Battle of Corvus

Posted on Wed Mar 27th, 2024 @ 6:45am by Damien McGinnis & Kilena Keithron & Spencer Gustaffson & Ellie Evans & Stephanie (Stephi) Hill & Valdana 'Dan' Raadax & Jamie Bullock
Edited on on Wed Apr 17th, 2024 @ 4:41pm

1,847 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: The Secret of Corvus
Location: Archaeological Site
Timeline: January 5th 2051, 1900 Hours

Damien and the other five Rangers teleported down into the middle of the dig site in flashes of their respective ranger colours. He pressed a control on his morpher, engaging his heads up display.

"Stay sharp guys." He said "We know the enemy are in the area, and that they've got some super time altering weapon. Real 90's sci-fi stuff."

“I just have a weird feeling.” Kilena commented. It was hard to focus but she suspected that was due to her precognitive abilities trying to work against the time altering weapon.

Valdana looked around and sighed. She had never revealed her abilities to anyone on the team in either time line but she knew that she could do something useful in scanning the area. “Something is coming but I cannot tell what it is.” Valdana commented as she saw a power source coming towards them on her display.

Spencer brought up his own scanners, looking around as he drew his blaster. "We have targets - something is teleporting in."

"Something...or someone?" Ellie asked out loud.

Stefi teleported down to join her new team mates.

"Gold?" Damien questioned, looking at the other rangers "No offence, but got to ask. Alliance or Imperium? Kind of had new Rangers turn up on both sides of that particular fence."

"Hmm must have missed that part. rest assured, I'm on your side. I'm your newest teammate." she rubbed her neck. "I don't care what the professor says. Counting to two rather than three does not make it hurt any less!"

"He's still using that? I've told him before..." Damien shook his head "Wait, how did you get here? You weren't on the megaship. Unless you've been hiding in a cryo pod..."

"Wrong on both counts! I have my own ship. She's small but fast. I call her the Golden Dart!"

"Let me guess; about 5 metres long by a metre wide, in your ranger colour with a silver section on the nose?" He asked, sounding mildly downtrodden as he said "What was wrong with Solar Streaker as a name...."

As he described it Steffi nodded. "That's it alright! Solar streaker huh? Not bad! Not bad at all! Still Golden Dart seems more appropriate!"

“Hendrix?” Kilena snorted with a roll of her eye. At least something was the same as it had been 24 hours before. Though she was not sure on him creating a ranger but it sounded like at the very least her and Damien had, had a lucky escape in how they had been created.

“He creates rangers now?” Valdana wondered still sceptical about the gold ranger but she had the readings for using GPF technology.

"You mean he didn't always?" Stephi asked.

“We were not created as rangers in the same way.” Valdana said kindly as she looked over the markings on the gold ranger. What could a scale mean for her abilities?

"Interesting. Good to know!"

"Created?" Ellie wondered, not entirely following the conversation. "I thought someone said we were chosen?"

"Not always how it works..." Jamie said back, his meaning quite clear even from just the short sentence.

Kilena turned away and blinked as a feeling of dejavu came over her that she had felt before when…. “Incoming…. Move … move!” She yelled nudging Spencer and Jamie away from where they were stood as a purple streak of energy came towards them. Kilena looked up as the dust dispensed to see the monster that they had faced previously to cause the changes in the universe plus the dark red ranger, Lunandria and several other people that Kilena did not know. “Well some things never change.”

"I take it you've met some of these guys before?" Stephi asked. Talk about jumping into things. The action certainly did take long to find her. Still she was ready for action.

Spencer nodded as he and Jamie hit the dirt. He came up to one knee, readying the blaster on his wrist. "Yeah. The fake Red over there is a priority target. The rest are goons, of varying levels of combat skill. How are you as a fighter, Gold?"

"Good enough to send him back where he came from!" Stephi said. "I was top 5 in my class!"

Already it was obvious, something had subtly shifted in Spencer during this timeline shift - maybe the vague pain he had of losing and then gaining friends had shifted something in him. While he was obviously ready to get in and get fighting, he wasn't going to act without the team ready to back him up.

"You good, Spen'?" Jamie grunted from next to him, noting the slight hesitation.

Spencer nodded at Damien, giving a thumbs-up. "I'm good. Just making sure we all go in at once. This isn't a time to charge first and think later."

"Our priority needs to be the clock looking thing." Damien said "Kilena, how fine tuned is that whole precognition thing of yours? Think you can call where he's going to fire next if I go on an attack run?"

Kilena wanted to comment that they need to avoid the staff from Luna but she was not going to get into that discussion there and then. “Possibly.” She had a basic understanding of how her abilities worked but she had not tested them like this since KO-35 and even then she had not been in control.

