"Your move."
Nate exhales through his nose as he looks down at the board. He looks kind of cute when he's focusing. They were currently playing a board game at her house while they both sat cross-legged on clouds of their own creation. So far the game was pretty evenly matched. Nate finally makes a move on the board, and she rubs her hands together.
"Your move, Pinkie."
"Pinkie?"
"What? You don't like it? I just assumed you liked the color pink because of your wigs and you're-" Nate rambles with a light blush on his cheeks.
"It's okay, Nate. I didn't mind it."
"Oh." His blush deepens, and she feels her own blush coming on. Then both of their Morphers beep. They both share a look before she hits her Morpher.
"I think the computer's about to find a match for the power. You guys might want to get down here." Chad's voice comes through.
"Teleporting now." They jump off the clouds, which poof away once they do. They teleport to The Cave, and see that the twins are already there. The four walk over to the monitors, and look at the loading screen. The bar is almost to the end.
"Come on. Come on. Come on!" Xander says, earning him a glare from his sister. Then the bar freezes with 99% in red letters at the bottom of the screen. "Aah, what?!"
"Just give it a second." Chad says. Several moments go by of them waiting for it to finish loading.
"Come on, we've got class!" Xander says, earning him yet another glare from his sister. Then the screen finally reaches 100%, and they all lean closer as a picture appears on the screen. Once the picture appears, all their mouths drop open.
"Danielle Wilks-Morozov?!" All four of them shout. There has to be some mistake. Danielle's a bully, and a mean girl.
"You know her?"
"She goes to our school. And is a total mean girl. There has to be a mistake." Jessica says.
"Uh, well, according to this," Chad drags his index finger over the list next to Danielle's picture, "she's a black belt, flexible, smart, brave, committed."
Chad spins around to face the kids, who are still unconvinced. He sighs, and rubs his eyes. "Have you ever considered that there's more to this girl than you think? Hanley, people once said that your sister was beyond redemption."
"Lani had a drinking problem and dated some regrettable guys. She didn't bully people she thought were beneath her." Hanley argues. "You should run the scan again."
"Fine." Chad turns back around in his chair. "I'll tell you when the scan finishes. Again."
"Are you sure about this new studio?" Xander says as the group starts to make their way inside the building.
"Well, we don't have much of a choice. Since our last studio was attacked by a monster." Jessica says.
"Fair enough." They walk into the studio, and find Danielle inside. "You've got to be kidding me."
"Let's just ignore her." Jessica says, pulling her brother away from the girl. "Her studio probably got attacked just like ours."
"Oh look, it's the losers. Did your amateurish studio get attacked too?" Jessica breathes heavily as she attempts to ignore her. Danielle scoffs, and walks away from them. Then the studio shakes violently. In a puff of green energy, Mandili appears outside with the same monsters from yesterday standing behind her.
"Away from the glass. Away from the glass, kids." The instructor starts to pull them away from the glass.
"Guys, Mandili's out there with a whole bunch of her Crushers."
"We can see that, Chad." Hanley says.
"But what do we do about it? We can't exactly leave or morph with all these people around." Nate says.
"Come on out, Rangers." Mandili says with a grin. "Fine. Crushers! Charge!"
Mandili points ahead, and the Crushers charge at the studio, easily breaking the glass, and gaining entry. While Mandili stays outside. The instructor and Danielle scream as the Crushers grab them by their arms.
"Let them go." Xander swings his leg around, kicking three Crushers to the floor. The instructor, who they'd been holding, runs out of the building while screaming. Xander looks around the room in search of Danielle, and finds that she's already freed herself from the clutches of the Crushers. But more of them surround her, blocking his view of her. He swings into action, and pushes several of them aside with ease. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Danielle flipping one of the Crushers with ease.
"Thank you. Not that I needed your help."
"You know, a normal person would just accept the help."
"I'm not a normal person."
"Hey, guys we could use some help over here." Jessica says from the other side of the studio. Xander turns his head to see that the others have been swarmed by Crushers. Xander grabs one of the many Crushers on the floor, and swings him around in the air. This knocked several Crushers to the floor, but there were still several of them around.
A Crusher grabs Hanley's leg, but she uses this to kick the Crusher back with the same leg. The Crusher falls backwards, crashing into several of its comrades on the way down. Then she sees some silk in a bow, and looks over to Nate just as he pushes several Crushers away. Hanley grabs the silk, and Nate helps her tie it around the remaining Crushers surrounding them. She sees Mandili pull something out of… somewhere before throwing the ball at the studio.
"Get down!" Hanley shouts just as the ball flies through the already broken glass. The studio explodes, and they all go flying. Hanley swears she hears roaring over her head. She groans, and opens her eyes only to see dust. Someone grabs her, and pulls her to her feet. She can barely make out a yellow blur. "I can barely see anything!"
"I can kinda see!" Jessica shouts back.
"Lucky you." Xander coughs from somewhere to her left. There's that roaring sound again. The dust clears just enough for her to see where the boys and Danielle are. And that a woman is standing before them, and a yellow dragon is flying above them. The woman has shoulder length plum red hair, and looks like a human red mushroom.
"Guys, you've got no choice. You're going to have to morph." Chad says.
"We can't. Danielle's here." Hanley says.
"You don't have a choice. You can't fight two monsters unmorphed without using your powers."
Hanley sighs. "You're right."
She looks up at her fellow rangers. "Let's do it guys."
She holds her wrists, and they all do the same. "Element Masters! Charged up!"
The power surges them, and Hanley's sure she hears Danielle gasp from her place behind them.
"Nice costumes. But your colorful costumes are no match for Shroom May!" The woman says.
