Chapter 19-Fourth Time’s the Charm

Kat struggled as Elsa handed her over to two Tyrannodrones so she could head to the main room of the fortress. Fortunately for Elsa, Kat was still reeling from the foot-sweep she had done, so it was a little easier for the drones to hold her.

“What do you want with me?” Kat asked Elsa defiantly.

Elsa turned and faced her. “You want the truth?” she asked rhetorically. “Well, personally if I had my way I would put you out of your misery right here and now, if for no other reason than for having been bested and humiliated by a non-Power Ranger blonde bitch of a slut like you, but seeing as how those weren’t my master’s instructions, you won’t have to worry…well, at least for the moment, anyway.”

“Ah,” Mesogog said in amazement as he turned in his swivel chair to face Elsa and Kat. “Well for once Elsa, I will earnestly say job well done.”

“So you must be…Mesogog.” Kat said as she glared at the reptilian mutant.

“Ah, I see that my reputation precedes me.” Mesogog said as he rose from his chair and stepped towards Elsa and Kat. “But then again, fraternizing with the likes of Dr. Oliver and his Power Ranger protégés can do that.”

Katherine just glared. Mesogog however, wasn’t fazed by it.

“But enough with the pleasantries, let’s get down to business.” he then turned to the two Tyrannodrones who were still holding her. “Tie her to the life-force extractor.”

Though the drones kept a vice grip on her, Kat still struggled all the same.

Once she was strapped into the chair, Elsa walked over to a control panel and began entering in a series of codes while Mesogog walked over to where Kat was.

“I don’t suppose you could tell me what you plan to do with me, do you?”

“Well, since you were gracious enough to ask, I suppose it’s only fitting to tell you.” Mesogog answered. “You see my dear, I originally was just going to keep you as a hostage, but recently it’s come to my attention that during the few encounters that my sometimes competent, sometimes incompetent general Elsa had with you, you were more than able to hold your own against her, and with no Ranger powers at all. Needless to say, that’s quite an interesting combination, and one that I find a little far-fetched.”

“So why do you have me strapped under a device that will probably kill me once you turn it on?” Kat asked.

Mesogog snarled. “Just because it’s called the ‘life-force extractor’ doesn’t mean that that’s its only function, as you’ll see.” He then turned and walked over to where Elsa was. “But in the mean time, I’ll be generous and give you a front-row seat of sorts to Dr. Oliver and his students’ demise.”

Kat sneered. “And what makes you so sure you’ll succeed? According to Tommy, he and his students seemed to have pretty much botched up every plan you can concoct; how do you know this won’t be any different than the previous times?”

“Well, why don’t you just take a look for yourself?” Mesogog asked as a holographic viewing screen dropped from the ceiling and showed Kat the battle that was ensuing between Tommy, Conner, Ethan, Kira, Trent, and the White Ranger clone and Felectro.

“Dr. Oliver and his four Power Rangers won’t escape me this time.”

--

“So what do you say, Rangers? Let’s finish this!”

“Couldn’t have said it better myself.” Conner said as he and the others activated their respective weapons from their belts. “Tyranno staff!”

“Tricera shield!”

“Ptera grips!”

“Brachio staff!”

“Drago sword!”

Not wasting any time, the Rangers then charged at Felectro and the White ranger clone. Trent, Kira, and Dr. Oliver took on the clone while Ethan and Conner dealt with the hybrid.

Ethan then raised his shield just as Felectro swiped a heavy claw at him. Though the blow didn’t connect, it did make Ethan stagger back a few steps. Luckily though Conner rushed in and slammed the head of his staff on the side of the hybrid’s face. Furious, Felectro looked to his left and quickly backhanded the Red Ranger savagely while using his right claw to knock Ethan’s shield arm away which he then followed up with a fierce kick that sent Ethan flying a few yards.

“Uh, bro,” Ethan said as he struggled to get up. “I think now would be a good time to use those upgrades.”

“Oh really, you think?” Conner asked rhetorically.

“I can’t believe this.” Felectro remarked. “I was actually hoping this wouldn’t be a reenactment of the last three times we tussled, and instead you kiddies just keep pouring the same crap over and over again. Boy, as far as I’m concerned, you two have about as much style as my pinky claw, and that’s just sad, ‘cause it’s probably got more style than half of you.”

Conner chuckled. “If you really think that’s all we’ve got, you’re not even close, pal. Not even close. In fact, we’re just getting warmed up!” he then tightened his grip on his staff which then caused it to glow slightly.

Ethan then did the same and tightened his grip on his shield which then caused the “horn” on the end of it to extend.

“So am I.” Felctro replied as he then flung two energy balls at the duo.

“Let’s do it!” Conner yelled.

“Right with you, man.”

