A/N:
All right, sorry for the minor delay in updates everyone. You can thank work and real life for that one. While this series is intended as a leisurely side project for PR hiatus and season breaks, I'll do my best to try and maintain a semi regular update schedule. Thanks again, and enjoy!
The demon warlord Abaddon slammed his heavy gauntlet against the heavy stone walls of the Dark Prison Spire. Outside, the darkness and lightning of the Abyss continued to swirl as the general turned back from the window toward the inner throne where dim lights flickered from ancient eldritch torches.
"Those worms with the Empyrian Keyrunes have defeated another one of your servants Master Gideon. Yet, we continue to sit here while they grow stronger!"
From the foot of the throne, a female Cambion gave a sinister smile and a mocking laugh, "Is the great General Abaddon telling us he is afraid of a few human children?"
"Do not mock me Shemhazai," Abaddon snarled, "I didn't become the greatest of the Cambion warriors by being timid!"
"Enough," the master of the two demons said with an authoritative voice. "I am aware of these new Vanguard Rangers, but they pose little threat to us."
Abaddon turned his head curiously toward the dark throne where his master Gideon sat. The large fallen angel had a powerful build and six grey twisted wings folded elegantly. While the winged human bore strikingly beautiful and patrician features, there was still a sinister air of dark power about him.
"These lesser Cambions we send are but our own vanguard. Whenever they inflict misery and calamity among the humans, the seal holding us in this Abyss continues to weaken. Sacrificing a few lesser servants to lay the groundwork for our return is but a trivial price to pay General. Those human children are not the same Empyrian warriors who put us here, so until then, we will bide our time."
Abaddon growled and stood down, "Who would you have me send then, Master?"
Gideon gave a thoughtful smile, "I have already sent Cerberus, one of your prized war mastiffs. With his maddening touch, the humans will devolve into berserk mobs and further weaken our prison."
General Abaddon sputtered, "But Master, what if Cerberus should meet the same fate as Ahriman or Belial?"
Gideon laughed lightly, "He will not. He has been branded by a Cambion sigil, one which will revive and empower him should he fall."
Abaddon gave a grudging nod and turned back to face the window. He supposed for now he would remain quiet and accept the situation. It's not like he or any of the other Cambion demons had much of a choice anyway.
Late morning sunlight streamed in from the bright windows as Danny Winthrope read a newspaper and reclined upon a comfortable couch in one of the dormitory's common rooms. "Hey Claire!" he called out, "Check out this story, there's been a rash of people in the city getting bitten or scratched by some big dog. Must be a slow news week, huh?"
At a nearby table, his classmate and fellow Ranger Claire Li sat hunched over an electronic device with a frown. As she poked around the circuit boards and wires, she gave a yelp as one of the wires erupted in a cloud of sparks that stung her fingers.
Gingerly holding her hand, Claire gave another frown over toward her classmate on the couch, "You know, I really wish you had followed my directions Danny. The wiring job you did on this was so haphazard!"
"You asked me to help wire your little device up while you were in class and that's what I did." Danny answered idly flipping a page, "I just glossed over the needless details. It still works, doesn't it?"
"Not very well," Claire grumbled carefully poking at another wire. "The signal output is very inconsistent."
"Just what are you working on anyway?" the Blue Ranger asked.
"It's a transmitter for ultrasonic radio waves," Claire answered absently, "I'm hoping I can enter this in a science contest later in the month."
"So what are you going to do with it? Contact space aliens or something?" Danny sniggered.
Claire shrugged fiddling with another wire, "I don't know, dogs can be really sensitive to sound. Maybe I can use it to scare you away."
As she zapped herself again, the common room door opened and Joe entered with an angry look. The Red Ranger marched over to where Danny lay and slapped a small stack of papers on the coffee table.
"Is there a problem?" Danny calmly asked looking up from his newspaper.
Joe pushed the papers in front of him quickly, "Yes, there's a problem! I just got your email this morning! Is this… outline what you intend to hand in for our team research project?"
"I was looking at the big picture buddy." Danny shrugged, "It's still got all the major points across."
"It's not even coordinated with my half of the project!" Joe cried in exasperation, "Were you even paying attention to me when we went over the plan a few weeks ago?"
"We still have two days left," Danny sighed getting back to his paper, "I'm sure we can just touch it up in the meantime."
Joe stared at the Blue Ranger in outrage before turning to Claire, "I'm going to kill him."
"Take a number. I have first dibs," Claire sighed as she continued working on her science project.
At that moment, Nick and Izzy walked into the common room, bundled up in heavy green and pink jackets with their teeth still chattering. Nick marched right over to the couch and tilted it, dumping the startled Blue Ranger on the floor as Izzy stood over him with her hands on her hips, "What the hell Danny? Where were you this morning?"
Danny screwed his face in thought, trying to remember what he was getting yelled at for when Izzy continued, "You were supposed to be at the Student Union this morning to get those Halloween Party tickets… remember?"
Nick turned to the others and explained, "Danny was the only one with no class this morning so we asked him to get all of us tickets to go to that big Halloween Party later this week."
"Except he didn't show," Izzy added, "By the time Nick and I got to the ticket office, there was a huge line and we were waiting for about two hours in the cold!"
"I was going to get around to it," Danny said defensively, "As long as it was done by today, right?"
"We told you if you went later, there wouldd be a line!" Nick answered, "Were you even listening to us at dinner yesterday?"
Danny backpedaled a little, "Oh come on guys, I'm sorry. Don't you think you're all overreacting a little bit here?"
