FicWad

Disclaimer: All characters and locations you recognize belong to Saban/BVE, not me. No money made. (Dang!)

Note: Yes, I know this is extremely late, and I apologize to all. But a little thing named "Seasons To Remember" kind of got in the way, then there was Real LifeÔ which got in the way ... anyway, here I am again, and I hope this makes up a little for the long interval. : ) Please don't forget to leave a little feedback on the way out? DB





Times Present, Times Past

Chapter 5: A Different Perspective





Angel Grove, the Past

Kat straightened with a tired sigh. She'd been out digging up roots and tubers all morning, had cleaned and chopped a few for tonight's meal, and put the rest into the storage area Jason had created out of flat stones, moss and a mound of earth. It worked like an old-fashioned cellar, almost - reasonably cool in summer when they added fresh water, and dry enough in winter - most importantly of all, though, it was secure enough to keep small animals like squirrels and mice away from their meagre hoard. She'd finished with her part of the daily chores, their dinner was ready to go on the fire as soon as Jason returned from his daily hunt. Bracing herself, she gripped the flat slab of stone they used as a cover for their 'cellar' and pushed it into position, taking care that all openings were suitably covered. They'd learned the hard way that it was not a good idea to leave their supplies accessible to the local wildlife - food was scarce at the best of times, and the small rodents that abounded near their camp by now were used enough to their presence to come by at night and try to steal their painstakingly collected foodstuffs.

She didn't even give a thought to the effort and sheer strength required to shift the large rock; her resolve from last fall to ease the physical strain on Jason as much as possible still held firm, and during the winter had honed her skill at a number of tasks she would have believed far beyond her capabilities before the two of them had been stranded in the past.

Panting a bit from her exertion, she sat back with a satisfied grin. /Another job done. And done as well as possible, even if I say so myself. /Checking the position of the sun - their watches' batteries had both given out by now - Kat saw that the golden ball just brushed the edges of the trees on the other side of the lake. That meant it was about mid-afternoon; seemed she'd actually finished her chores a bit faster than she'd anticipated.

Goody. Some 'me' time!

She got up and, after checking the fire, wandered down to the lake, to wash her hands. The water was still spring-cold, but it was clear and fresh - much more so than in their own time. Kat splashed a few handfuls onto her face, squealing a little when a few rivulets trickled down into her fur/leather tunic, raising goosebumps in their wake as they touched her skin. She tugged at the edge of her dress, only to have the most unpleasant odour hit her as she became aware how sweaty she was. Never mind the dirt she'd collected on her hands and legs during the day. She wrinkled her nose distastefully.

I need a bath.

Wistfully, she imagined stepping into the cream-tiled bathroom at her parents' house, turning on the hot shower and washing herself with her favorite scented soap. From there, it was just a small step to fantasize about herbal shampoo, conditioner, fluffy towels and that lovely perfumed body lotion Tommy had given her last Valentine's Day.

Thinking of her boyfriend brought a now-familiar wave of depression, sadness and anger, and the blonde girl quickly turned her mind towards other things. There was nothing she or Jason could do to get out of their predicament, except survive - and trust their friends to retrieve them back into the present /somehow/.

Sighing, she sat on a small ledge, staring out over the sparkling water. If it was already summer, she could go for a swim, but as best as they could determine, it was mid-March now; the California sun was warm enough during the day, but the depths of Angel Lake would be way too cold yet. And the one thing the stranded ex-Rangers couldn't afford was to get sick; untreated, even a simple cold could easily develop into a much more serious disease. So, she half-heartedly started to rub water over her limbs, removing the worst of the grime. However, the more she got used to the cool freshness on her skin, the longer Kat looked at the play of sunlight on the gently-lapping waves, the stronger her desire grew to be totally clean - or at least as clean as possible under the circumstances.

Her eyes swept the shore. She had promised Jason to stay at, or at least near, their camp; it was one of the safety precautions they had agreed on. But if she went just around that copse of trees a couple of hundred yards to the left, she'd still be within shouting distance ... and there was a shallow stretch of water that wasn't deep or large enough for swimming, but just fine to duck into, as they'd discovered last year.

Plus, if I'm lucky it's also warmer than the rest of the lake ...

The lure of a proper bath - her first for months - was suddenly irresistible, and Kat rose to her feet in one fluid motion. She put a couple of small logs onto the fire, checked to make sure that no combustible material was close to the circle of small rocks containing it, and strode off, towards what Jason had grandiosely labelled their 'bathroom'.

