As the smoke began to clear Jason Lee Scott looked out through blurry and painful vision. A low groan escaped his lips as he stared up at the unforgiving grey sky and realized he was laying on the ground and unmorphed from his ranger form. What was left of his red t-shirt clung to his torso with a sticky moisture he assumed was his own blood. At least he hoped it was his own. Judging from the burning radiating across his chest from pec to hip, it had to be. "Oh god," he thought, he was bleeding out. The sudden realization of this caused a wave of panic to sweep over him. "G…guys!" He yelled in a voice that was not his own.

He heard another set of groans. Judging from the proximity and tone, they had to be from Kim. She was the one standing closest to him when the blast struck them. He felt slightly relieved, it meant she was alive, but he had no way of knowing how badly injured she was, given he was paralyzed on his back. He couldn't even accurately judge his own condition, though he was certain it was grave. "Kim?" He asked softly, craning his neck to the side, trying in vain to see her. His vision was so blurry he wasn't sure he could make her out anyway.

"Jase?" He heard movement. Scrapping sounds along the ground that grew louder until he felt the heat of another human body close to his own. "Oh my god, Jase." He could just barely make out her features as his vision began to clear. He saw her reach for what remained of her pink blouse and heard the screech of fabric giving way. She tore away her shirt and pressed the cleanest part of the fabric against his torso. He groaned at the sting. "Sorry." She muttered. He looked down and saw blood caked on her hands and between her fingers. He wondered if it was all his.

"You…Are you okay?" He asked, trying to fight his way through the fogginess in his brain caused by both the blood loss and the fact that his head had bounced off the stone linden ground a good number of times. His vision was almost completely clear by now and he could see that her face and torso were cake with blood and dirt. She had an open gash across one cheek and her shoulder was turning a sickly purple color.

"My knee is pretty thrashed. I can't stand." She admitted, glancing down at her leg. Blood and dirt were smeared from her thigh to her ankle, and fresh blood poured from the gash at the base of her knee, which was turned at an odd angle. "It's broken." She said after a moment.

"What about the others?" Jason groaned as he clamped her bloody shirt down on his stomach, struggling to raise his shoulders from the ground. She gripped his bicep and helped him lift his torso from the damp earth. With his vision clear he could see that his wound was not as severe as he first thought. It had not cut deep enough into his skin to cause damage to internal organs, but it was deep enough that if he didn't find some way to staunch the bleeding, he'd be in trouble, though he had a few hours.

"Careful. Careful." Both he and Kim groaned in pain as Jason got to his feet, a little unsteady, but at least his legs worked. He hauled Kim to her feet and threw her good arm across his shoulders. Her other shoulder had been violently wrenched from its socket, at least that's what he figured from the degree and severity of bruising that blanketed her pale skin.

"I can't feel this arm." She admitted to him when they were partially stable in an upright position. He gave her a sympathetic smile and helped her cling to him as he tried to get at his communicator. Unfortunately his was smashed. Kim groaned softly, trying and failing to lift the injured arm that held her own communicator until Jason reached out and gently pulled at her wrist to reach the device. He struck one of the buttons and mumbled softly into it.

"Zordon? This is Jason."

"Jason. Are you alright?" Came the dramatic but serious and concerned voice of their leader.

"No. I'm bleeding pretty bad." He grunted. "My communicator is smashed, I'm using Kim's. Her shoulder is really bad and her knee is broken. We need help trying to find the others."

"Don't exhaust yourself, Jason. You and Kimberly must teleport to the Command Center for immediate medical attention, no doubt Rita will soon discover that you are still alive and attempt to come after you again."

"Zordon, we need to at least try to find the others. We can't just leave them here, especially if they're hurt badly." Came Kim's strained voice as she clung to Jason's shoulder for support.

"Very well. I will have Alpha send a signal to the other rangers' communicators; however you must not put yourselves at risk for further injury in trying to locate them. Teleport here as soon as possible."

"We will, Zordon." Came Jason's reply. He and Kim looked around at the rubble, trying to catch even the smallest glimpse of their friends. "Zack? Billy?" Jason yelled out.

"Trini? Tommy?" The weight of revelation had finally started to crash down upon Kim and she heaved a small sob into Jason's shoulder. He tucked her head under his chin as he held her up, one of his arms wrapped tightly around her to keep her from collapsing. The pain was starting to affect both of them very rapidly and they silently prayed that they would be able to locate their friends.

The beeping of a different communicator caught both of their attention. It was faint, but they both heard it and snapped their heads toward the left, peering into the ruins for some indication of whose it might be. "You stay here. I'll be right back." Jason told her, gently moving her form off his own and unto the ground. When she was sitting down, he took careful steps toward the noise. He was still shaky on his feet and he hoped to God his friend was not trapped. There was no way he could move anything heavy in the state he was in.

