Jen stopped her vectorcycle at the driveway entrance and looked at her destination. It was a house, but so big and rich looking she thought it could be better described as a mansion. A long driveway wound toward it through artfully designed grounds, trees and shrubs giving some privacy but not obstructing the view. A walkway led from a large garage through a small, beautifully maintained flower garden to the front door.

With a sigh, Jen drove on and parked her cycle several yards from the garage, where it would not block anyone. As she walked through the garden to the house she noticed Wes Collins’ motorcycle.

Five minutes later she was sitting on a bench in the mansion’s entrance foyer, looking around at the marble floor, a few delicate pieces of furniture, and the massive stairway leading to the upper stories. Everything around her shrieked of money.

She could hear a murmur of voices coming from another room. Moments later she recognized Wes’s voice as it grew louder.

“But Philips, these meetings are so boring!”

The voice of the butler who had let her in answered him. “That’s why they’re called bored meetings.” They both walked into the foyer, Wes followed by the butler, who was carrying a formal-looking suit of clothing.

Even his voice and the way he walked were like Alex, although his casual manner was very different. Almost without realizing it, she touched the ring on her left hand. Sternly she blinked back the tears that blurred her eyes, but the memories flooded through her mind despite her efforts to block them out.

Memories of the way his face looked; Alex smiling, Alex serious, Alex the way he looked when he was about to kiss her. The warm, clean smell of his skin, the way his face softened when he was sleeping, the sound of his voice when he told her he loved her. You and me. Forever. The strength and heat of his body. And the image she didn’t want to remember, Alex’s face as he lay dying.

She took a deep breath and forced her thoughts back to the present as Wes saw her and stopped.

“Hello again. What are you doing here?” Wes asked as Jen stood up.

“I need to talk to you. It’s important.”

A man in his fifties with an air of authority and an unmistakable resemblance to Wes strode into the room. “You’re not going to be late, are you, Wesley?” he asked in a tone that said they had had this discussion many times before. “You know how I feel about punctuality.” He stopped to pick up and put on a business jacket.

“Actually, Dad, I can’t go.” Wes moved a few steps closer and took Jen’s arm. “I have a date.”

“A date?”

“Yeah! This is my friend… uh…”

“Hi. I’m Jen,” Jen filled in.

Mr. Collins looked her up and down. Jen knew what she must look like, in her strange and not too clean uniform, lack of makeup, and untidy ponytail. “Charmed,” he said with a sarcastic edge.

“You see, I promised… uh… Jen that I would take her out. And I know you want me to keep my commitments. So I can’t go to the meeting. You don’t need me there anyway. Let me know what happens. Bye!” Wes headed for the door, pulling Jen with him, and leaving his father scowling after them.

Outside, Wes walked to his motorcycle, with Jen following. Picking up his helmet, he turned to her with a breezy smile. “Thanks! Now we’re even.”

“Wait a minute. I need to talk to you.”

“You don’t need to thank me again for helping you with those guys. Or whatever they were. Actually, it was kind of fun.” He mounted the motorcycle and smiled at her. “Now, what did you want to talk about?”

“I need your help.”

“Yeah? What kind of help?” he asked with a lightly suggestive smirk.

“I need you to put on this morpher and activate it.” Jen pulled the red Chronomorpher from her pocket and started to put it on his wrist. He pulled away from her grasp.

“Wait a minute! What’s a morpher? And what do you want me to do with it?” He started to look suspicious.

Jen sighed. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

“All right.” She sighed again and plunged in. “My friends and I are from your future. The year 2200. We belong to a law enforcement agency called the Time Force Police. We’re after a gang of mutant criminals who escaped here through time. The morphers -- these wrist devices -- are weapons. When they’re activated they change us, give us protective suits, enhanced strength and other abilities, and a set of special weapons. In that form we’re called Power Rangers. But each one is locked to the genetic code of one person, and all of our morphers are linked together. Ours won’t work without someone using this one with us the first time. We think you might be able to use it.” She stopped and looked at Wes.

“You know, I believe you,” he said. She smiled, momentarily relieved. “I believe you’re nuts,” he continued.

Jen glared at him and backed away, her frustration at his frivolous attitude and irrational anger at him for daring to look like Alex abruptly boiling over. “I knew you wouldn’t help us. You’re nothing like him,” she shouted angrily.

