Two weeks had passed and Tommy had yet to sit with them and explain what had happened with the Command Center. He had shown Kimberly and Shelby the books, but had not done much more. Cameron was furious any time he saw Tommy and the other rangers were barely containing his anger. Tommy had said he was arranging a meeting, but they were all starting to doubt it. While Shelby was getting better, Kimberly had barely improved and they suspected Tommy's reluctance to say anything had to do with that. It had to be hard to watch one of his rangers get better when his wife was still struggling.
"We have a meeting tonight," Tommy said as he walked into the Command Center and Cameron looked up at him. Tommy knew how aggravated they were with him, but he hadn't been able to pull this together any faster. He had been unaware how many schedules would need to be juggled to just get the audience that they needed in the room. "It took me this long to get the Guardians to agree to a time and place where we could have this discussion. And then it took a few days to figure out when the others would be free to babysit. I know how much you wanted to get this information, but I can't do this more than once."
"Have you seen what the books say?" Cameron asked and Tommy gave him a terse nod. He was furious about what the books had said, but he didn't feel like he should tell Cameron that. "Doesn't it feel like it's impossible?"
"It feels like it is the antithesis of the life that I know Kimberly had until now and the life that she wants to continue to have. I trust the Command Center when it says this is the way, but Kimberly…there's more with her than with Shelby. I'm more," Tommy grumbled and Cameron gave him a confused look. He was more? What the hell did that mean? "They agreed to 7pm, we should probably be early."
"Are we going back to that place?" Cameron asked and Tommy nodded. "They're assholes."
"Trust me- Kimberly will be able to help with that," Tommy stated and Cameron looked over at him. He was not sure what Kimberly could help with at the moment. "If she's mentally with us."
"Tommy- how is she, really?" Cameron asked and Tommy just shook his head. He couldn't talk about it. He was not sure how he would be able to talk about it this evening, but he was going to have to figure out a way. "I'm sorry."
"Thomas lost her when Kiros killed her. I'm losing her in a different way," Tommy whispered and he quickly shook his head. He couldn't dwell on this for too long, especially with the one person who might experience the same thing. He had faith that they could find a new normal, he just hoped it wouldn't take too long. "I've got a busy day at the university- can you get Kimberly and Shelby there with you?"
"Absolutely," Cameron said and Tommy clapped him on the back and then turned to leave. Cameron watched him and glanced over to see Shelby standing at the end of the hall, with concern etched on her face. How much had she heard? "Babe…"
"She's not getting better?" Shelby asked and Cameron just nodded. It was obvious that Tommy was keeping a lot from them and he didn't really blame him. This had to be hard to have part of his marriage displayed in such a public way, even if it was only with the rangers. "How is that possible? I know the stuff is weird, but it's helping. I'm actually able to make sense of the prophecies I'm seeing now and I'm mostly back to normal."
"He mentioned something about how he was more. I don't know what that means," Cameron said as Shelby stepped into his arms and he let out a sigh as she comforted him. He hated seeing what might be her future, but he hoped that it wouldn't be the case. He hoped that they had started her training early enough to prevent what was happening to Kimberly. He hoped Shelby had a chance to be normal.
"Rebekah," Tommy said with a nod as they walked into the Guardian headquarters. He had had a few meetings with her over the last two weeks and was glad that she was at least reasonable, but so many of the Guardians did not seem to be.
"Are they meeting you here?" Rebekah asked and Tommy nodded again. He had come straight from the university, which explained his slacks, sweater, and loafers. Kimberly regularly teased him about how his students had no idea who he really was and he knew that had carried over from teaching high school. A part of him missed teaching high school, so when they had asked him if he wanted to do a lecture series for local high schoolers- he had jumped at the opportunity. Today, it had also had the benefit of keeping him occupied. "Ivan and Anise will be here."
"And so will Kimberly," Tommy said with a chuckle and Rebekah looked over at him as they entered the elevator. She had not met her, but she had heard enough about her to guess that Ivan and Anise had underestimated her. "I know my wife and I can guess what is going to happen today."
"And if they try to throw her out?" Rebekah asked and Tommy looked away from her. He had thought of that and he was not completely sure how he wanted to handle it. He actually wasn't sure that he could handle it, letting Kimberly lose it was definitely a back up plan. "I agree with you that they are assholes, but they're highly respected here. And this meeting has the full delegation of elders, Tommy. Everyone is concerned about limiting the prophet problem."
"Kimberly and Shelby aren't a problem. We're supposed to have them. They're just not supposed to be the soulmate of rangers," Tommy stated and Rebekah stared at him. Their archives indicated that Power Rangers could have soulmates, she just didn't think Tommy was one of them. "You didn't know she was my soulmate?"
"That explains so much," Rebekah whispered as the elevator doors opened and they saw everyone waiting in the atrium. The rangers were standing against one wall and were well outnumbered by the Guardians. Tommy stepped out and all eyes landed on him. He locked eyes with Ivan and the man snarled at him. He smiled and then walked over to his wife and rangers. He knew they were not prepared for this- he had not been completely sure what a full delegation would involve, but he hadn't quite imagined this.
"How'd today go?" Tommy whispered as he gave Kimberly a quick hug and then a lingering kiss. Any time he was nervous, he wanted extra reassurance from her physically. He was definitely nervous now. He suspected what would happen if this went wrong and he couldn't think about that. He could not think about them locking away his wife until things were under control.
