Chapter 4

It's been two weeks since Preston found out the truth about his mother. Two weeks since he found out his father lied to him his whole life. Two weeks since he found out he had a brother. And two weeks since he started learning the spells in his mother's spell book.

He was currently working on a battle spell that allowed whips of energy to appear in his hands. Mick had set up some cans for Preston to try to knock off in their training area outside of the base. Over the course of the past two weeks, he was becoming better at controlling his increasing powers. Mick, Redbot, and Sarah were watching him. Preston was perfectly knocking the cans off and when he was done, he made the energy whips disappear.

"Great job, Preston," Sarah said as she walked up to her boyfriend.

"Thanks," Preston said. It still felt a little weird for him knowing that he's actually so different from the others, but Sarah didn't seem to mind.

"That's a major improvement from yesterday," Mick said. "You're getting better."

"Uh...What's going on?" a new voice asked. The four of them turned and saw that Levi was standing at the entrance watching them.

"What are you doing here?" Sarah asked nervously.

"I was actually trying to find Brody," Levi responded.

"How long have you been standing there?" Preston asked.

"Long enough to see you doing magic that I've never seen you do before. What is going on here?"

Sarah saw Preston deflate when Levi asked for an explanation. He is still struggling with everything and hasn't talked to his father since he found out the truth. "Levi, please just go find Brody. It's not-"

"No, I want some sort of explanation! You guys have been sneaking around for two weeks! At first, I thought you were doing couple things, but it started getting more suspicious! Really, what is going on?"

Sarah looked at Preston and he nodded, which signaled to Sarah that it was ok to tell Levi. She knew that he probably didn't want to explain it again, so she gave Levi the rundown of everything.

Levi was at a loss for words. "That's...wow...that's a lot," he said. "How are you holding up?" he asked Preston.

"I'm just trying to focus on my powers," Preston said. "I don't need the family drama."

"That's understandable. So, you've just been training your powers here in secret?"

"Yeah. I don't want the others to know right now. It would raise a whole bunch of other questions that I either don't want to explain or don't know the answer to."

"Ok. I won't say anything, but you should consider telling them."

"I will...eventually."

Levi nodded. He wasn't going to pressure Preston. Levi knows what it's like to have some issues going on with his family. Granted, the issues he had were thinking that his dad was dead and his brother got kidnapped, so he had to stay at a relative's place and create a fake identity. So, his and Preston's might be completely different, but hey, they both ended up with bad people after them. Although, they haven't met the person yet who's supposedly after Preston. Levi thought of something else that he kind of wanted to see now. "Can you show me some of the new magic you've learned?" he asked.

"Sure," Preston said and Mick set everything up to show Levi.

A couple days later, Levi was still keeping Preston's secret from the rest of the team, including his own brother. Preston was thankful that both Levi and Sarah were willing to keep it a secret. He knew that it would probably be a good idea to tell the others, but he didn't want to yet. The only reason he let Sarah tell Levi was because Levi saw Preston training his growing abilities. Otherwise, Levi would still be in the dark about it. Although, it was strange how quiet Madame Odius had been since telling Preston about his magical heritage, but of course, that wasn't going to last forever.

The rangers were currently fighting her latest monster. He wasn't really that tough compared to other monsters they've faced before. After a while, the monster left when he knew he was losing and vowed to fight the rangers again. What else is new?

The rangers all demorphed and walked back towards each other in the area where they had just fought the monster.

"That monster was odd," Calvin commented.

"Madame Odius hasn't sent a monster in a couple weeks and then, the one she does send isn't even that powerful," Hayley added.

"Maybe she's running out of monsters," Levi suggested.

"I don't know," Brody said. "We should keep our guard up just in case."

Sarah noticed that Preston was looking up at something. "Preston, what's wrong?" she asked.

"GET DOWN!" Preston yelled all of a sudden. The others listened and Preston put his hands up to make a magical shield. It's one of the spells he's been working on, but he hasn't had much experience using it in an actual fight with something being fired at them. Training with Mick was a lot different than using these spells in an actual fight. Something was being shot at them by someone. It was hitting Preston's shield hard and the shield started cracking.

Brody, Calvin, and Hayley had no idea Preston could do that. They had seen his magic before and the spells in the book that Princess Viera gave him. This was not one of the spells.

"Come on, Preston. You can do it." Brody looked over at his brother, Levi, who was encouraging Preston like he knew Preston could do this.

Sarah saw how much the shield was cracking. That couldn't be good.

"I don't think I could hold it," Preston said. Right after he said it, a bigger blast hit the shield which completely broke it and caused Preston to fall onto his back.

Sarah was quickly at her boyfriend's side. "Are you ok?" she asked worriedly.

"Yeah," Preston reassured her as he started getting up. "I think so."

"What just happened?" Calvin asked confused. One minute, they had just finished fighting a monster and the next, they're being attacked and Preston is using a spell that they've never seen him use before.

Before anyone could answer, a hooded figure appeared a few feet away from them. "The ninja steel rangers," the figure said. "I'm so glad that I am finally getting a chance to meet you, especially you, blue ranger."

Levi moved to stand closer to Preston and Sarah to be able to whisper to them without the others hearing them. "Preston, is that...?" Levi whispered. He didn't need to finish that question for Preston to know exactly what Levi was asking. Preston didn't answer because how we he know? Levi wasn't really expecting an answer anyway. It was more thinking out loud.

"What? No hello to your brother?" the hooded figure continued.

"Brother?" Brody asked and looked at Preston.

"Look, I didn't even know about you until a couple of weeks ago," Preston said honestly.

"I'm not surprised that Dad didn't tell you," the figure said. "Well, let me introduce myself. I'm Asher and I have not seen you since you were a baby and Mom had a vision of me being evil. She really should've made sure I wasn't listening before she told Dad."

"Look, we really don't need to fight-"

"Yes, we do." Asher used his powers to teleport all the rangers except Preston further back and put up a magical barrier so they couldn't interfere. "It's just you and me now. And don't even think about morphing it won't work with the barrier up."

Preston took a glance back at his team. They all looked worried, but Levi and Sarah looked more worried while Brody, Calvin, and Hayley's expressions also had a mix of confusion. That's what he gets for choosing not to tell them.

Asher sent a blast at Preston which the blue ranger easily dodged. Preston noticed how Asher's magic was red like his was when he was angry. Asher must have a lot of anger and it's being directed towards him. Asher sent another blast at Preston and this time, Preston sent his own magic blast back. The two blasts hit and both magical brothers were putting as much energy into it as they could, but it was clear that Asher has had a lot more practice with his powers than Preston. "That's all you got," Asher taunted. "Nice try, little brother." Asher used more power and it overpowered Preston and sent him flying back.

"PRESTON!" the other rangers yelled. At that moment, they really wanted to break through the barrier and destroy Asher.

Preston lifted his head up a little to look at Asher. "You're not even worth fighting yet," Asher said. As Asher was standing above Preston, his vision was going blurry and he passed out. Asher used his magic to teleport away and the barrier disappeared.

"Preston!" Sarah yelled as she ran towards Preston with the rest of the team following closely behind her. "Preston," she said as she started to gently shake her boyfriend. "Come on, Preston. Wake up."

A/N: I hope you enjoyed!