~*~



Jason whistled a jaunty tune (more than slightly off-key, but who cared?) to himself as he made his way back 'home', very pleased with the day's endeavors. He'd managed to catch not one, but two wild turkeys - meat that could be fried fresh and smoked, so that it would feed them for more than just today. And the feathers would go into their supplies, maybe for a pillow or something - later, when they'd figure out a way to make a cover of sorts. Sure, smoking game in their makeshift curing thingy was a smelly, laborious process, but it beat having to hunt every single day. And it was the only method of preservation they'd been able to devise.

This way, I can work some more on the shelter tomorrow, he thought to himself. Together they'd enlarged the cavelet where they'd first camped with branches, bark and moss, but there were still several gaps that let wind and dampness through, making staying in there rather uncomfortable on the occasional rainy day. Or maybe Kat needs some help with the deer skin.

He'd come across a dead buck, probably killed by a cougar or something, a few days ago, to judge by the ripped throat and partially-gnawed carcass. The meat had already started to rot and was too old and tough to provide them with food, but its skin was still usable; they needed more leather and fur for cover and clothing. So, he'd skinned the animal and carried the coat to camp; Kat had done a great job stretching it between wooden pegs, and had been scraping off the inside with a sharp stone and charcoal ever since.

If there's nothing else we can use it for ... if I'm lucky she'll think of a way to cut some pants for me.

With his jeans torn beyond use over the winter, Jason had had to accept wearing a garment that was half kilt, half loincloth; serviceable enough now that the weather was getting warmer, but definitely too skimpy for another cold season. He tugged at the bottom edge of his outfit, still self-conscious about the fact that it just barely reached the top of his thighs ... and that he was wearing nothing underneath.

"I've worn swim trunks that were longer than this," he grumbled to himself for the umpteenth time. "Man! If the guys could see me ..."

He knew exactly what kind of comments he'd get, especially from Rocky and Zack. Probably Aisha and Tanya, too!

'Tarzan' would be the most harmless epithet, he was sure. Especially with Kat wearing a plain short tunic also made out of animal skin ... and with her middle name being in fact Jane, it was almost inevitable. But damn, she looks good in that thing! If he was honest with himself, Kat looked a lot like an actress that had haunted his boyish fantasies for weeks ever since he'd seen an old movie about a gorgeous blonde lost in the jungle somewhere on late-night TV. What was it called again? Sheila - no, Sheena. That's it. Sheena.

"Kat, Queen of the Jungle," he snickered, entering their camp from the forest. Almost immediately, though, he looked around half-guiltily; Kat would give him what-for if she heard him. Lucky for him, though, the blonde was nowhere in sight. Jason checked the campsite with a quick glance. The fire was flickering gently, the tin they used for a cooking pot stood ready to be put on ... there was a peaceful air around the place, not at all as if something had happened.

"She's probably gone to the little Ranger's room," the young man muttered to himself, grinning at the facetiousness. They'd known enough about camping to have established a latrine of sorts well away from camp and their drinking water. He deposited his turkeys in the storage, noting with approval the amount of vegetables - Kat's handiwork. She's been busy. Good - no more foraging for a couple of days. Whew!

However, after a few minutes of loitering around the fire, Jason creased his forehead in a frown. If his companion had indeed only answered Nature's call, she should have been back by now. It wasn't that far away from camp!

"Where is she?"

Of course, the trees and lake gave him no answer. Refusing to be worried - yet - Jason tried to assess the situation rationally. Kat would never leave camp out of shouting range without leaving him some kind of message; they'd both promised each other they wouldn't, and so far neither had had reason to break their word. For some reason he couldn't name, though, he felt reluctant to call out for her - almost as if it were a crime or something to disturb the serenity of their sylvan 'home' with loud yelling. /She has to be close - she promised ... /The logical answer was, Kat was somewhere in their immediate surroundings, out of sight. Taking a few steps toward the lakeshore, Jason scanned the expanse of water before him. Except for a few ducks paddling lazily in the distance, he could see nothing. That left the forest.

There's nothing to forage there, though - we pretty much harvested everything edible in the vicinity during those first few weeks when we didn't know better. Unless ...