As she turned away her morpher sounded. She raised it and activated the communicator. An image of Trip appeared above the morpher and spoke. “Jen! We’ve spotted Ransik downtown. We need you.”

“On my way.” She ran down the driveway to her vectorcycle and sped away toward the city, leaving Wes Collins staring after her with a very puzzled expression on his face.

He had nothing better to do anyway. Or that’s what he told himself. Wes started his motorcycle and followed the strange and probably insane -- but very pretty -- young woman. It was bound to be more fun than the board meeting at Bio-Lab he had ducked out of. And something about her appealed to him.

She stopped on a side street in the downtown area and joined the three other people who had been with her in the mall. Wes parked his cycle at the side of the main street several yards away and watched as they talked. They all looked tense and grim, and a little frightened. Wes could easily guess why.

Four people were walking slowly down the middle of the main street, followed by a group of the same metal creatures he had saved Jen from the day before. They were led by a very tall, heavily muscled man with long black hair, dressed in black leather. A scattering of short metallic spikes protruded from his flesh, apparently a part of his body. His face was deeply lined and might have been handsome if not for the scars crisscrossing one side. Behind him was another man -- but the strangest man Wes had ever seen. He was very tall and strong looking, with white, pebbly skin, no hair, big, long-fingered, powerful hands, and cold black eyes. He wore grey, metallic-looking body armor. The third being was a humanoid robot, quite different from the silvery ones, bigger and made of golden metal that gleamed in the sun. The fourth was the pink-haired woman again, now dressed in white.

They were just walking and looking, at the moment, not doing any harm beyond stopping traffic. But Wes had seen what the woman and the silver robots had done at the mall. And the two men looked considerably more dangerous.

He watched, slipping closer behind the cars along the side of the street as Jen and her friends exchanged grimly determined looks, then as one marched out into the street, directly in front of the other four. Jen stepped forward, held out her badge, and confronted the black-haired man.

“Time Force. You’re under arrest, Ransik.”

He took a few steps closer to her, as if unable to believe his eyes. “I’m impressed, young lady. You have a lot of courage to face me, after what I did to your boyfriend.” He smiled as Jen’s face twisted with anger and hatred.

“We’re taking you in.”

“I don’t think so,” he retorted, and, pulling a weapon from his belt, fired at the ground behind Jen. A beam of energy struck the pavement explosively, staggering the others and forcing them back. Ransik leaped forward and grasped Jen by the arms, lifting her into the air. “Go back where you came from, or share your lover’s fate,” he snarled.

“Leave her alone!” Wes stepped out from the line of parked cars. He started for them. Ransik stared at him in astonishment. Then, with a growl, he threw Jen at him. Wes braced himself and caught her, but the impact sent them both falling to the ground.

“Is it too late to help?” He smiled at her as they got to their feet. She spared him only a glance. Looking at Ransik and his gang, he continued, “I guess you weren’t kidding about mutants.”

Ransik glared at him, then turned back to his group and commanded, “Frax, Nadira, you take care of them. I have more important things to do. Conwing, you’re with me.”

The tall white-skinned man looked at them with a predatory smile. “I’d enjoy killing them.”

“I know you would. But let Frax and his brainless cyclobots do something useful.”

Conwing nodded, shooting a look of contempt at Wes and Jen. The two of them pressed buttons on their belts and disappeared in flashes of shimmering light, leaving Wes staring in disbelief.

The robot and the pink haired woman -- Nadira -- were left. “Why don’t you just give up and go home?” she asked petulantly. Then as Wes walked closer with Jen, she squinted at him incredulously. “Didn’t we get rid of you already?”

“What’s she talking about?” Wes asked.

“Doesn’t concern you,” Jen said firmly. She handed Wes the same device she had tried to put on him before. He saw now it was identical to the ones she and the others wore. “Here’s your morpher. Take it.”

He pressed it onto his wrist, where it fastened on with a band. A pulse of visible red energy ran over his body from head to foot. Jen and the others smiled in triumph.

“Ready?” Jen said. Her team nodded. “Press that button on the morpher,” she continued to Wes.

“I hope you know what you’re doing.” At her nod, he tapped the button along with the others.