The other four Rangers stood in silence fixing him with angry glares when Joe's cell phone went off. Looking down, he quickly checked the text message before turning to the others, "Everyone, that was Professor Bishop. We have trouble in the city."
Forgetting their previous frustrations, the Rangers hurried out of the common room and headed for the roof of their dorm building, reaching for the Keyrunes in their pockets. It had been several weeks since the students' first initiation as Power Rangers, and it seemed their Cambion adversaries weren't quite ready to just give up yet either.
Meanwhile, another one of Hyperion Falls' outlying districts found its streets devolving into chaos and confusion as a small crowd of people scrambled for safety. From a narrow alley, a huge black dog with thick black skin and fiery red eyes smashed through bricks and gave a deep ferocious bark. The giant dog had a large and freakishly muscular build and hot ash was left on the pavement where it walked.
As the Cambion hell hound named Cerberus sent a mailbox flying with a shoulder check, it swiped its claws at several civilians. The terrified people were sent flying and had their clothes torn by the superficial scratches of the monster's claws. Amid the fleeing people, several local police officers pulled up in a car and opened fire with their pistols, but it had little effect on the monstrous dog.
Cerberus growled as the bullets deflected off its hide, and it turned toward a large pole holding up some traffic lights. Taking one big chomp with its razor sharp teeth, the metal pole split and crashed down on the police car, sending the cops scattering in panic. While the police fled in fear, the five morphed Vanguard Rangers arrived, carried on one of the Pink Ranger's powerful summoned wind gusts.
Taking a moment to look around, they took in the situation and saw a score of injured people lying on the ground with scratches from the hound's claws. "What is that thing?" Nick exclaimed in awe as Cerberus finished rooting around an overturned dumpster and grabbed a nearby car with its jaws. Turning its head, the beast hurled the car like a toy and it smashed on the ground not to far from where the Rangers stood.
"Bad dog..." Joe muttered shaking his head and drawing his Feather Stinger pistol. "All right everyone, let's try to draw that thing away from the civilian center."
The five Rangers got into a flanking position and let loose a volley of blaster fire. Cerberus growled in fury as the hail of golden blaster fire struck him, erupting in a cloud of sparks and small scorch marks on his tough hide.
Turning quickly toward his attackers ,the hell hound gave a powerful snarl and generated two more identical heads. In a flash, it let loose a corrosive cloud of ash from its three mouths which scorched nearby cars and debris.
"Huh. That's really freaky... but also kinda cool." Danny exclaimed as Claire pulled him toward momentary cover with the others.
As the Rangers took a moment to hide under cover, they huddled up, "Ok. What now?" Izzy asked, "Our blasters aren't getting through."
"You really want to take that thing on hand to hand?" Joe asked back in uncertainty.
Just then, their cover was smashed away as Cerberus sniffed them out and chomped through the concrete pylon they were using as cover.
"Guess we don't have much choice now," Nick groaned as he and the other two male Rangers leapt up to grapple and struggle with each of Cerberus's three heads. As the three struggled, Claire called on her bow and began to take aim, concentrating a great deal of elemental ice energy into a single arrow. At the last moment, Izzy shouted a warning and the three male Rangers let go to dive safely away. The icy arrow struck Cerberus in one of its side heads and the devil dog gave a wounded yelp as the burst of ice exploded, momentarily neutralizing its fire breath.
Shaking off the attack, the center head gave a low deep howl that resonated along the street and to the Rangers' surprise, the people who had been injured by Cerberus's scratches rose up with a crazed look in their eyes. Many of the people grabbed fallen rocks and metal pipes, then began coming after the Rangers like some pack of crazed rioters.
"Oh, not good." Claire gasped deflecting a blow from one of the crazed citizens.
Turning to her side, she saw the Red Ranger put a citizen in a headlock and call out, "We have to restrain these people, but don't hurt them!"
Each of the Rangers leapt into action to try and disarm or restrain the rioting people, except Danny. As his other allies held off the rioting people, he glanced over to watch Cerberus for a long moment. To his surprise, the heads of the dog focused their attention on the people and became less aggressive. Was the monster maybe focusing to try and control those people?
Seeing the Rangers thoroughly distracted, Cerberus turned and quickly stalked off into the shadows of a nearby alley, most likely to recover from the wound Claire had inflicted on it. Once out of range, the rioting people stopped and froze before fainting to the ground in exhaustion.
"What the heck is going on here?" Izzy asked checking to make sure that one of the fainted victims was still alive and breathing.
"Whatever it is, we'd better go talk to the Professor later." Claire added tapping the Pink Ranger on the shoulder to tell her that more police and paramedics were on their way.
Across the street, Danny continued to stand in place looking to where Cerberus had disappeared before he was given a shove by Nick, "What's the deal Dan? You've been standing around here the whole time while we were under attack."
"I was watching that dog thing!" Danny protested as Joe stepped in to restrain Nick, "Didn't you guys notice how strange it was acting just now?"
"With everything that's gone on today, you're suddenly telling me you're paying attention to details now?" the Red Ranger asked in a stern but level tone.
"Come on Joe!" Dan begged, "Will you guys just listen to me for a minute?"
The Red Ranger turned away and gestured to the others, "Now is not the time Danny. We've got to head back to campus."
Danny sputtered as his fellow Vanguard Rangers all shook their heads at him and called on their wings. The Blue Ranger watched as the others quickly took off into the skies before taking one last glance at the ruined street and reluctantly following his friends home.