After Darkness Falls

"Reunited"

Disclaimer: I do not own Power Rangers, that is owned by Saban/Disney. Carri and all things related to Carri (including Jason's cougar ninjetti power) belong to KJ with many thanks. Everyone else belongs to me.

A/N: To avoid confusion, there's a black morpher with white etching for the white ranger, and a white morpher with black etching for the black morpher, as the animal face that is etched into the morphers is the ranger color. Kim's powers were inspired by KSuzie, but unlike KSuzie's she cannot travel between dimensions, only time and space. As always, reviews are appreciated. Sorry it took so long to get it up.

Dulcea hung her head, staring at the ground. She was glad that Kim had been able to retrieve the powers, she just wished that Kim hadn't had to see what she did. The dimension she hid the Ferral Powers in was a special dimension, it preyed on a persons worst fears, showing them a possible future based on that. Kim hadn't said what she had seen, but the look on her face suggested it had been worse than she could have ever imagined. She wanted to ask her pupil about it, but she ran off without a word to help her friends. Dulcea smiled, she was proud of her apprentice for being so loyal to her friends.

Jason felt Xinas hit the back of his helmet and knock him to the ground. He quickly rolled over and blocked the monsters sword with his own. "Come on guys, hurry!" Through his visor he could see the humanoid wolves onyx black eyes staring at him, studying him. He pushed the wolf off of him and jumped back to his feet. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Wes, Eric, and Zhane fighting a losing battle against Sarahna. The three were holding their own, but just barely. One false move and it would be over for them. He needed to finish this fast. Holding his sword up in the air he turned it down and struck the ground, sending a path of ice towards Xinas.

Xinas looke don as the black ranger struck the ground, he saw the ice racing towards him, and as he prepared to try and jump out of the way he felt a blade press against his neck before the ice covered his legs up to his waist. "Damn!" he growled.

Jason watched as a crimson ranger appeared behind Xinas and forced him to stay where he was. He stared at the new ranger before him, his helmet had a basic design reminiscent of the Astro rangers, and the suit itself was crimson with a black tiger face on the chest, a black band around the collar, and white boots and gloves with black bands around the tops. "Jason come on, it won't be long until he's free of your ice, the other need out help!" a male voice said from behind the crimson helmet.

"Tommy." Jason said to himself as the two ran to help the others against Sarahna. He noticed a third red ranger with Zhane and the others. He knew then that Kim had come through for them and gotten the Ferral powers. "Took you long enough, didn't it?" Jason joked as he ran up next to Kim and froze the daggers headed for her.

"Yeah, yeah. Just shut up and fight!" Kim retorted as she raised her bow and fired a few energy arrows at Sarahna. "Damn, she blocked them!" Kim seethed as the evil empress waved her hand around and sent the arrows flying behind her.

Sarahna smiled, they could bring out as many rangers as they wanted and it still wouldn't be enough, she would triumph. Her smiled quickly faded as she felt a sharp, burning pain her back. Lokking behind her she saw the silver Astro ranger facing her with his super silverizer aimed at her. "Enough of this!" She cried out as she sent flaming daggers headed for everyone of the rangers. She watched as Jason froze those that were headed in his and the two new rangers direction, the two Time Force rangers blocked them with their sabers, and the silver ranger shot down the ones headed for him.

The six rangers surrounded her. "Damn. This isn't over rangers, Jason." She said as she eyed the black ranger, a look of hate in her eyes. She threw one last dagger at Xinas to free him from the ice and together the two teleported back to the palace.

After the two enemies had left Wes and Eric turned to look at the others and Wes said "Well, we'd better be getting back to Silver Hills." He turned to Jason and Tommy and said "It was great seeing you again, despite the circumstances."

"Same here." Tommy said.

"Hold on," Kim said, interrupting Tommy, "why don't the two of you come back to the Power Chamber and see if the Ferral Power will accept you?" She knew they were needed in Silver Hills, and she hated to keep them gone any longer than they had to be, but it would benefit the team if one of them was chosen. It'd be an extra Ferral Ranger that much sooner.

"I suppose we can stay gone a few more minutes." Eric said, looking to Wes, who nodded his approval.

"Alright Billy, teleport them to the Power Chamber, we'll follow." Jason said into his communicator. Billy acknowledged him and in two red streaks the red and quantum Time Force rangers were gone. "Let's go." Jason said as they all motioned to teleport.

Deep in space, on the planet Aquitar two well known rangers were preparing to depart for home. Carri squeezed Rocky's arm as they stood by, ready to be teleported back to Earth. He had been stung by one of Sarahna's monsters. The reaction had been delayed due to the venom needing to be spread throughout his entire body before it took any sort of effect. Billy had never seen anything like it, he had studied the different types of known poisons in the universe while he lived on Aquitar, and brought some of the antidotes home with him, while he created the others after returning. But this one, there no records of it in his files. The only explanation was that it must have been fairly new.

