The Bro Moment

Posted on Sun Nov 5th, 2023 @ 7:39pm by Spencer Gustaffson & Keon Seong

2,201 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: The Invasion
Location: Forward Base, Angel Grove
Timeline: Before Departing on the Megaship

With the dust settling at what would be their new 'home base,' Keon needed his time. Going from full-time ghost hunter to full-time monster fighter was a lot to process for someone who had little training, little experience, and a pile of gadgets and gizmos that would serve little purpose to the new team's efforts.

The calibrations that were required for him to make the gadgets workable would have taken time. And space. He suspected that, with the number of rangers they had currently and the number over the years, he would at least be allowed that. And, for all intents and purposes, he felt like he could just waltz out, so long as he took some form of communication with him in case another emergency struck.

But, just in case, he asked Spencer to go with him. Who knew when said emergency was going to strike or where. Better to have back up. And Spencer was becoming a comfortable person for Keon to talk to.

It also meant Spencer was subject to Keon's ramblings about technology while they sat at the self-dubbed 'Forward Base' that they had secured in Angel Grove.

Zipping around the bottom floor, Keon spent a good portion of the afternoon re-wiring and expanding upon the one monitor they had set up previously. Now, there were a small number of monitors, all solar-powered, and rigged up to take readings of various activities outside of the dilapidated home. "See, if I recalibrate the EMF reader and set it outside, it'll read suspicious activities against - who did you say we were fighting?"

Spencer looked at Keon, having listened to the young man's ongoing discussion about technology he barely understood. All he knew was that if there was a blip, they needed to take action. He wasn't stupid, by any means - heck, the working radio up in the attic was proof of that; but his technical knowledge was mostly focused on immediate need. Still, he could at least report what he saw on the monitors. "The Kaldor Imperium. They'll be back, and we need to be ready - they won't be taking over the planet ever again. I wish I knew that fake Red bastard's name, specifically."

"Kaldor Imperium," Keon repeated, nodding. He turned back to the screen. Blank, thankfully. "We don't have the resources here to monitor the whole world yet, but we can at least detect if they're in the radius of Angel Grove. I'll set it up so we can get the pings back on base."

He turned back to Spencer, arms crossed. "So, this Kaldor Imperium - Have you faced off against them before?"

Spencer looked at Keon, and decided that someone who'd lived through everything they'd seen together deserved to know the truth. Or at least as much of it as Spencer had. "Before the invasion, you mean? Yeah. I was late coming onto the team; but I'd run into them before that. Red and Pink were the first two who got their powers, that I know of. Then on the way back from Mirinoi, Green and I got our gems when we were attacked on the planet. We won - sort of. When we got back to Earth, they were waiting for us. We didn't win - Orange pulled our fat out of the fire, and Pink got hurt - she was laid up for a while. Then we went to Australia when we got attacked, and well... the rest, I think you know."

"Guess they're not just the villain of the week then," Keon quipped awkwardly, before offering a tilt of the head. "But it also means that there's a database of information I can use. If I set this up to receive updates remotely, we can feed information to the system and have it feed new information back to us. Angel Grove seemed to be some sort of epicenter, and was even before that. If that's the case, then they'll strike again, and we'll know everything before we come down and kick butt. That's the problem with not being the monster of the week; we get to learn about them now."

Spencer nodded at Keon's assessment. The two of them had a long-term view of strategy that Damien sometimes lacked. Knowing the enemy was important. Given that they lacked a great deal of information, it would be helpful to figure out anything they could. "Yeah. Angel Grove, Mariner Bay, and Coral Harbor seem to have something weird going on. There's a lot about this Ranger stuff I don't know yet, frankly - they were basically legends to me before all this, even though Mariner OEM had a team of Rangers. I bet that megaship we found has some kind of records on it. Learning about ourselves and our enemies will help."

He looked over the tech that Keon had set up, and nodded. "That's a good setup then. The more data we can pull, and the more we can keep a backup behind the GPF nets, the better off we'll be. I trust the Force, but no one is so perfect that a secure backup isn't a good idea. As soon as we're sure this stuff is up and running, we tell Damien, and make sure that all of us can monitor it."

Keon made a mental note of the other areas. He would want to pursue equally upgraded bases if they were as 'hot spot'-y as Angel Grove. But there was something else that nagged him. "... Do you know much about the others? On our team I mean. Are we a team? I don't know... anyone but you... and..." He trailed off. Having only seen a fleeting moment of Kyarah, it dawned on Keon that he did not even know her name. Awkward. "I don't mean to sound forward, but after we dealt with... that other ranger, can we trust these guys?"