"I don't really know. It was another heavy writing day," Kim said as she just shook her head. Her mind was still cloudy with thoughts that were just out of reach and she was struggling to stay here with him. She desperately wanted to just get back to how things were before her new powers came in. "Why isn't it changing?"
"We'll be talking about that in a bit, I promise. I don't really know why, but I have some guesses," Tommy whispered and she just nodded. She had lost all of her pregnancy weight and then some. As much as he tried to keep food in her, everything was wasting away with the hours that the prophecies were rolling through her body. They had noticed some changes in Shelby, but they were nowhere near as drastic. "C'mon- we should get settled."
They walked into the conference room and Tommy scanned the placards for his name and noticed that Kimberly was not next to him. He glanced over at her and she shrugged as she continued looking for her name and saw that it was on the other end of the table, next to Shelby. He glanced at Cameron who was seated next to him and just shook his head. There was a reason that they wanted them separated, but he was not going to think about it too much. A new Guardian settled at the head of the table and the other Guardians filled in their spots.
"Welcome to an unscheduled delegation meeting- we will be discussing the prophet problem and will be hearing data from Dr. Thomas Oliver on the current conditions and limitations of the Prophetesses. This will not be a decision meeting, but we will be taking motions from the floor for decision points in the future," the man stated as Tommy locked eyes with Kimberly and he saw the fear in her eyes. Would the Guardians decide that they were too dangerous? And what would Tommy do then? "Dr. Oliver- the floor is yours."
"Thank you for that introduction and thank you for rearranging your schedules for this meeting. I have not recounted these events to my wife or the rangers, the only additional information they have is the books the Command Center gave them," Tommy said as he stood up and began passing out copies of the books to the Guardians. "I have reprinted the entire collection so that the Guardians may have a set for their reference. The materials that Rebekah emailed to you have the salient points that I will be speaking about today, but you will be able to look through the rest of the references at your leisure."
"Thomas Trueheart indicated that in his world- there was a balance between Guardians, Power Rangers, and Prophets. He also said that of the groups, prophets were the most at risk. Two months ago, Billy restored Kimberly's prophet abilities. As the pre-brief indicated- Kimberly and Shelby have been playing catch up. When it comes to how many prophecies they have had and being able to control their abilities. Over the last two weeks, I have cataloged Kimberly's and Shelby's prophecies. I have been unable to review all of them, but included a few particularly worrying ones in your briefs. Neither Kimberly nor Shelby have been able to review them for additional clarity and that leads us to why we're here. There are severe ramifications from these abilities being reinstated and all prophets having to catch up. This is beyond my ability to mitigate, which is why we are here."
"The Command Center explained a few reasons why Kimberly and Shelby are struggling to adjust the most. The first is that all prophets will struggle until Kimberly has more control over her own abilities. The second is that prophets previously were placed in an intensive training regime as soon as the abilities were identified. Shelby is young enough that there is a chance the regime will be enough. Kimberly is going to need additional help and the Command Center indicated it would take some unusual methods to help her. The third reason is that prophets, traditionally, weren't rangers. It's even rarer that they were the soulmate of a ranger. And the rarest, apparently, is a prophetess that is the soulmate of the most powerful ranger to ever live. And that's Kimberly."
The silence was deafening as Tommy walked over to Kimberly's chair and placed his hands on her shoulders. She quietly clutched one of his hands and he closed his eyes. He didn't want to continue, he had barely been able to meet her eyes the entire time and knew how much of a shock this had to be for her.
"I didn't ask for this," Kimberly whispered and she then cleared her throat. "I didn't ask for this. Neither did Shelby. I can feel my powers building again and I know what happened the last time those needed to be released. I think we would all like to prevent that from happening again."
"You dare threaten us!" Ivan exclaimed and Kimberly gave him a confused look. What part of that had possibly been a threat? "You heard the threat, Abdalon."
"I think she was stating a fact, not a threat," Rebekah remarked and Ivan glared at her. "Abdalon, other than Atlantis' actions, they have never had a negative interaction with a Guardian."
"The Prophets threaten our existence! They threaten this world!" Anise yelled and Tommy's hands tensed on Kimberly's shoulders. The room burst into arguments as the Guardians lost all sense of decorum and Cameron made his way over to Shelby. Kimberly glanced at Shelby and noticed she was doodling again.
Kimberly shrugged Tommy's hands off her shoulders and she carefully walked to the front of the room. Tommy quietly followed her, wondering what she had planned as she stood on one side of Abdalon and indicated that Tommy should stand on the other. Abadalon rose to his feet and a wave of power rippled through the room- knocking the arguing Guardians off their feet. They, slowly, stood and turned to face the three of them.
"Apparently that was something else that needed to be restored," Kimberly said as Abdalon smiled over at her and then glanced over at Tommy. He had been right with how good his wife was at this, even if she didn't know it. "Now- are you going to continue arguing about my purpose or are you going to do the jobs you were born to do?"
AN: Another twofer weekend! Thank you to everyone that has reached out with their favorite 90s pop-culture memories. It's giving me some inspiration that I really needed- it's not too late if you want to leave a review with some 90s suggestions or PM them to me (if you take a look at what I've got planned for 2024- you can probably guess where it it going to be included). Again- thank you to everyone that's reached out- I couldn't write those scenes without your help.