There had been a patch of blueberries behind a small rock formation a few hundred yards eastward into the trees; roughly where the bluff overlooking the park in their proper time was. They'd had hopes that the bushes would bear fruit again this year. Jason wasn't at all sure if spring was the right time for blueberries to grow, but ... hanging around the deserted camp to wait for Kat to return was boring, there was really no task he could start that wouldn't keep until the next day, so ... telling himself he was not being a worrywart, that he was just concerned Kat might need some friendly assistance, he took off, making his steps deliberately casual and leisurely.

~*~



Kat squealed just a little as she immersed herself in the shallow water; as she'd hoped, it was warmer than the lake, but it was still pretty cool. However, it would do just fine for cleansing her. Once she got used to the low temperature, that is. The cool liquid felt heavenly on her skin after a while, though, and she enjoyed 'washing' herself. Ducking under the sparkling surface a few times at the deepest end, she rinsed her hair - now hanging halfway down her back - as best she could. The water was about chest-high for her.

I wish I had some shampoo, she mused. Even the cheapest store brand ... Longingly, she thought of the scented rinse she had at home. Her hair might be clean now, but it was a far cry from the soft, baby-fine curls she was used to having and with which Tommy liked to play in tender moments. That memory, too, brought a wave of longing and sadness.

"Do you miss me, Tommy? As much as I miss you?" the blonde murmured to herself, then shook her head. Of course he does. /But, she was here, trapped God knew when in the past, and he was /there - at home in Angel Grove, hopefully in contact with the Rangers and trying to bring them back into the present. She and Jason agreed that that was the only likely course of action open to their friends - what they would do, were the situation reversed.

Thinking of Jason, however, made Kat realize regretfully that she should get out of the water and back to camp. He'd be coming back from his foraging soon, and would most certainly be ravenous. Besides, her own stomach was beginning to growl softly. With a sigh, she eased back into the water, stealing a few more moments of peace and quiet by paddling leisurely on her back towards the bank. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a birch tree, its bark glowing whitely against the darker backdrop of evergreens. It told her that she'd almost reached the point where she'd left her tunic, and with another regretful sigh she lowered her feet towards the sandy bottom.

~*~



Jason had noticed with satisfaction that the blueberry patch was in full bloom; there were no berries to pick yet, but it was gratifying to know that there would be a fresh supply for them close to camp in a few weeks.

If we're still stuck here then, he thought, but without much conviction. The longer they stayed in the past, the slimmer their chances of getting back became. The cool, logical part of him knew that, but in his heart he couldn't help but keep on hoping that their friends would find a way to retrieve them ... eventually. However, to get back they needed to be together, so ...

"Dammit, Kat, where are you?" he groused.

He stopped, looking back towards their camp. He could just make out the clearing and the fire pit between the trees. Jason knew that his companion wouldn't have strayed far - not without letting him know somehow where she'd gone. That meant she was somewhere in the vicinity. His curiosity aroused now, he started circling the surroundings, his steps inaudible on the leaf-and-moss-covered ground.

A glint of sunlight on water caught his attention. He knew he was too far away from the shore for it to be the lake, and the stream feeding into it from the mountains was about 2 miles to the east, so he paused momentarily. "What ... oh. Duh." Of course, the shallow inlet they'd used for bathing in private. Could it be that Kat had gone to wash herself? Only one way to find out. But he'd have to be careful not to intrude. Quite naturally, their isolation and total dependence on each other had forced a high degree of intimacy on them, but they at least tried to maintain some privacy - matters of personal hygiene being very high on the list.

"If Kat's bathing, I'll just make sure she's okay. Then I'll wait for her at camp," he resolved. Jason veered towards the sparkle he'd noticed, oblivious to the fact that he continued to move with hardly a sound (a necessary skill he had acquired in hunting).

As soon as he reached the treeline, he found his assumption verified. The blonde was indeed in the water.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust from the verdant dimness under the trees to the bright afternoon sunshine dappling the water. Jason had honestly had every intention to turn back immediately, but as it happened ... just as he could see clearly again, Kat rose from the water in one smooth, graceful motion and turned around, presenting the mesmerized young man with a view he had dreamt of in his most secret fantasies.

Kat, standing in hip-deep water, tiny drops of moisture clinging to her peaches-and-cream skin as she lifted her arms to shake out her hair. Gloriously nude, and too beautiful for words.

It was temptation personified, and Jason was helpless to resist. Frozen in place, his dark eyes drank their fill of the woman before him ... and he couldn't prevent his body from reacting to the sight.

