At the prison ship, Nadira pouted as she watched Ransik, Brickneck, and Conwing hold a council of war. Since she had returned, alternating between tears and fury at the way the Silver Guardians had treated her, Ransik had been deep in thought. Maybe now he would do something about it.

She listened to him speak. “The historical records from our time, along with the local library files we took, told me that a security force at Bio-Lab was involved in the origin of Time Force. The appearance of these Silver Guardians confirms it. This is what we’ve been waiting for all these months.

“Now I know who our target is. I also have a score to settle with them for shooting at my little girl.” Nadira smiled at him.

“Let me do it,” Brickneck said. “I’ve been getting bored.”

“No. I want Conwing to do this. Your turn will come.” Ransik turned to Conwing.

“Just try not to kill anyone else. Except the Rangers. No need to disrupt the timestream any more than necessary.”

“You sound like Time Force,” Brickneck complained. “All right, all right. Forget I said it,” he hastily added when Ransik snarled at him.

“This is what I want you to do….” Ransik continued.

Nadira listened. When the meeting broke up, she returned to her room silently. What her father was planning shocked her, although it shouldn’t. She knew their mission, and that it would involve violence. And she herself had tried to kill an enemy in battle on occasion, although she was secretly glad she had never succeeded. But to discuss deliberate murder so casually… He was human. He had shot at her. She should want him dead. And yet she felt guilty at being part of the cause of it.

When the Rangers arrived at the small downtown park where Circuit reported a mutant attacking, the police were already there. The cyclobots had blasted their cars, leaving several wounded and the rest behind cover attempting to pick off the mutant and the robots without much luck. Bullets seemed to have little effect on either of them.

Conwing sent some of his cyclobots against the Rangers, who used their blasters to make short work of them. The Rangers grouped together again and faced their main opponent. He stood coolly in the plaza, in the middle of the destruction he had caused, flanked by his remaining cyclobots.

“Who wants to be first?” He smiled at them, aimed his blast rifle and fired at the Rangers, who leapt and scrambled out of the way, and quickly took cover. They returned fire at Conwing, who ducked behind a fountain.

The roar of engines and screech of tires announced the Silver Guardians, who sped in, pulled over and spilled out of their cars, a black limousine pulling in behind them. In moments they were in formation, with small rocket launchers set up. The remaining cyclobots charged them, and were immediately blasted into uselessness, distracting Conwing for a moment.

The Rangers took advantage and bolted for the mutant, but he was tough and strong; he didn’t even bother with his rifle, knocking Trip down, throwing Katie into Lucas, and kicking Jen to the ground, while laughing softly. Wes threw a kick at him, but Conwing blocked it easily and punched Wes repeatedly in the belly, finally backhanding him hard, knocking him off his feet to land on his back crying out in pain.

Wes rolled over to see his teammates out of commission and Conwing striding closer, leveling his blast rifle and smiling. “I guess you’ll be first,” he said. Wes staggered to his feet and retreated.

Suddenly he saw uniformed men racing in front of him. The Silver Guardians rushed to form a line between him and Conwing. As the mutant stopped and watched them curiously, Commander Porter moved in.

“Weapons ready!” he ordered. “This is your last warning. Lower your weapon or we will fire!”

Conwing smiled at him maliciously. “The Silver Guardians. I’ve been waiting for you.”

Wes moved forward and grabbed the commander and the soldier next to him by the shoulders, barely noticing as he did that the other soldier was Eric. “No, wait!” he said. “You can’t beat him with those weapons! He’s too powerful!”

The commander and Eric shrugged him off, as Porter shouted, “Fire!”

A volley of blaster fire struck the mutant, hurting him only enough to make him angry. He fired at the ground along the line of men, the burst explosively knocking them down. Porter was obviously hurt, but he scrambled up to his knees and took aim again at Conwing who aimed right back at him.

The Red Ranger was up again and leaped in front of Porter, just in time to take a direct hit from the mutant’s blast rifle. The energy exploded around him, flattening the Guardians again and sending Wes reeling. Conwing fired again, hitting him in the chest and bringing him crashing down. As he tried to get up, Wes’s overstrained suit gave out, and he abruptly demorphed with a painful electric-shock sensation that sent him collapsing to the ground again.

