“Are you sure you’re all right, Alex?” Logan was looking at him, a concerned expression on his face.

“Yes. Of course. Just glad to be back at work.” Alex sighed. They were at Time Force headquarters, in Logan’s small office. Another meeting. More talk. He wanted -- needed -- something active to do, some way to help. They kept insisting he was too weak, needed more time to recover. Couldn’t they see that it didn’t matter, that whatever it took, he would find the strength to do it? “Just go on,” he said.

“Yes. Our plan to help Jen and her team. We’re sending the Quantum morpher and the Q-Rex.”

The Quantum morpher. Time Force was developing a new set of morphers, with enhanced power and weaponry. And the Q-Rex was the most powerful weapon that would go with that new morpher. They could be a tremendous help to Jen, if they could successfully be sent back. But... “Who’s going to use the morpher?”

“One of them, or perhaps they’ll find someone from 2001. The way they found a red Ranger.”

“No. A native of that time? Untrained? We can’t trust a morpher that powerful to someone we know nothing about.”

“Then Jen or one of the team will use it. She’ll have to make that decision.”

“That would mean giving up one of the chronomorphers. That’s not the best solution either.”

“Then, what would you suggest?”

He leaned forward. “Send me. I have experience as a Ranger. I can use the Quantum morpher.”

Logan stared at him, his face settling into a frown. “No, Alex, you’re still not fully recovered, and it’s too dangerous to send anyone through the timestream now.”

“I don’t think there’s much choice. We need another Ranger back there. Someone we can trust. I can do this.”

“Alex...” Logan said, hesitating. “The timestream’s very disrupted, we don’t know if you’d survive the trip, let alone the fight against Ransik. Better to send the morpher and let Jen decide what to do with it.” He held up a hand as Alex took a breath to protest. “The decision’s already been made. The morpher and the Q-Rex will be sent this afternoon.”

“But...”

“That will be all, commander.” Logan sat back, watching him, his face softening after a moment. “You’ll have plenty to do to help them, Alex. We’re counting on you to coordinate the effort to establish communications, and to send more support when we do.”

“Yes, sir.” Alex pressed his mouth shut, keeping an angry response to himself. He was well trained. Knew enough not to protest orders. Time Force command knew what they were doing. But still, he wished he could do something himself, be there himself, somehow.

“Come on, Wes. You’re not trying.” Jen blew out an impatient breath.

The blond young man facing her across the practice mat they had spread on the grass in Hillside Park smiled. “Sorry, Jen. I’m not used to fighting girls.”

She scowled at him. “I’m a trained Time Force Officer, probably a better fighter than you. Is this how you’re going to be if you’re up against Nadira?”

“Well...”

“She’s a mutant, at least as strong as you.” Jen moved in suddenly, slipping past his guard with a stiff-armed blow, swinging a leg to trip him, and stepping back as he fell to the mat on his backside. “And besides,” she added, “I’m over eighteen. Hardly a girl.”

“Geez. Sorry.” He rubbed the injured part of his anatomy with a sulky expression.

“You okay?” She held out a hand to pull him up.

“Fine.” He surprised her with a grin. “Watch out. This time I’ll kick your butt.”

“That’s more like it.” She couldn’t help smiling back. There was something so endearing about Wes. He could be irritating, with his habit of not taking anything seriously, with his jokes, and his tendency to be lazy. But he was also one of the nicest people she had ever met, generous and caring. And he had given up a very comfortable life with his father, in order to help them. Hardly the spoiled rich brat she had thought he was, at first.

And it was easy, now, not to see Alex every time she looked at him. The resemblance was still there, of course. An amazing, exact resemblance, except for the hair color. But they were so different in personality, in expressions and mannerisms. Good thing, too, otherwise the constant reminder of what she had lost might have been too much to bear.

Alex. Once again she wondered. Had he really been dead? His heart had stopped, but then the medical rescue team had taken over... She had assumed he was gone, but they had left immediately, needing to go after Ransik, to stop him before he could disrupt history. Not that their speed had done them any good, their ship had crashed, their morphers hadn’t worked until they had been lucky enough to find Wes to help them activate the red morpher. And now, they were stranded, with no way to contact their own time, until Trip got the communicator working again.

“But there’s no time,” she said now. “We have to get back, it’s time for strategy class.”

“Chicken, huh?”

“In your dreams.” Still smiling, they both gathered up their things and headed back to the clock tower.