Danielle comes to, and is acutely aware of the fact that dust is swirling around her. And that a fight is going on nearby. She rolls over with a pained groan onto her stomach. Through the dust, she can see the Power Rangers fighting a woman that looks like a human mushroom. And she can hear roaring above her. She looks up, and sees a yellow dragon flying above them. The others are nowhere in sight. Then the dragon breathes fire down at the ground, hitting the Rangers but somehow missing the mushroom. The Rangers are thrown backwards. Danielle gets to her feet, and clutches her side. Where had the others gone? They'd just disappeared. If the Rangers had taken them away then why wouldn't they take her away with them? The only explanation is that… those losers are the Rangers. Oh, and she said the Green Ranger had a nice ass.
While she's thinking, the Rangers have gotten back up. But the mushroom woman presses her palms together, and hits them with a rapid fire attack from all directions. Parts of their suits burn away before the attack finally lets up, and they go flying backwards. In a flash of white energy, they demorph, confirming Danielle's theory.
"Guys? Guys?!" Hanley groans, both from the pain and from Chad's screaming. She sits up with a pained grunt. "Are you guys okay?"
"That's a big no." Xander says with a groan. Jessica and Nate both groan as well.
"You're the Power Rangers?" Crap. They turn to see Danielle still standing there.
"Not the time, Danielle." Hanley says as she gets to her feet. "We've… got to keep fighting."
"No offense, but everything hurts right now. I don't think we can keep fighting." Xander says.
"He's right, Hanley." Jessica says.
"But we are the only ones with the power to stop them. We've been given the chance of a lifetime. To fight for something bigger than us. To fight for the safety of the world. Not just Crystal City is counting on us, but so is the entire world. Maybe even more than that. So as long as we're still standing, we have to keep fighting."
Silence falls over them, and for a moment she thinks that her speech has fallen on deaf ears. Then her fellow Rangers get to their feet, and the four charge back into battle.
Danielle watches as the Rangers charge back into battle, despite their injuries. Electricity forms between Hanley's hands before she directs it at the monster. But the monster backflips out of the way, only to have a pillar of stone come out of the ground and hit her. The monster falls to the ground. Nate and Xander kick her in the stomach as she gets to her feet, sending her flying backwards into a building. She hits the building hard enough that the structure cracks around her before crumbling completely as it explodes. But the monster still isn't destroyed as she rises from the ashes of the building, and a rain of fire starts to come down on them. And Danielle's moving before she can stop herself. She leaps into action, and catches the fire with her hands. She directs it back at the monster, who stumbles before exploding with a wail. Danielle hits the ground roughly.
"Danielle!" They run over to the girl. Just as they do, a blaster gun appears in Hanley's hands. She doesn't even need Chad to say anything for her to know what he wants him to do. She aims the gun at Danielle before firing at her. Red energy covers the girl's entire body before she morphs into the Red Fire Ranger. Her costume is red with apricot orange wrapped around her elbows, wrists, tops of her arms and her waist. There's a pink-orange fireball on her chest. And she has copper orange gloves. The dragon lands on the ground before shrinking down to become human-sized. It breathes fire at them again but the fire hits Danielle, bouncing off her body.
"His attacks take time to charge up. You should attack now." Hanley advises, and Danielle hums in response. Then the Red Ranger lifts off the ground.
"Master Weapon, activate!" A red ax appears in her hand, and she swings at the dragon monster. A slash of red energy appears in the air above the monster's head before hitting him. The monster roars and stumbles. Danielle lands on the ground gracefully. The dragon breathes fire at her but she flips out of the way. The dragon continues to breathe fire at her but she easily dodges each attack.
"I'll give it to her. She's good." Jessica begrudgingly admits.
"I think now's a good time to strike." Hanley says. "Xander-"
"Already on it." A block of wood appears in the air. The block separates into pieces one by one, hitting the dragon at rapid speed. The monster stumbles but doesn't fall. A large ball of solidified air appears in front of Nate before he lifts off the ground, and kicks the ball with force. The ball hits the monster, and he stumbles backwards as he finally explodes with one last roar. Nate lands on the ground gracefully. "Let's just hope they don't go big."
They all turn to look at the boy, each looking equally annoyed. "What?"
Danielle demorphs. "So you losers are the Power Rangers?"
"We're not losers. But yes. And you're a Power Ranger too now. And as much as I don't like it, we have to work together." Jessica says.
"For once I agree with you. But don't expect me to hang out with any of you."
"We won't. And we don't want you to." Jessica says.
"Okay." Hanley claps her hands to get the girls' attention. "Why don't we take her to The Cave?"
"Fine. Do what we do." Jessica says with a roll of her eyes. They teleport to The Cave.
"Welcome to The Cave." Hanley says. Chad emerges from a hallway. "And this Chad, my brother-in-law. He's also the man behind our Ranger technology."
"So since I'm the Red Ranger, does that mean I'm the leader?"
All four of them open their mouths, speaking over each other as they protest against this.
"Guys!" Chad interrupts them. "Danielle's not the leader. Truth be told, I haven't given much thought to who's the leader but if I had to pick anyone to be leader, it'd be Hanley."
"Of course you pick your sister-in-law." Danielle says.
"It's not about the fact that she's my sister-in-law. If anything I'm picking her despite the fact that she's my sister-in-law. She hasn't exactly been super welcoming of me since I married her sister. But I'm picking her to be the leader because she pushes you all to be better. If not for her, you all would have given up today. Among other reasons."
"Ha."
"Don't make me regret my decision."
"Sorry."
"Now you kids head on home. Except for Danielle, we need to work on your powers." Danielle groans dramatically in response.
A/N: I was feeling lazy when posting this chapter so there are no line breaks. Sorry : - (