~*~



Katherine found her footing on the sandy bottom and stood, turning towards the shore simultaneously. Wishing only to smooth out her hair as much as possible while it was still wet - it was easier than untangling the long strands later - she put her hands to her neck, lifting the mass of curls in an unconsciously seductive pose. The air was beginning to get nippy now that the sun was setting, and while she was still in full sunlight, she knew her damp skin was covered in gooseflesh, her nipples contracting into hard little peaks. The sensation wasn't entirely unpleasant, though. She'd come close enough to the bank that the water just brushed her buttocks, and all she had to do was walk onto dry land. She opened her eyes to find her exact bearings ...

... and froze on the spot when she looked directly into Jason's face.

Oh my.

For a timeless moment, the two castaways stared at each other. Later, neither could say how long it took or how exactly they managed to remember every detail, but that's what happened.

Jason's memory was indelibly branded with the picture of Kat, gloriously nude, her pale skin glistening wetly under the setting sun, and he'd also always remember how much he longed to join her, to take her into his arms and sink back into the sparkling water with her. He really ought to give her her privacy, but he just /couldn't/, not when right now she was the very embodiment of his most secret (and barely acknowledged, even to himself) fantasies.



For her part, Kat knew somewhere at the very back of her mind that she should cover herself, that she was fully exposed to a man who really had no right or business to look at her like this, but she could read clearly the awe and longing in the dark eyes ... and found herself unable to turn away. Even though she could see clearly his body's reaction in the way his short kilt moved, albeit Jason's motionlessness.

The tableau was frozen for what seemed like a small eternity, and yet lasted only seconds. Neither could think of anything to say, nor knew a graceful way to extricate themselves without embarrassing each other.

Somewhere in the trees surrounding the lake's inlet, a bird chittered angrily at its mate; in the afternoon stillness, it might as well have been a shout. Both flinched. Kat jerked her head over her shoulder at the sudden noise, but saw nothing; when she turned back around, Jason was gone.

~*~



Angel Grove, the present

"Yo, yo, teleport coming in! Give a guy some space already, dudes!"

"I swear, if someone doesn't program that overgrown tin can a new voice chip soon, I'll screw off his head and use it for a paperweight," Rocky muttered under his breath to Zack as the Rangers moved out of the way, towards the walls of the Power Chamber. "Talk about getting on a guy's nerves!"

"Can I help?" the first Black Ranger asked, only half jokingly. "Can you imagine that relaying information to you during battle?"

"No - and I don't think I'd even want to," Rocky shuddered, feeling the tiny hairs on the back of his neck rise as always when a teleportation beam coalesced in his vicinity and he was unmorphed. "I've had enough near-nervous breakdowns in our fights without that sorry excuse for a New York accent!"

"Amen, brother," Zack replied with feeling, then both their attention was diverted to the center of the room, where a white beam of light began to form, tinged a cerulean blue at the edges. It gradually solidified into an all-too-familiar form. Shaking off the after-effects of interstellar transport with a slight shudder, Billy smiled briefly.

"Long-distance teleportation is not the most agreeable mode of transportation, I must admit," he murmured to no one in particular, "I much prefer travelling in a spacecraft."

There was an instant of stunned surprise, then Trini, Kim, Tanya and Aisha surged forward, a veritable pink-and-yellow-clad perfumed mob, smothering their friend in enthusiastic hugs.

"Billy! Are you okay?"

"How was your trip?"

"What's this I heard about you and a fish girl?!?"

"It's sooooo good to see you again, Billy!"

"Why did you leave without saying goodbye?"

"You look a lot better than the last time we saw you!"

"Are you staying?"

"Can you help us get them back?"

"We really, really missed you!!!"

Zack laughingly waded into the happy mêlée, seeing that his old friend was quite obviously feeling somewhat deluged by the girls. He removed what seemed like an octopus's tentacles from around the former Blue Ranger.

"Now, ladies - why don't you let the guy catch his breath from teleporting first? The way you gabble, he can hardly get a word in edgewise!" He grinned as he took in Billy's bemused expression, caught halfway between relief and disappointment. He may have felt rather overwhelmed, but was clearly enjoying the welcome. "Good to see you again, main brain."

Zack ran his eyes over the new arrival, quickly assessing him. Billy looked well enough, although not quite the way Zack remembered him. He'd known the glasses were long gone and that the one-time geek had finally found a sense of fashion, but the changes apparent went deeper than that. Billy looked ... older. Not like an old man, but not as young as the rest of them, either. His hair was shorter and had grown rather sparse, his face was a little lined - in short, he looked like a man in his early thirties, perhaps, rather than the nineteen years he was. But that hardly mattered to Zack.