“I’m bored...” Nadira pouted at her father, watching him sigh impatiently. She knew she was annoying him, but it was his own fault, for bringing her here, for taking so long to do whatever it was he wanted to do. He should have thought about her. Should have been more considerate.

“If you’re so bored, find something to do,” he answered.

“Like what?”

“Go shopping. Find yourself something nice.”

Shopping. Nadira smiled. Her kind of shopping could be fun... “I could use some new clothes,” she said.

Ransik raised a brow at her. “Then go. Have fun. I’ll order some cyclobots to go with you.” He turned back to his work, already forgetting about her.

Nadira watched him for a few moments, almost offered to help. But he would only smile absently, pat her hand, and say, ‘This is much too complicated for you, my dear. Run along and play...’ just like he always did.

So she would play. And the city of Silver Hills would pay for her frustration.

No, it couldn’t be true... Alex stood in a Time Force hallway, staring blindly ahead. In the room he had just left, the scientists and historians were still talking, still going on and on about what they had discovered in the historical record, what was going to happen -- had already happened -- to the small team of Rangers in 2001. Talking about it as if they were only two-dimensional characters in some old story, only names in a history book, instead of the people who lived in his mind... Jen, and Lucas, Trip, Katie.

It was all history... Assuming the Rangers succeeded in defeating Ransik, there would be a final battle. One which would end in the destruction of a good part of Silver Hills. And the destruction of so much more. His friends, his teammates, his lover. All gone, in a last sacrifice, all killed in action, all remembered as heroes.

His lips thinned, his fingers curled into fists. It went against all his training, against all his convictions. He had never disobeyed orders before. Had always believed sincerely in the chain of command. But not now. There was no way he could let it happen, not to Jen. Not when he had a chance to save her, to at least be there to share her fate. His destiny lay with her, and there was no way to deny it.

In that moment, Alex made a decision. Later, he would wonder more than once if it had been the right one, whether he would have done the same if he had known the consequences, not only to himself, but to all the lives his actions would touch. He made a decision, and acted on it.

On duty, with nothing to do. Eric had already had a light workout and done some target practice. He could have joined the card game several of the other men had started, or watched television. But something in him hated the waste of time.

They were all nervous, waiting for their first chance to go into action. He should be used to this, he had spent a good part of his time in the military waiting, just like this. Long stretches of boredom punctuated by terror -- who had said that, to describe life in the army? It was accurate enough, and just as appropriate for the Guardians, considering who -- or what -- they were up against.

Just as he had resigned himself to settling in for some TV, it happened. The alarm that summoned them for their first mission. A mutant attacking in the city, their first chance to show what they could do. In seconds everyone in the room was on his feet, running for the loading dock that held their SUV’s.

The Quantum morpher...

Alex stared at it for a few moments before reaching out to take it. It looked different from his familiar red chronomorpher. But the effect would be much the same. Another chance to be a Ranger. A chance to find Jen, to help her, and their friends.

He was in the laboratory where the last tests were being performed, before it would be sent back to 2001. Where some technician had left it, lying on a workbench. Careless, but they wouldn’t be expecting anyone to take it. To steal it. He lifted it, wrapped the strap around his left wrist and fastened it. The morpher was red and black, more angular than the oval chronomorphers. He stared at it, feeling the whisper of its telepathic voice in his head.

Now that the moment had come, he was oddly reluctant. Somehow it seemed to mean giving up the red morpher forever, giving up his role as the red Ranger, the identity that had come to mean so much to him. But his chin came up. The Quantum morpher was what he had to work with now. And in a way it was better. It was a later design, and more powerful.

He stood up, raised it to his face, took a step away from the bench, and said steadily, “Quantum Power!”

It felt almost the same, perhaps a little more intense, or maybe that was just because his emotions were very different from the first time he had morphed. A burst of sparkling light wrapped around him, blazing through his body as his uniform was replaced by the red and black Quantum Ranger suit. When it faded he looked down at himself. Almost the same as the red Ranger. Darker, red and black instead of red and white. More powerful, he reminded himself. The better to save Jen with. He raised the morpher again to demorph, and looked around. No one in sight.

He was on his way to the timeship hangars, the morpher hidden under his sleeve, when the sound of running feet reached him. Then Logan’s voice, fear showing around the edges, turning him around to see the tall officer running down the corridor towards him, three other people trailing behind him. Logan looked frightened. Alex hurried to meet him.