As he got closer he could hear a soft whimper coming from behind a large rock. From the tone he knew it was male and he racked his brain, trying to figure out which ranger had been standing in that particular direction. "Billy?" He asked finally as he reached the rock and dropped to one knee.

"Jason?" The blue ranger stared up at him with shattered glasses. He was laying on his side, most of his navy colored sweatshirt had been burned away, revealing a badly scorched and bruised body. Blood stains cris-crossed his jeans, and he groaned when Jason reached out to try and get a feel of his injuries. "I do believe they are merely superficial cuts. The dermis of my posterior thoracic seems to be where the most grievous damage is located." The red ranger raised an eyebrow and Billy merely winced. "My back has third degree burns." He translated himself for once. "And I hit my head and have only just recently regained consciousness."

Jason nodded once and reached his hand out toward Billy. "Can you stand?" He asked softly, beginning to feel dizzy again. The other ranger nodded slowly, placing his palms against the earth and pulling himself up unto his feet. Both men moaned in pain as they took a few steps back to where Kimberly was waiting. "Billy's burned." The red ranger told her, helping her to her feet once again.

"But otherwise I seemed to have sustained far less severe injuries then you two have." The blue ranger added, surveying the wounds of his two teammates, he frowned as he noticed Jason's lacerated stomach, and the pink ranger's badly damaged knee and shoulder. "You two need medical attention, now."

"We know, but we still don't know where Trini, Zack, and Tommy are." Kim told him, once again supporting herself against Jason's shoulder. Her pain level had gone up significantly in the last few minutes and she was trying to hold in the mind-numbing sensations that radiated through her limbs. "We have to find them."

"I'll find them. You two teleport back to the Command Center." Billy assured her. He met Jason's gaze and a nod passed between them. "I'll find them, Jase." The red ranger finally relented, and he and Kim disappeared in red and pink sparks.

Once they reached the Command Center, Kimberly fainted dead away unto the floor, pain finally rendering her into unconsciousness. Jason gripped the nearest surface, feeling faint himself as Alpha hurried over to them, scanner in hand. "Her first." Jason told the robot, pointing to his fallen teammate. He closed his eyes and tried to will away the dizziness as he listened to the noise from the medical scanner in Alpha's hand. "Well?" He asked, opening his eyes with a slight wince.

"She'll recover. It will take some time because of the severity of her broken knee and the tearing that occurred when her shoulder was dislocated, but I see no indication of long-term disability." He nodded as Alpha began to run the scanner over him. The results didn't surprise him; the gash across his torso was severe but not life-threatening, at least, not with proper treatment. The trauma to the back of his head was minimal though he was going to have one helluva headache for days.

As Alpha finished the scan of Jason, blue lights appeared and Billy stepped out with an unconscious Trini in his arms. "She's has cranial bleeding." He announced. Jason gave him a sharp look and he swallowed heavily. "I mean, her head is bleeding. And she has a couple of broken bones, including a couple ribs, I think." With Jason's help he gently set her down on the floor beside Kim, who had yet to regain consciousness.

"What about Zack and Tommy?" The red ranger asked as Alpha began to scan Trini to confirm Billy's diagnosis. The blue ranger hesitated for a long moment, watching as his leader realized what had happened. As Jason moved closer to him he realized that his friend had been crying. "Did you find them?" He asked, his dark eyes suddenly filled with tears. Billy nodded.

"You must bring them here." Came Zondon's voice, low and sad as he glanced at his fallen warriors.

"Is there any hope of reviving them?" Jason asked softly as tears began to stream down his face. He had known Zack since they were small children, and Tommy was his best friend. When Zordon didn't answer, the red ranger broke down into uncontrollable sobs, grabbing his injured stomach and sliding down against the wall.

"Billy, Alpha, take Trini and Kimberly to their chambers and begin treating them. Jason. I know this loss affects you very deeply, but nevertheless, you are seriously injured and need Alpha and Billy's medical attention. There will be time to grieve when you are stronger."

The words of his leader were little comfort, but something inside Jason nevertheless insisted that Zordon was correct. He willed his sobs to quiet as he slowly stood up. He walked over and lifted the pink ranger into his arms, not caring the effort to do so had caused the forming clots to burst and his wound began to bleed more profusely. "I'm putting Kim in my chamber. I want to be there when she wakes up. I want to be the one to tell her." She would need him when the time came, he knew how deeply she loved Tommy and this news would shake her to the very core.

