A/N: I know I've been quiet across the last couple of days, and this is a pretty short interlude. I will no doubt have more ready in the near future. In the meantime, hope you enjoy it.

A couple of days later, Spike, Cody and Bulk were training under Emily, only now they were being put through their paces. After her initial teething problems, she was beginning to find her stride, managing to establish a balance between working them hard, and also making sure they had a little fun to stop the training seem like a chore.

Bulk was standing, unarmed, staring down Cody. Emily was watching this with interest.

"Alright remember what I taught you." Emily told him. "Cody, full speed this time."

Cody lunged towards him, swinging a shinai. Bulk moved aside, catching his wrist and guiding the 'blade' past him, and down out to the side. Adjusting his position, he took a solid grip on the handle, and started to twist it. Cody was soon left unable to hold the shinai, and found it ripped out of his hand. Bulk brought it up, before bringing it down, stopping just short of Cody's head. Emily just clapped, clearly impressed by Bulk's progress.

"That was perfect!" She complimented him. "Disarming an opponent is a difficult, but highly useful skill. You won't always have the luxury of being armed when an opponent attacks."

She looked around her students and was happy with their work for the day. They had worked hard, and she was happy to let them relax.

"Alright, clear away the equipment. We're done for the day." She told them. "Good work guys."

As they started to clear their stuff away, Emily pulled out her Samuraizer, and dialled, finding to her disappointment that once again, Serena wasn't answering her phone. She hadn't spoken to her sister since she had left for the farm. She had hoped that after all this time; perhaps Serena would finally be ready to take her calls. Kieran saw the look of disappointment on her face, and came over.

"I'm guessing that was Serena?" He asked her.

"She still isn't answering." Emily told him. "The last time I talked to mom, she said that she's spending all her days in the barn training."

"I'm sure she'll talk when she's ready." Kieran told her. Emily just shook her head.

"I've never seen her like this. She's never shut herself off from us before." Emily told him. "I'm just really worried about what she's doing to herself."

"I guess it is pretty worrying." Kieran admitted. "Do you really think she would do something rash?"

"Stephen was the love of her life." Emily told him. "If there was anything that could get her to do something stupid, that would be it."

She gathered up her bags and looked to him with a concerned expression.

"I just hope she hasn't already decided to go after Serrator." She told him. "Once she's made up her mind, Serena isn't known for changing her mind."

Toxica and Jindrax brought an injured Dayu into a cave a little way from the city. After their disastrous attempt to retrieve Urumasa, they had been left with a desperate situation. Urumasa clearly sensed what they had planned for it. It had repelled her violently, unleashing a tremendous amount of power to protect itself. Were it not for her Nighlock form, she almost certainly would not have survived.

They laid her down gently, trying not to aggravate her already considerable injuries. Toxica had done all she could to help heal her, though being unfamiliar with Nighlock physiology, there was only so much she could do. All she could really do was try and keep her comfortable, try to deal with her pain, while her own regenerative abilities dealt with the wounds.

"Dayu, are you sure about this?" Jindrax asked her. "I mean, Dekker doesn't have his memories anymore. As far as you know, he'll destroy you if he sees you."

"I can only hope that he listens long enough to hear what I have to say." Dayu told them. "Once he knows where Urumasa is, there's nothing he won't do to get it back."

"But once he has it back...won't that make him more powerful?" Jindrax asked her.

"We don't have a choice." Dayu reminded them. "We can't destroy Urumasa if we can't get to it."

"But that's just it, how do you intend to destroy it?" Toxica asked her. "I don't know if we even can."

"There's clearly something that can." Dayu told them, forcing a little smile. "Do you know what Urumasa's attack taught me?"

She looked to them as she pulled herself up painfully.

"It was frightened." She told them. "If there was nothing that could destroy it, would it have tried so hard to defend itself?"

"So, have you got any ideas what could do it?" Jindrax asked her.

"I have one idea." She told him. "One that I should have thought of much sooner."

Meanwhile, over in the barn of their family farm, Serena was working, as usual, training hard for the day she would return to the city to take her revenge on Serrator. Right now, she was hanging upside down from the upper level, pulling sit-ups. She had worked so hard for so long, that every inch of her ached, and she was feeling light-headed. Although she knew that she was in quite possibly the best shape she had ever been, she couldn't help feeling like it would never be enough.

As she dangled down, breathing heavily, she noticed something a little way off. The barn didn't have much in it, some training equipment and bales of hay, but there was something else there. She unhooked her legs from the beam, flipping backwards onto her feet, and made her way over. She reached in, pulling some hay out of the bale, eventually finding it. It was an octagonal power disk. She didn't know where it had come from, but then finding a piece of plastic in the bale along with it, she suddenly remembered.

About a week after she had arrived at the farm, her mother had found Stephen's Master System among her possessions. Everything he had owned had been taken and disposed of, in order to leave no evidence to get people asking questions about his disappearance. Her mother had thrown it against the wall, smashing it to pieces. Serena had cleared it up, but obviously hadn't gotten all of it. She didn't know why, but it seemed that Stephen had kept this with the Master System.

It was a power disk, but it was unlike any she had seen before. It was a lot smaller, and octagonal. She looked to her sword, Kasamune, resting on a stand a little way off, and headed over. Sliding the power disk onto the hilt, she smiled. It was a perfect fit. She didn't know what it was, or what it did, but it seemed that Stephen had left her with one last gift. Without Ranger powers, she was sure she was going to need any edge she could possibly get, and now she was sure that the man she loved had given it to her.