“Alex, it’s happening!” Logan grabbed his arm, pulling him along, headed back for the laboratories, as he spoke breathlessly. “Something’s happened, something’s changed... It’s a temporal shift wave... We have to send the morpher and the Q-Rex now!”

“A time wave? But that’s only theoretical...”

“Not any more. It’s happening. It’s propagating from 2001. We have only minutes before it hits us.”

A temporal shift wave. A sudden, catastrophic change to an alternate reality, in response to a critical, deciding event. According to theory, the shift would travel like a wave through the stream of time, leaving a new world in its wake. So far it had never happened. At least as far as they knew.

“Are you sure?” he asked, stopping and holding Logan back.

“We’re sure,” one of scientists behind them said, her voice tense. “All the instruments are off the scale. Reality is changing into whatever Ransik’s interference has caused.”

“Any idea...?”

“Not good. Strong indications of the use of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. War on a massive scale.”

Alex stared at her. Then he faced Logan again. “Then I’m going, with the morpher. It’s our only chance.”

“No, Alex, I told you, it’s already decided. We can’t risk sending a human through the timestream.”

“You have no choice.” Eyes narrowed, Alex raised his arm, his sleeve falling back to reveal the morpher. “I’ve locked it to my voice. Send it without me and it’ll be useless to whoever finds it.” He smiled coldly. “Like I said, I’m going.”

“Damn it, Alex... Release the lock. That’s an order.”

“Sorry, sir. No.”

Logan glared at him coldly. “You know you could be dismissed for this.”

“If I succeed, and make it back here with Jen, it’ll be worth it.”

With a last angry look, Logan gave in. “All right,” he growled. “Let’s go.”

“Good.” Alex let the way as they started for the hangars again. “I’ve already prepared a ship. It’s loaded and ready. Scanners, medical, weapons. Ransik has Venomark with him, I stole a supply of serum too.”

“Very foresighted of you. We’ll send the Q-Rex right after you.”

“I...” Alex paused at the ship’s door. “Come with me! There’s room for you!”

“No.” Logan seemed calmer now. “Without the suit to protect me, I wouldn’t survive going through the wave.” He stepped forward and held out his hand, taking Alex’s in a powerful grip. “Good luck, Alex. We’re depending on you.”

“I won’t let you down.”

With a last look, Alex turned and stepped inside. No time to think about what was happening. No time for fear or doubt. He raised his arm, morphed, and moved quickly to the controls.

“Wes, are you okay?”

Jen, of all people, trying to comfort him. Wes smiled at her. Almost worth it, just to see Jen look at him so sympathetically. They had been on their latest job, collecting garbage from a factory, when his father had happened to drive by and see them. Wes had tried not to be embarrassed -- even worse, ashamed -- to have his father see him dressed in dirty coveralls, tossing bags of trash, smelling like it too, reduced to jobs like this to earn a living.

‘I couldn’t be more disappointed...’ That was what he had said. It had hurt, just why Wes wasn’t sure, after all he was the one who had left, walked out, after finding out just how cold and selfish his father really was, when he refused to pay ransom for those kids Steelix and Nadira had kidnapped. But it hurt. As if he still wanted Dad’s approval. As if he still cared.

“I’m fine, Jen,” he said, trying to sound cheerful. “Doesn’t matter to me what Dad says. Or what he thinks.”

“Right.” She only looked into his face, with a little half-smile. “Still, he’s your father.”

“Yeah. Too bad.” It came out bitter, more than he had intended.

Whatever Jen was about to say was lost, as they heard engines and looked up to see a line of black SUV’s speed by. They screeched to a halt only a block away, dark-uniformed men spilling out, setting up weapons, forming a line in front of a small but expensive-looking store.

“What’s going on?” Katie asked. And then they saw a flash of pink, the unmistakable movements of cyclobots, and recognized Nadira, running from the store, stopping abruptly.

“Come on!” Jen exclaimed, starting to run.

He was afraid. It only really hit as he sat in the pilot’s seat and prepared to take off. As he tried again to calculate his chances of surviving this trip through a disrupted timestream, this mission against a powerful enemy who had already almost killed him. So many things could go wrong. So many ways to die.

Alex took a deep breath. Focus. One thing at a time. Take off, open the timehole, go in… hope the ship held together, hope he stayed conscious, just hope… Then engines came to life under his touch, a deep vibration, more felt than heard. Another breath. And he moved a control, looked up through the viewscreen as the ship began to lift smoothly into the air. He turned it to take a last look at the small group of people standing on the landing field to see him off, his eyes picking out Logan’s tall form.