"Okay, well then, this is going to take a little luck too." Damien said "Time to play QB. Jamie, Ellie and, erm, Gold; I need you three to focus on keeping the grunts off of us. Dan, take Miss leather over there. Spence, I need you to keep my much less handsome doppelganger busy. Kilena, you're with me. We're going after a clockwork orange over there! Everyone understand the play?"

"You can call me stephi and I got it loud and clear. Well take care of the grunts for you!" She said. Stephi was ready for action.

Spencer nodded enthusiastically, drawing his Solar Weapon and, after a moment’s thought, extending the handle and converting it to rapier mode. As much as he wanted to use his claw, that wasn’t an option against the Phoenix Ranger, at least not to start the fight, “I’ll handle him. If you need to switch targets, tell me.”

"Do you think he remembers I actually did play football?" Jamie asked, glancing at Ellie. She shrugged.

"I'm not totally convinced he knows the rules himself. Shall we?" she grinned. "Stephi - look out!" The Green Ranger jumped in to deflect a swing from one of the Imperium grunts with the shaft of her Solar Spear. "Close one..."

"Yow! Too close is right! Nasty looking thing. Ok try my rapier buddy boy!" she converted her weapon into saber mode and slashed at the grunt.

"You're picking things up fast!" Ellie noted, dashing in with a slash of her spear. "Stay close; they can overwhelm you with numbers if you're not careful."

"Gotcha! Thanks for the warning!" she kept close to her new teammates and slashed some more at the grunts. "No way are you getting by! No way! No how!" a strategic kick sent one to the ground.

Damien made a dash forward towards the creature, raising his right arm and beginning to open fire from his morpher. As he did, his weapon materialised in his hand in saber mode.

"One, two, three four five, I'm gonna make sure you take a dive, gonna-" He started singing before narrowly dodging a purple energy blast from the creature "Easy there big guy. Almost took me out."

"That was the plan, ranger." The creature hissed, taking aim again "Next time I won't miss."

"Kilena, which way do I go?" Damien asked, watching a ball of purple energy forming in front of the creature "Kilena?"

Kilena snapped her head to the side as Damien yelled at him and frowned. It was not as easily as he assumed it was but she indicated left just as the creature did exactly why she knew he would do. It would get easier she knew but he needed to understand that. She glanced over to see Lunandria and Valdana battling but it seemed like the woman was not as engaged as usual as Valdana was getting more shots in than last time.

Damien launched himself in the air, gearing his trajectory to the left. As he did, he flipped open his belt, retrieving a crystal and inserting it into his sword, cocking the crystal back.

"Hey ugly? How do you like this?" He asked the creature as his sword began to pulse with red energy "Solar Force Leo Strike!"

He descended down on the creature, slashing the sword down into the creature, going through the crystal in the process, causing it to crack.

"That has to kill you..." He said, hearing a crackling sound as the crystal began to crack more "Oh shi-"

He didn't get to finish the sentence before the crystal exploded in a mass of red and purple energy, leaving a massive smoke cloud in the middle of the battlefield.

Kilena jumped back at the explosion covering her eyes as she looked around for Damien. "Damien?" She questioned into her comms but got nothing in response. She turned around and surveyed the others around her. She would not panic just yet but once she found time she knew that she would be worrying but for now she needed to help the others.

"Looks like your little red ranger is all gone," Luna smirked as she sent a shock wave from her staff towards Jamie, Ellie and Steph.

"Damien-!" Ellie called out in vain, before the shockwave lifted her into the air and crashing backwards with the other two. Dazed and scrambling, still on the ground, she looked over at the cloud of smoke. "He...he's gone..."

"We will figure it out later," Kilena said firmly as she pulled the woman up and stood awkwardly to her own feet. "We have to stop them." She said taking charge of the situation.

Spencer had just started his charge toward the Phoenix Ranger, aiming to be the distraction and hold him off. But he heard the explosion, and heard Kilena starting to take charge. That was good. He spoke, as calmly as he could, changing the way he was headed - straight into the smoke cloud. If that monster was still alive, he’d need to be taken out. As he ran, he converted the Solar Weapon in his hand to claw mode. “I’ll check the monster! Kilena, if you get anything strong, let me know! I don’t think he’s dead, that feels different, I think… but I don’t know where he is. If the guy with the crystal is gone, I’ll go to the other Red. McGinnis wouldn’t want us faltering just because he took a bad hit.”

With that, the Blue Ranger charged wildly into the smoke, looking, smelling, and listening for any hint of the monster or the crystal.

But there was nothing there.

 

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