His guess had been right, it was fairly new. A few Aquitians had been infected with it just a few weeks prior and had since developed an antidote. The only drawback was that it wasn't an immediate cure, it took several weeks of injections and time in the rejuvinating waters of Aquitar to completely purge it from the system. Rocky had been sent to Aquitar for healing, and Carri was adament about not leaving his side. So they chose Zhane and Karone to temporarily replace them on the team.

Rocky looked over at Carri, he couldn't believe that she had come all this way for him, that she had stayed by his side everyday, rarely leaving it. He leaned in a little and kissed her on her temple. She turned to look at him, her eyes lit up.

She had been so scared that she was going to lose him. His first week on Aquitar there had been no signs of improvement, but after that first week things started to look up. She didn't think she'd ever been so happy when Delphine came and announced that his treatments were finished and that they could return home. "Do you have the case?" she asked. It was the last thing Carri wanted to talk about, but she knew it was important and she wanted to be sure that they didn't forget it.

"Yup, I sure do." Rocky replied with a goofy grin on his face as he held up a small bluish- black case. Inside the case were a few new antidotes to recently discovered toxins. Cestro was sure Billy would want to have it just in case.

"Alright," Delphine said as she turned to face the two rangers "things are all ready and soon you will be back home."

Rocky held his hand out and said "Thank you, Delphine, for all your help. I really appreciate it." He hated saying goodbye to his Aquitian friends, but he was ready to get home and see his other friends and family.

"Yes, thank you." Carri said as she held her hand out to Cestro.

"It was our pleasure to have you." Cestro said as he and Delphine took Carri and Rocky's hands. After saying goodbye to Tidius, Aurico, and Corcus the two Terra rangers teleported out in streaks of blue and white.

The rangers, Billy, Karone, and Trini sat around as one by one Wes, Eric, Zhane, and Jason tried their hands at the Ferral Powers. After rejecting the two Time Force rangers and Zhane, Jason walked up to try it. He looked down at the box that contained four black morphers, and one white morpher. Each morpher had an animal face etched into it in it's respective color. He held his hand over them, and the Silver Wolf Morpher glowed in response. He picked it up and felt the power run throughout his body as he put it on. "Incredible..." he said as he looked at it. He had held a few morphers in his day, not as many as some, but still he had never felt anything like this. It was clear that these powers were made by Zordon himself. He didn't know how, maybe it was the Muranthian power within him, or maybe it was just a sense of familiarity, but he could feel Zordon's presence, like he was there with them.

"I know right?" Kim said as she saw the expression on Jason's face. She too had felt like Zordon was there with her, and she was sure Tommy had felt it too.

"But we're still down two rangers." Tommy pointed out. Karone was now powerless, and Zhane couldn't keep going up against Sarahna with just the Silver Astro powers alone.

"Four," Kim corrected him, knowing it only made their situation worse. Before he could respond she continued. "There's four morphers left, in order for us to have a complete team we need four more rangers. I say we call another meeting, get all the rangers together to try for the morphers." She looked to Wes, Eric, Zhane, and Karone and said "You four don't need to attend, since you've already tried."

"Sounds like a plan, Billy, could you contact them for us?" Jason asked as he turned to look at the former blue ranger.

"Of course, but first I have a surprise for you." Billy said as he turned away from the computer with a big smile on his face. The rangers looked at him curiously as a blue and a white streak materialized into Rocky and Carri.

"Oh my God!" Kim cried out as she ran over and gave her friend a hug. It had been weeks since she had seen her friend, and she missed the company. The house just seemed lonely.

"Hey Kim." Carri said as she returned the hug.

Jason and Tommy both walked up to Rocky and patted his shoulders. "It's good to have you back, man." Jason said as Tommy nodded.

"I'm glad to be back. I can't wait to get back to my school. Bet you've enjoyed the vacation." Rocky joked, looking at Jason.

"Actually we've kept it going. Jason, Adam, and myself." Tommy told him. "Jason mostly, me and Adam helped out when he asked though."

"Seriously?" Rocky questioned, waiting for Jason to nod. "Thanks guys! That means a lot to me, it really does." He hadn't expected them to keep his school going for him while he was gone, but he was glad they did.

"So what have we missed?" Carri asked, taking note of the two Silver Guardians present, and the box of morphers on the table. The others proceeded to fill her in on the past few weeks, about them losing their powers, gaining new ones, Cairus' death, and the new guy, Xinas. She couldn't believe all of that had happened in just the time they'd been on Aquitar. "Geez, I leave you guys alone for, what, three, four weeks and everything goes to Hell? You guys just can't survive without me can you?" She joked.

"Yeah, I'm sure it's all because you were gone." Jason joked back. "Anyway, hate to rush you into duty so soon, but we need to see if you're capable of using any of these morphers." He gestured to the box on the table that contained the four remaining morphers.