Better having an older-looking Billy than a dead Billy!

As one, the girls pouted. But they also sported rather sheepish looks as they realized Zack was right. It fell to Trini to express the important thing, and she did so with the warm, lovely smile Billy remembered so well.

"Welcome home, Billy."

~*~



"It's good to be home," he replied, smiling shyly at his friends and the five strange teens standing a bit in the background; from the way they were positioned near the Power Chamber's warp tube and their obvious familiarity with various consoles and their surroundings in general, it was logical to assume they were the current Rangers. No doubt he would meet them presently. All Delphine had told him on Aquitar was that the Earth team needed his expertise on a temporal matter. His planet needed him; there was no question that he might refuse, but he had not expected to see all of his former team-mates again. Well ... not all; a quick mental tally showed him that two persons were absent.

Jason and Kat. Why wouldn't they be present? Curious.

Billy's second thought was how good it felt to see that apparently he'd been missed; even though Rocky, Adam and Tommy were keeping out of the way for now (the girls were still hovering close), the huge, delighted grins the three wore were a clear indication that they, too, were pleased by his return.

How very gratifying!

However, socializing - no matter how much desired - would have to wait. Regretfully, Billy cleared his throat.

"I believe there is an emergency that requires my input?" To forestall the protest he could see forming on Aisha and Kimberly's lips, he raised a hand and let his own regret show in his eyes and voice. "Guys ... believe me when I say I want to talk to you as much as you do with me, but would it be possible to postpone any prolonged conversation until a more opportune time? I promise, I will endeavor to answer any questions you might want to ask."

Darn it, he was right. "I guess," Kimberly grumbled, unhappily reminded of the current crisis.

"Yeah," Tanya sighed, finally letting go of Billy's arm, which she had still been clutching.

"But you're not gonna get out of this," Aisha warned him, also taking a step back. "Or else!"

Rocky's grin shifted from pleased to unholy delight. "And knowing Aisha, that's a serious threat. Better be careful, Billy!" He snickered when Aisha promptly stuck out her tongue at him.

"I have no intention to do otherwise," his former team-mate assured him, not bothering to hide a small smile at his friends' antics. "To business, though - what is the situation? The Aquitian Rangers mentioned a fresh perspective might be needed to help you solve a temporal problem of sorts; that's why they agreed to send me back ..."

"Jase and Kat were sucked into a time hole yesterday afternoon," Tommy explained tersely, his features growing grim and worried again in a heartbeat. "Like the one Kim fell into."

"Yeah - in public, too," Zack sighed. "Which means we had to tell their folks. Well, with the Rangers." He gestured towards the five Turbo Rangers, who took that as an invitation to come closer and greet Billy.

"Oh my," Billy murmured, the implications becoming clear to him in an instant. If there was a new Ranger team on duty, it meant that his friends were all retired, like him, held no Powers ... and therefore were also cut off from any direct connection to the Morphin' Grid's resources. "And they don't carry communicators."

It was not really a question, but Adam confirmed it anyway. "No. We - well, Justin, mostly" - he gestured at the young Blue Turbo Ranger, who grinned deprecatingly - "have tried everything we cold think of, but you didn't leave a lot of notes on how you located Kim that time, and frankly, we're completely stumped."

"I'm sorry; as I remember, things were rather hectic that first time, and I did not have the opportunity to write down all the equations. What's more, Zordon supplied me with a lot of the necessary data," Billy apologized. "I did make a few notes, but on my computer at home. However, if my father hasn't cleared out my lab, I should be able to retrieve the disc; that would give us a starting point and free us from the necessity of starting over from scratch."

"Oh, good," Trini sighed. "I was afraid we'd have to do all the research again."

"I'm reasonably certain that won't be necessary," Billy smiled. "But we must not forget our hosts." He politely turned towards the Turbo team. "Am I correct in assuming that we may use the Power Chamber's facilities? Provided we don't obstruct you in any way in your fight against the current threat to Earth's safety?"

TJ smiled back easily. He'd read in the Rangers' archive about the first Blue Ranger's habit of using polysyllables and rather formal speech. "Sure. We agreed to help you guys, after all. I'm TJ, by the way."