But... something was wrong. He could see it, the sky darkening, clouds suddenly seeming to flow across it like water, the air shimmering and shivering. Logan and the scientists were looking around fearfully. It was the wave, some rational corner of his mind knew. Hitting now. The ship’s shielding would protect him for a few seconds, but that was all. He hit the button to open the timehole, saw it blossom above him like a black and violet whirlpool, and sent the ship darting towards it. As he looked back, he saw the Q-Rex lift into the sky, following him closely. And in that last moment, he saw more.

It swept through reality, his mind not really able to comprehend what he saw, as everything simply -- changed, warped, shifted, became something different. Logan and the others wavered, their forms graying, shriveling, bones seeming to show for an instant before they were no more than puffs of dust on a sudden wind. The buildings around them were gone, replaced by the ruins of unfamiliar structures. The ground was bare of grass, the trees distorted and dead, no sign of any living creature.

Just before Alex plunged into the timehole, he glanced in the direction of Silver City, and was unable to hold back a gasp of horror. The city was there... or had been. What was left was only a skyline of crumbling wreckage, blasted and blackened buildings, nothing alive, the aftermath of some terrible attack; the city he loved so much, turned into a place of death and destruction. Only a moment to look, but it felt like an eternity, and the sight burned itself into his brain, hanging in front of his eyes as he left the end of the world behind.

Eric stared at his first mutant. Wasn’t quite what he had expected. A woman, just a girl, really, and pretty. Not very frightening. Didn’t seem quite right to be kneeling in a line of armed men, aiming a deadly weapon at a girl, pink hair or not. The robots with her were another matter, of course, he knew they were dangerous, some of them armed with blasters.

She had come charging out of the boutique that had sent them an alarm, hands filled with obviously stolen clothes, that bunch of robots prancing behind her. Now she had stopped, and was staring at them, looking both astonished and indignant.

“Who do you think you are?” she demanded.

Commander Porter answered her, boldly stepping forward from the ranks. “We’re the Silver Guardians, part of Bio-Lab, protecting this property. Just stop right there and put down your weapons, or we will be forced to shoot!”

“What?” She glared furiously. “No one tells me to stop!” She started forward again, the robots at her heels.

“Fire!”

Eric obeyed, aiming for a robot. The other men had the same idea, the girl was untouched, but several of her helpers hit the pavement, obviously damaged.

“You’ll pay for that!” she screamed. Eric almost smiled. Whoever or whatever she was, she sounded like a B-movie villain. Then he saw her glance to the side.

Whatever she saw there made her narrow her eyes. Eric risked a quick look, and saw only five people, three men and two women, in dirty white overalls, standing several yards away, watching. For a moment he wondered why she had reacted to them, then the thought faded as he concentrated on the battle.

It was a rough trip, as Alex had expected, a whirlwind of swirling colors and energies buffeting his small ship, battering it until he was afraid it would be thrown out of the tunnel, cast adrift in the vast reaches of time and space, to drift eternally... But then the other end was before him, whiteness growing rapidly, until he burst out, sailing over a blue ocean, under cloud-spotted skies, trying to slow down as he shot over a beach, empty, fortunately.

For a few seconds he feared it would end now, as the ship bucked, almost out of control. But then he wrestled it to a lower speed, and swept into a smooth turn, following the coast line, raising his eyes to see buildings in the distance, towers reaching up, not as tall as the Silver City he had just left, of course, but impressive none the less. Silver Hills...

He had made it. Two hundred years in the past. It hit him suddenly, the realization. I made it... I’m in the past... Incredible... No time for awe or wonder now, as the memory of what he had seen in his own time returned. As he began to look for a landing place, he realized the Q-Rex was nowhere in sight, and touched the controls to start a trace.

The bad news flashed on the screen even as he saw a likely-looking spot above the beach, hidden behind a hill and sheltered by trees. The Q-Rex had gone badly off-course. It had overshot, gone into the distant past, about sixty-five million years... not much chance it would still be functional now... he would have to go after it... But as he tried to decide whether to open another timehole, the mutant scanner alarm went off.

So soon... He’d hardly have a chance to catch his breath. Mutant DNA, in the direction of the city. Had he been lucky enough to locate Ransik so quickly? He landed as fast as he could, ran out of the ship, and a moment later was flying towards the city.