"Oh, sure. No problem." Rocky said as he and Carri walked over to it. Carri went first, waving her hand over it. The White Fox Morpher glowed in response.

Rocky watched the white ranger morpher chose his girlfriend. He hoped he would be chosen, he wanted to be able to be out and protect her if she needed it, not sitting around waiting for her to possibly return from a battle. He walked up to the box, hoping he would be chosen. As he waved his hand over the box the Blue Ape Morpher glowed in response. He couldn't help but smile. Not only had he been chosen, but he had chosen by the ape morpher. The ape had been his Ninjetti power, so the ape held some sentimental value to him.

"Well," Billy said as he looked at the two morphers that remained, "I contacted everyone. The meeting will be tomorrow in the hangar above. Everyone from Zack to the Jungle Fury rangers will be attending."

"That sounds awesome, but I think for now I'm going to head home. I haven't been there in so long." Rocky said. He missed his place, four weeks away was enough for him.

"That's fine, I think we're done here anyway." Tommy said, looking to Jason for confirmation.

"Yeah, go on home. I understand the feeling." Jason said "I guess we'll see you tomorrow." Rocky nodded his head and teleported out in a streak of blue light.

"I think we'll head home too." Kim said, and Carri nodded. "Bye!" The two then teleported out. Shortly afterwards they all headed out, Wes and Eric went back to Silver Hills, Zhane and Karone back to Andros' house, Tommy headed back to his apartment for the night, and Billy and Trini stayed behind to create new weapons that would be compatible with the new powers.

Jason left the Power Chamber and went to his usual bar, Charlie's. He took a swig of his beer, as he waited on his old friend to arrive. Just before leaving the Power Chamber on his Harley he had called Zack, one of his best friends, and the original black ranger. It had been a while since they had hung out, and he figured it was about time they did. Zack had agreed.

As he turned to look out across the room he noticed a very familiar blond over by the pool table. "Emily..." he muttered. He thought about if he should go over and talk to her. He hadn't seen her since he rode by her in the parking lot a few weeks ago. Tommy had said that she asked about him, that alone made him curious. He wondered if she still cared for him like he did her. Sure, she had cheated on him, and he wasn't sure if he could forgive her for it or not, but still. It was worth a shot, wasn't it?

Just as he got ready to get up he saw Zack come up. "Yo man, long time no see!" Zack said as he took the stool next to Jason and ordered a beer. "How've you been?" he asked as he turned back around.

Half listening, Jason replied "Good. You?" His eyes were fixed on Emily, still unsure of what to do.

Zack looked at his friend, and followed his gaze to the gorgeous blond playing pool. "Hey, isn't that your ex-girlfriend?"

"Yeah."

"Well why don't you go say hey? You look like you want to." Zack said, turning and grabbing his beer while thanking the bartender.

Jason sighed "I do, it's just...well she did cheat on me you know?" As much as he had tried to, he couldn't forget that nights events. It was as though it was permanently embedded into his mind.

"Yeah, but still. You look like you want to say hey, and who knows, maybe she's sorry. You'll never know until you talk to her, now will you?" Zack said, setting is beer down behind him.

"And you're not going to stop until I do go say hey are you?" Jason asked, glancing at his friend. He knew by the smile on Zacks face that he wasn't.

"You know me well." Zack said with a chuckle. "Maybe too well. Look, I'm gonna head out so you can talk to her. Later man."

"Later." Jason said, standing.

He watched as his friend stood and began crossing the room, his motorcycle boots thunking along the way.

As he made his way towards her, he could feel his heart begin to race and his breath catch in his throat. She was the only girl to ever make him feel like that. Coming up behind her he cleared his throat and said "Emily."

She turned around, stunned by who she saw standing behind her. She looked at him closely, makign sure it was him. There's no doubt about it, she thought. "Jason?" She said, though it came out as a question. "Jason hi, how are you?"

"I'm good, rough day. How about you?" He felt better about talking to her as they eased their way into conversation. She apologized to him for what happened eight years ago, he found that he was able to forgive her, but that didn't mean he was willing to date her again. He found out what she had been up to over the past few years, going to med school and now working as a doctor for Angel Grove Memorial Hospital. Out of all the career choices he thought she would have made, that wasn't one of them. He was proud of her though, he had to admit that.

They talked for at least an hour and a half about what they had been up to. He, of course, had to fabricate a story. She didn't know he was a ranger, and until he was sure he could trust her, if that were possible, he wasn't going to tell her. What he told her was that he had done some travelling, and done some training with a few great masters. It wasn't a total lie, he had travelled, and he had trained with a few masters. As the night dragged on they said their goodbyes and promised to meet up the next night in the same bar at the same time. He walked out to his bike, hopped on and rode home for the night.