[Wednesday, October 6th, 1993 2:07pm]

"The AquaBase is a state of the art facility that began construction a little over two years ago. Our primary goal is to offer assistance to the people of Marnier Bay whenever there is a natural disaster of any kind. Flood, Earthquake, tornado, the usual. However, our secondary mission is identify, locate and classify any demons who may make their way to Earth," Ms. Fairweather explained as she and Trini walked through the corridors of the AquaBase.

There were still many parts of the base that were inaccessible due to construction, but for the most part, Trini found herself impressed with the layout and level of technology. Some of the vaguely reminded her of the Command Center, but even she had to admit she wasn't as familiar with the systems as she should have been.

While Ms. Fairweather had done her best to satisfy Trini's concerns about having malicious intent, she did note that during the tour, they were accompanied by two armed guards. It led Trini to believe that Ms. Fairweather didn't fully trust her yet, which was a wise precaution. Trini kept her guard up as well, just in case.

"Demons?" she inquired.

The two of them turned into what appeared to be a briefing room, where there was a gentlemen sitting at the end of the table.

"I'll let the Commander explain it. Commander Mitchell, this is Trini Kwan from Angel Grove. Trini, this is the Commander of the AquaBase, Commander William Mitchell," she introduced, then gracefully backed out, leaving Trini in the room along with the Commander.

Trini again noted that the two armed guards were not only in the room with her, but were standing on the opposite side of the door.

"It's a pleasure to finally meet you, young lady. We've been keeping track of the Power Rangers ever since they made their first appearance on Earth. I admit, I thought you'd be taller," Commander Mitchell said with a cheerful smile as he approached Trini, extending his hand to her.

She obliged him, then motioned for her to sit down across from him. The two of them took their seats, and the Commander slid a vanilla folder towards her.

"This is all the information we have on the temporal rupture that happened in the construction area in Angel Grove. As you can see, it bears a striking resemblance to another anomaly we have been keeping our eyes on for quite some time," he told her.

Trini read through the paperwork, admittedly a little confused by what she was see. "What is… the shadow world?" she inquired.

"A lot of different people throughout time has called it different things… I've heard it be referred to as The Shadow World, there is an ancient document that makes reference to an Abyss of Evil. Its original name, as far back as we can recall, it was called os infernum. Its latin, it means…" he was interrupted.

"The Mouth of Hell," Trini stated.

"You know latin, very good. But beliefs and superstitions aside, this is what I can tell you about it. Based on our information, whenever any of the monsters are defeated, their souls… their essences, are taken there. The darkest of the dark, the most sinister beings, all of them end up there sooner or later. From what we can tell, there are only three entrances to os infernum, one of them is about ten minutes outside of Marnier Bay, which is the one we keep a close eye on, there is one in Cleveland, Ohio, and another in the small town of Sunnydale, California. None of them are active, meaning nothing is escaping, but the energy that amount of evil resonates is enough to wreak havoc on the natural world. That's why Lightspeed Rescue was created, to assist in containing that havoc. So far, it hasn't been anything we couldn't handle, but I'm afraid a time will come when we will need more firepower than we have," he explained.

"Sounds like you need the power rangers," she mentioned.

"Our top minds are working with NASADA on a man made ranger energy, where we can harness whatever gives you your powers and recruit our own team, but we're years away from that. Or at least, we thought we were. We have confirmed that the rupture that was opened in your city is also a portal of some kind to os infernum, but when we sent a team to investigate, it had been sealed. We brought you here to ask what you knew about it, and work together to prevent it from happening again."

"I don't know much about it, only that the blue ranger was sent to close the rift with some sort of device Zordon gave us," she said.

The commander leaned back in his chair, rubbing his chin. "A proton accelerator?" he asked.

"I believe so, yes."

"Very good, but I would still like to keep a team of people in that area for the next 72 hours to ensure it doesn't return."

"Has there been any sign of the blue ranger?" she asked.

"Negative. In order to seal a rupture, especially one of the size, strength and intensity that our sensors picked up, it was much too big to be sealed from this side. It would have had to have been sealed from the other side. I'm sorry, but I'm afraid your friend is in os infernum," Commander Mitchell told him.

Trini stood up abruptly. "We need to get him out of there, now!" she said.

"I'm sorry, but we lack the energy to open a rupture on our own, and even if we did, it isn't a one way street. Opening a rupture could let any manner of creature out into our world. I apologize for your friend, and if he did in fact seal the rupture the Earth owes him a debt of gratitude, but I'm afraid there is no way…" he was interrupted as an alarm went off in the entire base and red lights began to flash in the hallway.

"What's happening?" Trini asked.

Commander Mitchell hurried over to one of the com panels on the wall, pressing a button. "Rescue Ops, this is Commander Mitchell. Report."

"Commander, we have an intruder alert." a voice responded.

"An intruder? We're underwater. How is that possible?"

"Several of our guards are down in the upper pylon."

"Give me a visual of the main corridor of the upper pylon," he ordered.

The screen in front of him blinked on as the black ranger, power axe in hand, made his way through the corridor with determination in his walk as explosions and smoke engulfed the area.

"Friend of yours?" the commander asked.

"Its Zack. He probably saw you take me away from the police station and he followed us here to rescue me," she told him. Thats so sweet of him, she thought to herself.

"He is taking out our guards, and based on his path, it looks like he is headed straight for…" before he could finish his sentence, the door to the briefing room flew open. The smoke dissipated, and the black ranger walked in.

"Let my friend go!" Zack warned, making his way towards the commander.

Trini quickly stood in between them, putting her hands on Zack's chest to stop him. "I'm not a prisoner here. I'm okay," she told him.

The black ranger's body language completely changed as he stopped dead in his tracks, lowering his weapon and wrapping his arms around her. "You can't go around scaring me like that, girl. I'm too young for high blood pressure," he joked.

"You took down half a dozen of our best guards, young man. Impressive," the commander noted.

"Whats going on here? Who are you and what is this place?"

"I'll answer all your questions on the way out. Right now, we have to find a way to os infernum to rescue Billy," Trini told him.

"Os whatis?"

"Just come on," she grabbed Zack's arm, but quickly turned back to Commander Mitchell. "I assume we are free to go?"

The commander nodded. "Of course, but I think there is someone you'll want to meet first," he mentioned.

Before either of them could respond, another officer walked into the room. While Trini wasn't familiar with the ranking system Lightspeed Rescue used, it was clear that whoever he was, he was a high ranking officer. There were medals pinned to his uniform, and a gold tassel on his right shoulder.

The man himself was tall, dark and had a muscular build. He stood in front of Zack and Trini, removing his hat and placing it under his arm as stood, if Trini didn't know any better, nervously. It was obvious he was older as his hair was thinning, and there were traces of gray in his beard and goatee.

"Hello," he said softly.

In that moment, Zack powered down, and his ranger uniform was replaced by his civilian clothes. Almost all at once, he took a few steps forward, and Trini's hold on his arm completely fell away.

"Dad?"