A\N: And now we get to the aftermath of emotional abuse. Please consider your headspace before continuing.

Things did not instantly go better. For a few weeks, they got worse.

Trent was unable to control his morphs, or even remember what happened when he did. At one point he tried running away until Tommy tracked him down and pointed out that he could either have a dragon follow him everywhere or could settle down and come back. Trent opted to go back. Under protest, because he was terrified of hurting someone, but he still went.

Tommy…dealt with the mess Anton had left.

Trent was devastated. He believed Anton was rejecting him, and to be honest, Anton was. It was the same pattern he'd displayed with Tommy—drawing someone in, then acting as if he'd forgotten their existence. In Tommy, it felt like one minute he couldn't live without Anton, even if he'd always felt alone and alienated under Anton's quicksilver moods, then the next minute he wanted to tear Anton apart with his teeth and spit out the flesh as he watched Trent struggle. Trent was quiet, but Tommy heard him crying at night, too proud to ask Tommy for help and in too much pain to keep silent. Tommy saw Trent's moods change like lightning, always careful not to overstep, hungry for approval and praise but afraid when he got it. He wanted to please Anton, Tommy knew, but Anton wasn't the sort of man you pleased. Not easily. Not without scars.

And then they ran into a meteorite that gave everyone alternate personalities.

Tommy shapeshifted into a dragon and got stuck. Kira tried to be fashionable. (Maybe she was? Tommy wasn't incredibly up-to-date on fashion anyways.) Conner let his intelligence shine through, and Ethan worked out like a gym rat. Trent, though, was free of the gem's influence. Nothing in his personality changed; he was just free to morph, and he laughed with delight when he realized it.

Tommy flew him into battle, just to hear him cheer.

Tommy broke the rock into sections, planning on giving Trent a nice small stone to carry in his pocket, maybe tumble it so it could be worn as a necklace, and very suddenly he was human again. A few seconds later Hayley was yelping in his ear about how the White Ranger was out of control again.

Tommy took to the skies in a cry of frustrated anger.

A few days later, they set up a containment field and ended up using it later that same day. It worked, and the White Ranger seemed to figure out fairly quickly that he wasn't going anywhere. He settled for leaning against it, playing with his dagger and looking bored.

Ethan came into the living room, turned the sofa back over, pulled out The Hobbit, and started reading.

"…What are you doing?" Trent asked.

"Reading. You seem like you could use the company." Ethan said. He raised an eyebrow. "Or I could just let Dr. O and Hayley scan you while you sit around being bored."

Trent said nothing.

Ethan dove back into the book, and Trent…did nothing. Just stayed still, and quiet, and Tommy had a feeling he was listening.

He demorphed about half an hour earlier than normal.

Tommy dropped the containment field and gathered Trent carefully up, carrying him over to the stairs so he could go sleep it off on his bed. Trent shook Tommy off and stumbled over to the sofa, collapsing on the other end of it and passing out.

Ethan considered Trent, shut the book, and pulled out his handheld video game.

"You did a good job, Ethan." Tommy praised.

Ethan shrugged. "He's my friend. Not his fault this is happening."

It was the best Tommy had felt all week.

Tommy was very, very pissed off.

Mesegog, annoyed that Trent wasn't fighting for him, had used Anton Mercer to call Trent home. And then it turned out that Anton was Mesegog, or rather was shapeshifting into him. A surprise monster attack had been used to distract the Rangers, which would have worked if Tommy weren't a suspicious bastard who occasionally strung thoughts together like 'gee, Anton shows no interest in renewing contact with people he's dropped normally, why would he be interested in recontacting Trent?' and 'hey, this is a really convenient monster, maybe it's a distraction'.

In the fight, a blast had knocked the evil encoding free of Trent's Dino Gem.

Go fight with the others. Tommy had ordered.

"But—Dad—"

Trust me.

Trent had been torn for a moment, but he'd also been abandoned and betrayed, and he was a dragon, a baby dragon but still a dragon, and that was enough to make him run out and head for his friends.

Tommy shapeshifted.

The battle was a little strange. Tommy was a bit small for a dragon, but that was still large enough so that he had to tear off the roof and jump up onto it to get enough space to move. Mesegog was smaller, but slower, hindered by the fact that he was based off an alligator. Both of them, though, had the claws of a dragon. It was almost getting through Tommy's scales, and that only enraged him more as he tried to grab Mesegog off his back and fling him down. Finally Tommy resorted to flipping down on his back on the ground; landing hurt, but he successfully smashed Mesegog into the ground.

Mesegog staggered upright, and Tommy inhaled to breathe out fire and kill the damn bastard.

Mesegog teleported away.

Tommy let loose the flame, because once summoned there was no point containing it. Then he dropped down to human size and set about finding an invisiportal back to the mainland.

He could hunt later.

"Don't hurt Dad."

It had come out of the blue, after the party Hayley had whipped up. Trent and Tommy were watching TV and Trent had just blurted that out.

Tommy blinked at him. "Of cou…" He trailed off. He wasn't…actually sure that was possible. To defeat Mesegog without also killing Anton.

And suddenly he wanted to.

He was so sick of all the angst. The pain and the rage and watching Trent look defeated and hopeless. So sick of knowing that Trent was going through exactly the same thing. So sick of wanting, desperately, for someone who was abusive and fond of gaslighting—Hayley had been very clear on what Anton was—to come and return them to lives that had been ones of alienation and aloneness, because that had been 'normal' for so long.

It would be so much easier if Anton were to die.

But Trent was avoiding Tommy's gaze, stiff and scared, begging him not to hurt his father. "It's not his fault." Trent went on. "Like…like with me, it wasn't…he didn't want to be Mesegog."

"He chose to create Mesegog." Tommy said as gently as he could. "What he did was unsafe and he knew it. If we let Mesegog keep doing what he has been, a lot of people who didn't have a choice are going to die."

Trent shut his eyes. Tommy could see his breath hitching.

"I'll try." Tommy promised. "I'll do everything I can to save him. But it might not be possible, Trent."

"Please." Trent managed, and then he was crying, and Tommy stood and shapeshifted and curled his wings around his kit, this abandoned dragon child. Trent curled into a ball and sobbed, and Tommy kept him close and safe and whispered promises that he would do his best, would try to save Anton.

Eventually Trent stopped crying and rested against Tommy's wings. Tommy shifted down to human and sat next to Trent, and Trent leaned against him. Tommy gently played with his hair, wrapping his arms around Trent instead of wings.

"You don't die too." Trent whispered.

Tommy smiled. "No. Never."

Trent closed his eyes and rested.