As the energy ball got close Conner then began to twirl the staff 360 degrees, once the ball was close enough to touch him Conner then batted the ball away to his right where it hit a nearby wastebasket/ash tray, igniting some still warm cigarettes and causing the trash can to burn.

Ethan on the other hand held out his shield in front of him like a battering ram as the second energy ball came at him. Once it connected with his shield Ethan did everything he could to keep the ball from going through. Grunting in exertion he then summoned up enough strength to hurl the energy ball up into the sky where it then exploded into some fireworks.

Here goes nothing. Ethan thought as he pointed the “horn” of his shield at the hybrid.

“Blizzard shot!” he commanded.

Once he said it the “horn” on his shield then extended to full maximum and a small bluish ball of light appeared on the tip and began to glow and get bigger. Once it was about as big as Ethan’s fist the ball then began to shoot out icicles like a machine gun spitting out bullets.

“What the-?”

Felectro saw the icicles coming at him and laughed to himself as he swiped at them with his right claw, hoping to swat them down. Then he swiped at them with his left, thinking that he swatted all of them with no trouble.

“Ha! Is that the best you can do?”

Ethan just kept firing.

“Well, I guess if you want to play it that way…” Felectro then raised his right claw to swat the oncoming icicles. However, when he raised it he saw that it was covered in ice. Then when he looked at his left claw he saw that it was also covered in ice. However, he didn’t have time to figure out how it happened for another round of icicles struck him full on, freezing parts of his body and inflicting damage at the same time.

“Pretty cool, isn’t it?” Ethan asked.

Felectro snarled. “Oh, we’ll see how cool you think it is when-“ he then tried to break out of the ice using his electric powers, but the most he could muster was one static bolt.

“What’s going on? How come they won’t work?” Felectro asked himself as he tried again to break the ice, but with no success. He was still trying to break it when Ethan leaped at him with a fierce kick that sent him backwards.

“Your body can’t take super-low temperatures, pal.” Ethan said. “I guess that was a little something Elsa and Mesogog forgot to think about when they created you.”

Felectro then looked at his claws, then at the Blue and Red Rangers who seemed to be staring him down.

“You may have knocked me down, but I’m far from out.” Felectro growled. He then got on all fours and leaped at them blindingly fast.

Ethan reacted quickly and fired another round of icicles point-blank at the hybrid. Though they hit him with full force, Felectro still kept heading towards the two Rangers. Finally the blows from the icicles and his already frozen claws were beginning to take its toll and the hybrid lost his balance and rolled to the ground. Luckily though he still had enough agility to use the momentum to get back up on his feet, albeit with him breathing heavily out of exhaustion.

“Wind strike!”

The two Rangers and Felectro then turned at the sound of Tommy’s voice and saw his Brachio staff emit a powerful gust of wind at the White Ranger clone, knocking it off its feet and sending him flying into the air. The clone then slammed into Felectro, knocking the both of them to the ground.

The White Ranger clone then rolled a little bit as he was reeling from the blow the Black Ranger gave him. Once he stopped rolling the clone then called on an invisiportal and disappeared through it.

“You guys okay?” Trent asked as he, Kira, and Tommy joined the others.

“Never better.” Ethan replied. “Although I can’t really say the same thing about him though.” he then gestured to Felectro, who still had parts of his body frozen as he struggled to get up.

“Then I’d say it’s time we break the ice once and for all.” Conner said. “Mind if I take it from here now, Ethan?”

“Hey, be my guest, bro.” Ethan offered as Conner then stepped forward and drew his staff.

“It may be only me against all five of you now, but I’d still say the odds favor me.”

“I hate to disappoint you, man.” Conner said. “But I’d say this time the odds just turned on you. Tyranno staff, energize!”

And with that Conner then began to twirl the staff left to right and right to left, slowly at first, but then he gained momentum and began to go faster. Finally his staff was glowing a vibrant whitish-red, fully energized and ready.

“I don’t mean to steal someone else’s line, but, ‘Say hello to my little friend’, Felectro.” Conner quipped. “Tyranno staff, fissure strike!”

He then slammed the head of his staff on the ground, causing the ground to shake somewhat. Then a large energy stream shot from the staff’s head in the form of a T-rex and then turned into an energy fissure where it then streaked across the ground right towards Felectro. The hybrid tried to fly out of its path, but his wings were numbed and partly shredded up from Ethan’s attacks so it was as if he didn’t have his wings at all.

The fissure hit him with full force, causing sparks to erupt out of his body and parts of his skin to char off.

“It worked! Ha-ha!” Conner said ecstatically as he saw the hybrid reel.

“Now that’s what I call shakin’ it up.” Ethan remarked.

--

Meanwhile, Elsa, Kat, and Mesogog were watching the whole thing unfold.

“Looks to me like it’s your creature that can’t seem to escape.” Kat taunted from her seat.