He laid her down gently in his bed, checking to make sure she was comfortable before pulling off what was left of his t-shirt and glancing at his wounds in the mirror. Whatever it was that had kept him on his feet until that point gave way and he collapsed onto the floor. Billy rushed in at that moment and helped him up unto the spare bed. He opened the medical kit and began pulling out various items. "No." Jason protested. "Help her first." He gestured to Kim and pushed Billy's hands away.

Billy grabbed unto his wrists and held them firm."Jase. Stop fighting me, okay?" The expression on the blue ranger's face was extremely serious and Jason reluctantly let his arms drop to his sides. Billy started doing something to his stomach that stung and it took him a few seconds before he realized he was cleaning out the gash. "It's gonna need a couple stitches." He told him, cleaning the blood and dirt from his skin. At this point Jason couldn't care less.

"Just do whatever you have to do." He told his teammate. Billy filled two syringes and sat one aside. He began to inject the other into various sites along the wound. "That lidocaine burns." The red ranger told his friend calmly. He felt incredibly numb and it had nothing to do with the drug Billy was shooting into his skin.

"Just going in or does it still burn?" Billy asked automatically, in case Jason was having a reaction to the numbing agent.

"Just going in." He answered seriously, not wanting to disturb the young scientist. He nodded and proceeded to thread a needle with surgical stitches. "Make sure they're tight, Billy. You know me."

A smile appeared across the young man's face as he caught a glimmer of the old Jason. He nodded in affirmation and proceeded with the stitches. Jason was by definition tough, hardened years before they became rangers. Billy never knew the true reason, though he suspected that it was the sudden death of his mother during his childhood that molded Jason into the lethal fighting force. He knew Jason's father, and for Jason to be anything but tough and deadly would be a shock. And it was no shock that Jason lay perfectly still on the bed, even after 62 stitches littered his skin from under his left pec, across the perfectly chiseled six-pack abs down to the top of his right hip. It would be an impressive scar; one Jason would carry for the rest of his life.

After he finished the final stitch he bandaged over his handiwork and helped Jason to sit up so he could wrap an ace bandage around his ribs. "Guess showering is gonna be interesting the next couple of days, huh?"

"More like nonexistent. You get those stitches wet and I won't use the lidocaine next time." He threatened. Jason cracked a smirk as he picked up the second syringe and moved back over to his leader.

"What's that for?" Jason asked as he poped the covering off the needle and flicked the barrel.

"It's an antibiotic."

"Oh." Was the only sound he made, followed swiftly by "Ow." As the blue ranger jabbed the needle deep into his bicep. Even before the needle was removed he realized Billy hadn't been completely honest. His eyes felt heavy and his muscles relaxed by themselves. "Damn you." He cussed as Billy pushed him down unto his back. "Fuckin kill you." He muttered.

"You're welcome. Sleep Jason, you'll feel better when you wake up." Once he was certain the red ranger was unconscious, Billy moved away from the spare bed and over to the one that was occupied by the severely injured Kim. He gave her morphine to make sure she didn't wake up while he reset her knee and put her shoulder back in place.

By the time she was bandaged and medicated, he was exhausted and hadn't even tended to his own injuries yet. He checked on Trini, finding Alpha long since complete with tending to her wounds. She was either still unconscious from before or sleeping, but at least she showed no signs of being in pain. He returned to the main room of the Command Center, only to be sent to his chambers by Zordon who promised to send Alpha in to tend to his back.

As he walked down the dimly lit hallway, he couldn't help but stop in the doorway to Tommy's room. The walls were a light green and posters of martial artists were scattered across the room. The desklight in the corner was still on, illuminating the pages of Tommy's biology book. His green bookbag hung over the corner of his chair, as if waiting for its owner to pick it up. Billy breath caught in his throat when he realized he never would.

The bed in the opposite corner held Tommy's broken body. Alpha had laid the boy down on his back, as if he was only sleeping, though the burns and cuts would obviously indicate otherwise, especially the fatal wound on his chest that had punctured his heart and the dried blood spilling out from his lips. Billy had closed the green ranger's eyes himself, finding him already dead on the battle field. His morpher and communicator lay on his chest as a respect to the fallen warrior. Tommy's powers could not be transferred, they were his and his alone, and so with Tommy the green ranger had died as well.

As hard as it was for Billy to pass Tommy's quarters, Zack's were impossible. The black ranger had been alive when he found him, and he had held his friend in his arms as his lungs gave out and his heart failed. Try as he might, the blue ranger could not bring himself to enter the blackened room, just the sight of the map of Africa, that Zack had proudly hung on the wall the day after they became rangers was enough to make him sick to his stomach. He could not enter that room and instead he ran, down to the end of the hall and into the room painted blue and cluttered with failed experiments and random parts.

Billy threw himself on the bed and sobbed for what seemed like hours.