?" Theo asked.
"Fran's cell phone is out of service range. That's impossible un-"
"Unless she ran out into the woods or the quarry." Theo finished for her.
"I'm not liking this, you guys." Casey muttered in his usual ominous tone.
"Neither am I." Theo replied as Lily walked past the two. "First RJ stops talking to us, now Fran's run off, and-"
"RJ's not here." Lily replied in a stunned tone from upstairs. Theo looked up at her, then ran upstairs to find her standing in front of RJ's room, the door as wide open as RJ's bedroom window.
"What's going on around here…?" Theo looked around the room, picking up on signs that something rather rapid and violent had occurred.
"I see her!" Casey cried out from downstairs. The duo charged down to the TV sets, where Casey was focused on a screen rarely looked at.
"There, I just saw her on one of the cameras pointing out near the woods around the lake." Casey pointed out where on the screen he had seen her.
"Why is she out there?" Lily asked Casey.
"She must be following that thing." Theo grimaced and shook his head. "She's got too big of a heart sometimes."
"For once, Theo, I agree." Lily replied. The trio ran out towards the woods, morphing before they even got to the vines.
RJ continued on down the path, trying to work his way back to town from memory. He couldn't recall working this hard to keep himself awake, even the time he crashed off a sugar high that would've killed most diabetics. The numbness in his neck was spreading up his spine, making it subsequently harder to move and think. He could feel his internal temperature rising as his body fought to stop the toxin, but it was a sudden spike in the air temperature around him that worried him more than his immune system's losing fight.
This spike in temperature began turning rain to steam dragging a sense of increased alertness with it.
"What's setting it off…?" RJ muttered to himself in wonder as he leaned against a tree.
Across the way…
Spindarella stopped suddenly, closing her eyes and reaching out to her left.
"What i-" Spindarella held a finger to Camille's mouth, silencing her quickly.
"Do you hear that sound…?" Camille nodded in the negative. "Listen harder. I hear…a melody…"
Farther down the path…
Fran tightened her hat as she closed her umbrella, which had become a victim of a branch's malice. She began to hum an old tune, but quickly began softly singing the lyrics.
"Oh, raindrops keep falling on my head, but that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turning red…"
Spindarella held her hand out in front of her. "I sense…lingering energy coming from the direction of the sound. The energies of the children, in fact…and the other one."
Camille turned pale green. "…the other one, as well?"
"But I don't sense a unique energy of its own…it's all residual." Spindarella mused. "From the sound of the voice, I would say that it's a regular human woman."
"Hmmm…" Camille mused. "So that…Fran girl has come to save her beloved bumbling boss. How…romantic." Camille felt a passing sense of jealousy, which worried her a bit. Why was she so jealous of a stupid little girl anyways?
"What are you talking about?"
"The Rangers, they live a double life working a little pizza parlor during the day with a bumbling idiot for a boss and a little bookworm as an assistant. The bookworm is just a silly little girl named Fran, but their boss was definitely Pai Zhuq. I guess I underestimated his power a bit."
"A bit? You sound utterly shocked that the two could possibly be the same thing." Spindarella quipped.
"Well, as I said, he is rather bumbling. If he hadn't almost attacked me during a covert operation, I would've never thought he was Pai Zhuq." Camille corrected her.
"Well then…perhaps we should attract the hummingbird with a little nectar?" Spindarella grinned.
"I was just about to suggest that very thing."
"Brilliant minds think alike!"
Far back in the woods…
RJ began to feel the aura around him burning at the toxin under his skin, nipping at the numbness and bringing feeling back ever so slowly. It seemed to intensify and breathe a second wind into him the longer it burned, despite both its and his own drained quality. A feeling that he was being watched crept over him, the kind of feeling he hated more than anything…besides the feeling of his own incompetence.
"…Am I being followed?" He wondered aloud as he quickened his pace.
Suddenly, a scream rang out, and his eyes widened as he realized that it was Fran. "What's she doing here?" A thought crossed his mind that his rather smart employee got her smart self wrapped into a not-so-smart situation. "I fear that this's one of those times when her love of knowledge is not a good thing…" He sighed deeply and began to run in the direction from which her scream came.
"Go away!" Fran opened her ripped umbrella and attempted to use it as a shield.
"What's that gonna do? Shake rain all over me? I'm already wet!" Spindarella mocked Fran and laughed.
"I know I don't know any kung fu, but I do have mace, so stand back or I'll spray you!" She pulled the small canister out of her apron pocket.
"What's that gonna do? Make me smell good?" Camille chided, approaching Fran.
Fran let the umbrella down and sprayed the peppery mist all over Camille's face, causing the chameleon woman to drop her sais and attempt to shield her eyes to no avail. "It burns! Get it off!"
Fran then, with the speed and reflexes of a rather panicked waitress, simultaneously slammed the handle of her umbrella against Camille's head while closing it, making it mimic a knight's lance. She then slammed it over Camille's head repeatedly, trying to swat away the livid reptilian female. When that didn't work, she jabbed Camille in the stomach and chest, her blows doing more to knock Camille back than any real damage.
"General Camille!" Spindarella shouted in shock. How could a mere human hurt a general of Dai Shi like this? It made absolutely no sense…but then again, she was apparently a companion of the Pai Zhuq members in the area. Perhaps she was more dangerous than once thought, which gave Spindarella all the reason she needed to use all the force she wanted.