Mesogog turned and hissed at her fiercely. Then all of a sudden the doors to the main room opened and in stepped the White Ranger clone, staggering horribly and exuding smoke from his suit.

“And what are you doing here?” Mesogog demanded. “Why aren’t you out there?”

“I’ve taken…too much damage…need…to…rest…” the clone murmured as he gripped onto the edge of a table to support himself.

Mesogog then fired an energy stream from his forehead at the clone which caused him to grip his head tightly as he writhed in pain from his master’s brainwave scrambler.

“You’ll have your chance to rest when I say you can rest.” Mesogog hissed. “But until I do, you stay out there until those Rangers are nothing but smoke stains in the ground! Understand!”

Now at this point Mesogog had been so focused on getting his point across that he didn’t notice that as the White Ranger clone gripped his head the energy stream had deflected off of the clone’s morpher and right to where Kat’s chair was where the stream hit one of the shackles that kept her strapped there.

Kat saw the shackle open up, but since there were two shackles holding her there, there still wasn’t much she could do…or at least for the moment.

“Master,”

“What is it, Elsa?” Mesogog asked as he stopped using his scrambler on the clone, who had then slumped on the floor completely out cold.

“I think you might want to come over here, it appears I found something that you might find interesting.”

“What is it?” Mesogog asked again as he walked over to the main computer where Elsa was.

“Well, I’ve finished doing a bioscan on this human woman and I’ve found pretty much nothing out of the ordinary. However, I seem to be picking up traces of energies from her brain and muscle cells.”

“In essence-Power Ranger energies?”

“In a word, yes.” Elsa answered. “But unfortunately since there’s only traces of it, they wouldn’t be enough to give her a full Ranger power, unlike Dr. Oliver and his protégés.”

“Which would explain why she was able to fight off the Tyrannodrones without much trouble and why was able to best even you.” Mesogog surmised as he looked at Elsa. “Well, it looks like your suspicions were justified after all.” He then looked back to the screen with the readout. Not enough to give her a full Ranger power, eh? he thought to himself. Hmm. A pity. he then turned back to where Elsa was. “Well, as interesting as this new information is, unfortunately it can’t really be of any use to us. Or at least anymore than the hostage herself anyway.”

Elsa raised one eyebrow. “So…does that mean…”

Mesogog nodded. “Yes.”

Elsa then smiled wickedly. “It’ll be my pleasure.”

As Mesogog snarled back he then began to feel his body spasm somewhat. Once the second spasm surged through his body it didn’t take much for him to realize Anton Mercer was trying to fight his way out again.

“Master, are you all right?”

“What makes you think I’m not?” Mesogog snapped. “I just need to go take care of a certain inequity at the moment. As before, do what you like with the hostage, but I don’t want her alive when I get back.” He said as he went off through a pair of doors to another part of his fortress.

Once Elsa saw him disappear through the doors she then turned and walked over to the chair where Kat was strapped in.

“You still like to struggle even when you know it’s pointless, don’t you?” Elsa asked.

“I’ve been through worse.” Kat said, unflinching.

“Well, you may want to think about those hardships a little more, because once I get through with you, you’ll wish you only had those hardships.”

Since Elsa was standing next to Kat’s left side, where her shackle had been fried by the energy ricochet, all Kat had to do was quickly reach right to where Elsa had her sword holstered and grab it. Elsa’s eyes narrowed in surprise and anger, but before she could react Kat quickly unsheathed it and elbowed Elsa square in the gut with the butt of the handle. While the cyborg was gripping her stomach in pain, Kat then raised the sword and brought it down on her right shackle, hoping the blade would slice open the shackle and not her right hand. Luckily for her, the sword did the former, which then allowed Kat to get up from her chair.

Unfortunately once she got up Elsa then raised her right hand and did some kind of telekinetic power to yank her sword out of Kat’s hand and back to her own.

“No one…does that…to me!” Elsa hissed as she pointed her sword and fired an energy stream at Kat which she was able to dodge. Now had Elsa been thinking a little more clearly, she would have noticed that she was firing around some delicate equipment. But the fact that she had already been trumped by this woman a few times before plus now had made her lose it somewhat.

Elsa then fired at Kat again, which Kat was able to dodge, but this time the energy stream connected with the Geno-Randomizer/Hydro-regeneration system, which caused the machine to scorch and smoke horribly.

While the machine was smoking Kat then saw that the doors were nearby and quickly made a run for it.

Puzzled that a body wasn’t lying on the floor Elsa then looked to the open doors and saw Kat heading down the hall. Gritting her teeth angrily she then tightened her grip on her sword and charged after her.

As Kat made her way through the long hallway she then heard footsteps coming from behind her, and they didn’t sound distant at all.