"Oh! Excuse my bad manners!" Billy blushed, but quick introductions all around soon put him back at ease. He glanced with particular interest at Justin, who looked back up at him with a slightly awestruck expression that was perilously close to hero worship. The preteen might think of Tommy as someone to emulate as a fighter and leader, and adore Rocky as his surrogate big brother, but ever since he'd become a Ranger he'd always tried to live up to Billy's legacy. He blushed when he found the grey-green eyes on him.

"Justin ... what exactly have you been able to determine so far about Jason and Kat's predicament?"

The boy cleared his throat. He briefly worried whether his absence at the Children's Home would be noticed; it was around midnight now, and he'd snuck away after lights-out. Then he dismissed the thought. Getting their friends back was far more important than a scolding from the matron. "Well ... they were sucked into that time hole around 32 hours ago. I'm pretty sure from the particle readings I've managed to take in the park that they travelled the time stream backwards into the past, not into the future ..."

"On what do you base that assumption?"

"From the amount of chronoton particles I registered at the location of the vortex; the variables patterned in such a way that ... here, let me just show you. It's gonna be faster." Quickly, Justin booted up a program on one of the monitoring consoles. "Look - that graph shows all the attempts I've made to scan forward. I've run into a block of sorts almost right away each time I tried."

Billy scanned the readout. "Hmm. I concur. What about linear displacement, though? Have you checked into that?"

"Yeah. Almost the same result." Small, nimble fingers flew over the controls, calling up another chart. "See? Right here ..." Two heads bent over the screen as the current and former Blue Rangers easily slipped into an increasingly technical discussion. The others exchanged indulgent looks.

Carlos sidled up to Zack and Adam. "What's linear displacement mean?" he asked /sotto voce/.

"Beats me," Zack shrugged. Adam looked equally mystified, but nudged Trini. Of them all, she seemed to be most familiar with Billy's way of thinking and most likely to understand him. "Do you have any idea what they're talking about?"

The slim young woman considered the question. "I think it means alternate dimensions," she finally said slowly. "God, I hadn't even thought about that possibility!"

There were quite a few gulps as the assembled teens realized how much more difficult their task would be if their missing friends had indeed not only been transported through time, but through dimensions as well. Tommy in particular turned gray in the face.

"No," he groaned, fresh despair washing over him. He didn't even notice the sympathetic glances his friends sent him, or the consoling pat Aisha gave his back. To his great relief, though, Billy straightened at last with a satisfied look in his eyes.

"Well, I believe we can rule that scenario out. Good work, Justin."

"Thanks, Billy," the boy beamed.

Billy then turned towards his friends. "The good news is, Justin has done excellent preliminary work on the readings. I'll double-check his findings later just to make sure we haven't missed a significant clue, but we're as certain as we can be that Jason and Kat are indeed trapped in the past somewhere."

"Somewhen, you mean."

"Correct, Rocky." Billy smiled briefly. "Our problem now is twofold: first, we need to establish just how far back they have been displaced. Second, once we know /that/, we can start on devising a method to get them back."

"But how?" Tanya wanted to know. Billy gestured deprecatingly. .

"Again, two possible courses of action present themselves. Either we try to construct a mechanical device to send into the past or open a portal - we may be able to use my old portacom as a template of sorts for that - or we attempt to recreate an opening in the time stream itself - duplicating the effect that caused their disappearance in the first place."

"You mean, create an artificial time hole?" Ashley queried. "Is that even possible?"

"In essence, yes. And possible - maybe. But we won't know for sure until we have located them and can decide on the best method of ending their predicament."

"Then let's get to it," TJ decided. "Justin, you teleport Billy someplace from where he can get his notes. That's got to come first, right?" The two geniuses nodded. "Right. Now, what can the rest of us do to help?"

Justin and Billy shared a look. "Catalogue what kind of material we have in case we need to build that time machine?"

"Yes, although that is not of high priority at present. But I'm certain there will be any number of less complicated tasks for everybody once we start evaluating data."

"Okay. Get started, guys."

Justin nodded at TJ, grabbed Billy's arm and unceremoniously teleported them out of the Power Chamber, to a safe place near the Cranston house. With deep sighs, the Rangers and their predecessors proceeded to sort out tasks and assign duties to everyone. Soon, the Power Chamber was a veritable hive of quiet activity while outside, the moon rose majestically in the night sky over Angel Grove Park.







To Be Continued ...