Spencer's tone turned grim briefly as he recalled their lost Silver Ranger. "Her name was Kyarah. Yes, we're a team, or at least a collective. You didn't get to meet the others before the attack. Red - Damien - is a hotshot, but he's one of the luckiest guys I've ever met. With him around, we didn't lose Pink to her injury; and Orange pulled our fat out of the fire. Pink - Kilena - is interesting. She's actually one of the first extraterrestrials I ever met; and she's got a lot of sensitivity and female intuition. I've learned to trust her judgment, sometimes over my own; you can guess how hard that was. Green - Ellie - actually got her crystal the same time I did. Somehow, she got shanghaied by Damien when we were headed off-world the first time. I don't have much of a bead on her, but she's a civvie caught up in all this, a lot like you. I trust her. Orange and Black, I don't know so well. But Black is GPF, and Orange, like I said, we owe her one. Most likely a lot more than one, if I'm honest."

He sighed. "As far as that other Red Ranger, all I know is, he's with Kaldor, and he's got allies. We'll eventually need to get him out of the picture. I've gone up against him twice. Held my own actually, but lost both times."

Keon nodded quietly, and the silence gave the computerized programming ample time to fill the room with beeps and whirrs. The others had been through more than he thought. "You all are a little more conditioned to this, huh." He said it with a small laugh. "But if you trust them, I do too." It was an odd declaration, but Spencer had a good vibe. And he was sure if he and Kyarah was not trustworthy, they would have done Keon in when they found him. "Kinda glad I took my military training seriously when I did, or I wouldn't be able to keep up."

"I do trust them. I don't think any of us are more conditioned, just that we have different skills. Your training will help though, especially if you're cross-trained with GPF tactics. That'll give you a leg up. Though, hopefully our next training exercise won't be a disaster."

"It's rusty," Keon pointed out quickly. It had been years since he left his military service, but with how intense it was, surely he remembered something? "I don't think it will end in disaster. We're all on the same team, right? Whether we trust each other or not, we have at least that in common. Other people have banded together over equal adversity. So long as we manage to one up enemies, hopefully we'll come out on top." He gave Spencer a sideways glance. "How many more secrets do we have like that big spaceship?"

Spencer hadn't really noticed until recently the high degree of hope and optimism they all had. It just seemed so natural now and none of them had really noticed the shift. With the Ranger powers they all had, it made sense for them to believe they could win. With more allies than they'd expected now, there was even reason to hope that they'd be able to curtail the losses. "We are all on the same team. Don't worry about being rusty, no one can do everything. I'm sure you'll pick it back up in no time."

That second question led him to thinking about what else there could be out there. He shrugged. "As if I know. I bet there's more though. The giant robots, the space ship, these 'civilian powers', there's a lot of tricks waiting out their for us."

"Yeah I noticed people picked up powers with their little orbs," Keon mused neutrally. He had yet to notice if he could suddenly fly or breathe icicles, but the thought unnerved him. "I wonder if there's some chemical make up the crystals are changing that gives extra special abilities. I'd love to read up on the history of these sorts of things. Get a feel for what we could be in store for, or at least get a better understanding of where our abilities are sourced from. There'll be differences, but with so many rangers in history, there has to be a common denominator, right?"

Spencer shrugged in response to Keon's questions - truthfully, they were probably the right questions to ask. On the other hand, the Blue Ranger was mostly a pragmatic person; the way thing worked was far less important to him than the simple fact that it did. He didn't need to know how the powers worked, so long as they kept on working the same way. "There's probably something, yes; but I wouldn't know where to look for that information. Maybe it would help to ask Orange. She seemed to know a lot about all this."

"I'd like to know," Keon reflected. "I'll ask her." One day. But today? He had so many unanswered questions. He needed answers. He needed to understand. "Bu-" he paused, looking past Spencer to the sudden form appearing behind him. "There she is!"

Without a second thought, he stepped around and past the man to the little ghost girl who seemed intent to get his attention. "She's the one I saw who gave me the crystal."

Spencer looked at Keon, having learned to believe when the man was talking about a ghost; in spite of his native resistance to superstition. Then again, once you accepted being a Ranger, you learned to get over a lot of it very quickly. He turned and looked, more 'feeling' than 'seeing' the young girl there. It was like an outline, fading in and out of his perception, but now that Keon had pointed her out, there was definitely a being there. Spencer nodded, looking toward where Keon was. "I'm guessing that it was her ball we ran into when we were here first. Tell you the truth, it's like she's in my peripheral vision or something, even when she's right there. If I wasn't looking for her, I'd have missed it." Still, there was something about her - rather than the chill in the air purported to be from a ghost, or the potential of his hair standing on end, he felt comfortable with her around. Almost like she was providing safety - like she was connected to the Solar Crystals; or at least to Keon's cyan crystal. His expression turned curious. "Hey, I'm guessing you can hear me; though not the other way 'round. I'm Spencer. Thanks for making sure Keon got his morpher and crystal. He's a good ally, and a good friend."

He was sure that Keon would get some kind of message in response to that.

The ghost girl's head tilted to one side as she listened. She smiled, waving to Keon to lean down. When he did, she whispered into his ear and giggled, before disappearing into nothingness. Keon, who had waved away the embarrassment blush that was threatening to reveal itself, gave Spencer a nod. "She heard you. She said the crystal was meant for me. And she's happy I'm not alone."

 

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