She fired a quick shot of webbing, ensnaring the umbrella's top and giving Spindarella the leverage to yank it away. She then tore that webbing away from her mouth, then rapidly shot another web rope at Fran, catching her in the still outstretched arm and engulfing it in the sticky substance.
Fran dropped her mace and began trying to claw the web off with her right hand. "Get over here!" She tore away the web and wrapped it around her hand with speed and accuracy only gained through many years of practice. She then yanked on the webbing, jostling Fran towards her and knocking the girl off her feet. Fran screamed and tried harder to pull away from the webbing, but it was no use.
"Oh, don't worry silly human! You're worth more to me alive!" Spindarella laughed.
As if on cue, a purple blaze shot through the trees and clamped onto Spindarella's left shoulder with a set of flaming jaws, sending sparks flying from the clashing auras. Spindarella let go of the net and began clawing at the entity's jaws, trying to get it off of her.
Fran fell to the ground and crawled away to the safety of an oak tree with a low branch where she could watch the fight in peace.
Spindarella peeled the jaws back and flung the entity nearly twenty feet away, only to have it land on its feet and growl. "I'm surprised that my paralysis toxin hasn't killed you yet…you are worthy of us indeed." Camille commented as she got to her feet. She closed her eyes and focused on the creature's aura as she summoned up her sais. "Perhaps I haven't hit you enough times yet!" She ran at him cautiously, spinning her sais to assure her grips on them were tight.
The entity inhaled deeply, then let out a piercing howl which forced everyone to cover their ears. The shockwave from the howl shot through the rain and smashed into Camille, sending sparks up and knocking her off her feet and all the way back to Spindarella's side. Camille curled up momentarily as Spindarella charged at it.
As the entity inhaled deeply again, Spindarella was surprised by a heavy metal ball swinging up and smashing her in the head.
"Come and pick on us, you overgrown house pest!" Casey taunted as he, Theo, and Lily took positions that indicated their desire to charge into the fight. Lily swung her Jungle Mace about, preparing to make another attack.
"Fran! Get out of here!" Theo shouted, shooing her away. The entity looked over at Fran, then walked over towards the tree she was perched in as the Rangers sprinted towards Spindarella.
"Ha!" Spindarella shot off another burst of web at the Rangers.
Theo, in a moment of clarity, charged to the front of the group.
"Call to the beast inside! Unleash the jaguar!"
A blazing blue light surrounded him that shot forth on his command, taking the form of his animal spirit as it rocketed towards the webbing. As the jaguar spirit connected with the sticky net, it burst into flames. If Spindarella and the others could've seen Theo's face, they would've seen him beaming with pride.
"Just as I thought." He gloated, crossing his arms and standing proudly.
Camille got up and leaped high into the air towards Fran's tree. The entity spotted her and bounded up the tree trunk as the chameleon warrior began to descend. With no time for mistakes, the fiery being leaped off the trunk and flew at Camille with claws and fangs bared, sinking them all into her as they connected in mid-air.
Sparks flew about as they crashed to the ground and rolled, eventually stopping with the entity on top of Camille. It went in to bite her again, and she quickly shot the dagger through its head, feeling the blade slice through the top layers of skin. It flinched and yelped, then swatted the sai out of her hand.
She winced and spun her other sai, sinking it into its lower back. The entity howled in pain and whimpered, becoming stunned long enough for her to kick it off her sai. Fran gasped and looked away as it slowly got up and circled around, limping and weakened considerably.
The Rangers prepared for Spindarella's next attack, which came in the form of her belts. Lily laughed softly and waited, still spinning her mace rhythmically.
"I'll draw her fire for ya, Lily." Casey commented.
"Thanks, Casey."
"And I'm waiting on you two, so hurry up." Theo said, summoning his Jungle Fans.
Casey slowly made his way around the field, drawing Spindarella's attention. Lily watched the belts chase Casey around as she waited for the perfect moment…
There!
"Casey, duck!"
Casey dropped to the ground as Lily tossed the meteor hammer with a curve, making the cannonball end spiral in the air. As the ball circled around the belts, the chain followed and wrapped around them, and once Lily tugged back tightly, she stopped their movements and held them in place.
"Finally!" Theo ran forwards and, with a quick spin, cut through all of the belts with the fans.
Spindarella stumbled back and patted down her now trimmed down belts. "No! You little brats! What have you done!"
"Retreat!" Camille shouted, grinning.
"…Huh?" Spindarella asked, sounding greatly confused.
"Our job is done."
Although Spindarella didn't agree with the sentiment, she collected her wits and put her best face on. She turned and bowed at Camille. "Yes, General Camille." They both then leaped high in the air and out of sight.
Fran slowly slid down the tree and grabbed her can of mace. The entity slowly walked up softly to her and began clawing at the webbing around her arm, letting it burn away without hurting her arm.
"See? It's an animal spirit, like ours. That's how I knew to use my jaguar animal spirit against her webbing." Theo replied to Casey and Lily, who were watching on the scene between the entity and Fran with him.
They watched as it backed up, whimpered, then jogged off. Fran's eyes widened and she got up. "Wait! Waiiiiiiit!" She began to run after it, causing the Ranger trio to panic.
"Fran! Stop!" Casey shouted. He charged out after her, but was quickly stopped by a wall of Rinshi dropping out of the trees. "C'mon!" Casey whined, wigging out slightly. "What is it with you guys today? Can't you see we're too busy for you?"
"They're undead, Casey. I doubt they'd understand 'We're too busy for you'." Theo curtly replied, sounding annoyed with Casey's impatience. "Let's just get through them as fast as we can."