I’ve got to find a way out of here. Kat thought to herself as she kept running. Then as she turned at another corner she then saw an invisiportal appear in front of her. As she looked at it she quickly realized that this had to be how Elsa and co. were able to get to where they needed to go: cafés, downtown squares, parking lots outside restaurants, basically anyplace, anywhere. The question now was, could she use this one to get back to Reefside?

The sound of Elsa’s footsteps began to get louder and as Kat looked behind her she saw the cyborg’s shadow on the corner.

No time to weigh your options, Kat. Just go!

No sooner did Kat’s hand touch the portal did she then disappear through it with the portal closing behind her. By the time Elsa got around the corner she didn’t see her or the portal closing, so she kept on going down the hall.

Where did she go?

“ELSAAAAA!” thundered Mesogog from the main lab.

Once Elsa heard her boss’s yell she then wondered what he was yelling about. Then she remembered hitting the Geno-Randomizer/Hydro-Regeneration system on accident while she was trying to kill Kat.

Uh-oh.

--

As Trent and Kira attacked Felectro again he then growled in pain as he got knocked backwards.

“Good job, guys.” Conner complimented as he, Dr. Oliver, and Ethan caught up to them.

“Thanks.” Trent replied.

“Then let’s put this guy’s lights out for good.” Ethan suggested.

“You know it, Ethan.” Conner said.

So the five Rangers took their respective weapons and combined them into the Z-rex blaster once again.

“Z-rex blaster super mode!”

“Looks like you were wrong, Felectro.” Conner said to the hybrid. “It isn’t the third time that always the charm. Sometimes it’s the fourth. Ready!”

“Aim!” said the others.

“Fire!”

With that command the Z-rex blaster fired a giant energy stream at Felectro. Though the hybrid was weakened beyond reason, he still tried to hold his arms out like he did the last time in an attempt to stop the stream from hitting him. Unfortunately, this time his arms were so badly hurt that he couldn’t contain the stream in his claws.

As a result, the stream hit him with tremendous force, causing his body to sizzle out of control and Felectro himself to shriek horribly. Then suddenly his arms dropped to his sides as he looked at the five Rangers with a blank stare in his eyes as he dropped to the ground and exploded.

--

Mesogog was watching the whole thing with a sinister look on his face when Elsa came walking in.

“M-master?”

At the sound of Elsa’s voice Mesogog turned and faced her coldly.

“Okay, now before you say anything, just let me explain…”

Mesogog cut her off sharply. “Just…check the Hydro-regenerator and see if it’s still operational.” he hissed.

Already fearing the worst, Elsa walked over to the Hydro-regenerator’s control panel and tried to do a system check on it. The display on the cracked monitor scrambled for a bit, then the words “Power coupling damaged” appeared on the screen. Though they looked a little distorted, Elsa could read it pretty well.

“Well?” Mesogog asked sharply.

Elsa gulped to herself a little, then she turned to her leader.

“So what’s the condition on the Hydro-regenerator?”

Elsa sighed. “The main power coupling to the regenerator has been damaged.”

Mesogog’s eyes darkened at this. “Meaning…?” he asked rhetorically.

“Meaning that until the coupling’s repaired, the Hydro-regenerator’s useless-“

Mesogog didn’t let Elsa finish, for once she said that the regenerator was now useless he then shot his brainwave scrambling beam at Elsa with full force. Elsa grabbed her head as waves of pain flowed through her head.

“Here’s a word of advice, Elsa.” Mesogog hissed. “The next time you let your personal feelings get in the way of what needs to be done, don’t take your frustration out on something that might be useful later.” He said as he poured more power into his brainwave scrambler.

Well, at least right now I have a much better target for my frustrations, or at least for the moment.

--

“We got him. We got him!” Conner said as he punched the air with his fist.

“Now that’s stopping him ice cold.” Trent said as he complimented Conner and Ethan.

“You can say that again, Trent.” Ethan replied.

“You guys did a good job, all of you.” Tommy said. “But now we’ve got to figure out where they took Kat.” he finished with a solemn tone as he then stared off into the distance looking at the sky somewhat.

How could I have been so stupid? he thought to himself as he looked down and shook his head. I should have known…even though, yeah-she would have been pissed at me if I told her to stay back.

Conner then walked over to his teacher and put his hand on his shoulder, followed by the others.

“We’ll get her back, Dr. O.” he said assuringly.

“Even though, yeah it won’t be like she’ll-“

Before Ethan could finish his sentence, an invisiportal opened up in front of them and there appeared Kat.

As soon as he saw her Tommy then ran up to her as quickly as he could, covering the distance between them in less than a second.

“Kat!” Tommy said as he finally ran up to where she was.

“Tommy,” Kat replied in relief upon seeing him and his protégés.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his tone almost frantic.

Though his face was masked by his helmet, Kat could still somehow see the concern and worry on his face as she heard his voice.

“Yeah,” she said as she gave him a warm smile. “I am now.”