A flash of brilliant light wrapped around him, as a sensation of energy rippled through his body. He could feel himself change, felt his senses heighten, as new strength and speed surged into him, leaving him bursting with excitement. It was an amazing and exhilarating sensation. As the light faded, he caught his balance and stared down at himself. He was now wearing a form-fitting suit, mostly red, with white areas around the neck and over the shoulders, chest, and back. There were heavy gloves and boots, with white cuffs, and a narrow black belt. Reaching up, he felt a helmet completely encasing his head.

Looking around, he saw that Jen and her friends had similarly transformed, each wearing the same design, with a different basic color. Jen was in pink, the tall man in blue, the other woman in yellow, and the green haired young man, appropriately, in green. Their helmets included a molded plate over the lower face and an opaque colored visor over the eyes. Surprisingly, he could see perfectly, despite several small informational displays on the inside of his helmet.

“Wow! You were right! This is fantastic!” he shouted. He jumped around a little, filled with energy and enthusiasm and eager for action. Jen turned back to their enemies, who did not look at all pleased with the sudden transformation.

“Frax! Nadira! You’re fighting Power Rangers now. Are you two ready to give up?” she called.

“Cyclobots! Attack!” Frax commanded in a high, mechanical voice. The cyclobots obeyed, several of them leveling their blasters at the Rangers and firing bursting beams of energy. With supernormal speed, Jen and her team dived to the ground, evading the beams. Wes, caught off guard, was hit by a blast, yelping in alarm as it stung and unbalanced him but did no real harm.

“It’s all right! The suit protects you,” Jen called to him.

“This just keeps getting better!” Wes cried.

They charged into the group of cyclobots, scattering them. With their enhanced strength and speed, it didn’t take long to leave the robots in sparking heaps on the ground, Wes accounting for several of them. They turned next to Nadira and Frax, who shot at them with what appeared to be a blaster built into his arm. This blast was stronger, and knocked the Blue Ranger off his feet.

“Use your weapons!” Jen called. She and the others pressed another button on their morphers, and suddenly blasters materialized, seemingly out of thin air, in their hands. The Green Ranger grabbed Wes’s arm and indicated the correct button. Wes pressed it and one of the blasters appeared in his hand. With a startled jump, he dropped it.

“Fire!” The four Rangers aimed their weapons and fired blasts of energy. Before Wes could pick up his blaster, Nadira and Frax were down.

“Had enough?” Jen asked them.

“My daddy will beat you!” Nadira cried. “Frax! Let’s get out of here.”

“Whatever you say, Nadira.” The robot and the mutant touched their belts and disappeared, along with the cyclobots that were still functional, as the Rangers charged toward them.

“They got away!” Wes cried in disappointment.

Jen said, “Power down.” The others touched their morphers and in a quick flash of light changed back to normal form. Wes did the same a moment later.

Still caught up in the thrill of battle, Wes ran to the green haired man and the tall woman, exclaiming, “That was great! Incredible! We really kicked those guys’ butts! How many did you get?” They grinned at his enthusiasm. Wes turned to Jen and the tall man, who both stared at him sternly. “Wasn’t that great? Do you guys have this much fun all the time?” Undismayed by their expressions, he continued, “I can’t wait till next time!”

“There won’t be a next time for you.” Jen grabbed Wes’s arm, hard, and yanked the morpher off.

“Hey! What’s the deal?” he protested, rubbing his wrist.

“This isn’t a game, Wes. This isn’t fun for us. We’re risking our lives, fighting for our world. You don’t belong.”

“I thought you wanted me to help you fight. And I did okay, didn’t I?” Wes gave her his most charming smile, the one guaranteed to melt female hearts.

But not this one. “You’re not fighting. You’re playing. You’ve probably never had to fight for anything in your life.”

“Of course I have,” Wes said, the smile fading.

“Yeah? Like what? I saw how you live. I saw what you’re like.” Jen waited for a moment. “Name one thing you were willing to give up everything for. Something that wasn’t easy. Something you couldn’t buy.”

Wes had no answer. Jen went on in a calmer voice, “We needed you to activate the morphers, and you did it. Thanks. But we don’t need you anymore.”

Wes struggled to hide the hurt, disappointment, and anger he felt. He looked around at the others, seeing sympathy on their faces. The other woman sent an angry look at Jen. But none of them spoke up.

“Whatever,” he said, knowing it sounded childish. After a last look, he walked away.