When Wes managed to raise his head, Conwing was only a few feet away, smiling gently as he aimed. “Too bad there’s no time to make this more… personal,” he said softly. Then he fired. Commander Porter screamed, his body jerking as the beam struck him. Horrified, Wes looked at Porter, then turned back to Conwing to find the rifle pointed at his face. In panic he shrank back and tried to move away. Conwing stepped closer and paused, watching him with that same chilling smile -- and the other four Rangers had time to take him by surprise, grabbing him and wrestling the rifle away. He threw them off and ran.

As Wes slowly pushed himself to his feet, he saw Eric nearby, dazedly trying to sit up. Behind the line of recovering Guardians, he noticed a black limousine with his father’s face in the open window, and realized he must have been watching the fight. Then Eric was staring at him, taking off his sunglasses for a better look.

“Wes?” he gasped in astonishment. Wes heard his father’s voice also call his name and looked over to see Collins out of his car and running in his direction. In a moment they were face to face.

“Wesley? Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay.”

“What is this? You’re a Power Ranger?” Collins demanded.

“I wanted to tell you, Dad, but I just couldn’t.”

“But why? Why you?”

“It’s a chance for me to do something worthwhile, for the first time in my life,” Wes replied. He barely noticed the hurt in his father’s face.

Wes glanced at Commander Porter, obviously badly injured with several Guardians bending over him. “You should have kept them out of this. You don’t know what you’re up against. Now someone’s been hurt. All because you want more money.”

His face dismayed and disconcerted, Collins answered, “No, you don’t understand! I’m trying to help.”

“You could help by staying out of this! Let us handle it.”

Wes pushed by him and started for where his friends were still trying to corner Conwing.

“Wesley, don’t walk away from me!”

Wes started to run. He approached the battle just as Conwing, evidently deciding that the Rangers were too much to face without superior weaponry, used his transporter and disappeared.

Wes looked back to see that his father and Eric had followed him and were silently watching, Collins’ face a mixture of concern, anger and pride, Eric’s expression resentful. After a final look, he went to his teammates, who gathered around him as they walked away.

It was late the next day, and the Nick of Time crew was continuing their clean-up duties, raking leaves in a private park. It was another beautiful summer day -- and they were enjoying the work, sneaking leaves into each other’s piles and generally relaxing after the hard fight of the day before.

Trip succeeded in filling a bag of leaves, only to carelessly let it leak as he carried it away. In the resulting commotion they didn’t notice Mr. Collins approach until he was within talking distance.

“Wesley. I’d like to talk to you. Alone, please,” Collins said with an uncertain smile. Wes nodded. The others watched them walk a short distance away.

Collins began to talk quickly. “Listen to me, son. If defending the city is what you want to do, you should join the Silver Guardians. With your friends, if you want. I want you to be the new leader. With your Ranger technology, the Guardians can be much more effective. And you saw how they helped you yesterday. They could give you some protection.”

Wes glanced at him and then away. “Sorry. I’m not looking for a job.”

“You’d rather be doing this? Raking leaves and picking up garbage? Is this what you left home for?”

“It’s better than Bio-Lab.”

“I’m disappointed in you, Wesley. I thought you had more sense.”

Wes felt a flicker of hurt, quickly hidden. “Besides, you already have a commander.”

With obvious reluctance, Collins told him, “Unfortunately, Commander Porter died of his injuries. We need a replacement.”

Wes stopped and faced him. “He died? I told you you should have kept them out of it!” He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “This just proves that they can’t handle it. You’re putting them in danger, for money.”

“You can’t be everywhere. This city needs the Guardians. They’re brave and dedicated people, and they have all the training and resources I can give them. Don’t underestimate them. And yes, I’m making money from it. Why shouldn’t I?”

“Because this is too important. You shouldn’t be thinking about money.”

“Don’t be naïve. I wouldn’t be where I am if I didn’t think about money,” Collins retorted. “Will you at least consider my offer?”

“You just don’t get it. I don’t want any part of the Guardians. Or of Bio-Lab. Or you.” Wes looked at him for another moment and then turned his back and started back to his friends.

“Wesley, I try, but I just don’t understand you.”

Wes turned to look at him again, feeling a twinge of regret at his own words as he saw the pain on his father’s face. “I hope someday you will,” he said softly. And turned away again.