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DinoCharge: Call to Arms

by

Nagi Matsuo

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Chapter XV

Past, Present and Fusion - Part II

(Loading Bay, ABDM)

"Cool!" exclaimed Tyler, jumping in the T-Rex Skull and tossing his phone to Shelby, "Take a picture for me?"

As Riley and Shelby figured out how to work the camera on Tyler's phone, the Scarlet Ranger discreetly pulled back a tooth, sliding away as the back opened up.

"Tyler?" questioned Riley, looking up to see he was gone, "He must have accidentally triggered, I'm going after him."

With that, Riley leapt down the slide, ignoring Shelby's protests. Sighing deeply, the Red Ranger stepped into the mouth of the T-Rex and launched herself down the slide, determined to find the other two.

Reaching the bottom, Shelby hopped off the slide and walked over to where Riley was stood. Looking around them, the two marvelled at the sheer scale of the Dino Lab.

"Now this was not on the staff orientation day," muttered Shelby, walking over to the four hollows in the wall, Riley following her.

"By the time I got down here, Tyler had already disappeared," stated Riley, stopping in the first hollow, which had the Black, Blue and Pink Energems stored in the second, third and fifth slots.

"Whoa!" cried Shelby as her and Riley's Energems were pulled out their hands, settling in to the first and fourth slots, leaving only the sixth empty.

"It looks like some kind of power source," observed Riley, examining the Dino Chargers below.

"They are Energems," spoke Keeper as he solidified behind the two.

"Stay back!" warned Riley as she turned to face Keeper, drawing her Dino Blade in the same motion.

"What are you?" questioned Shelby, pulling out her Dino Blaster, "ET?"

"My name is Keeper," assured the alien, "I mean you no harm. Energems harness the untold power of the universe, long ago I entrusted them to guardian dinosaurs. When they went extinct, the Energems were lost, until now."

"Until we found them," continued Shelby, glancing at the Energems behind her.

"Exactly!" exclaimed Keeper, "The Energems have chosen to bond with you."

"Why would they chose to bond with us?" asked Riley, returning her Dino Blade to its sheath.

Suddenly, the other Rangers walked out of a corridor and stopped beside Keeper, facing Riley and Shelby.

"Koda? Chase? Jake? Tyler? Ms. Morgan?!" questioned Shelby in a disbelieving tone before looking at Emma, "Someone I don't know?"

"You fought to defend strangers at a great risk to yourself," spoke Kendall, stepping forward, "That's why the Green Energem chose you, Riley. Shelby, your desire to protect the defenceless is why you were chosen to be a DinoCharge Ranger, but as to why the it was the Energem that bonded to you, I do not know."

"Wait, these Energems, Dinosaur Spirits and Bonding is all a little hard to believe," remarked Riley, turning to face the Energems.

Smiling, Kendall turned to face the others, "Show them."

Stepping forward, Koda, Chase and Emma held out their hands, the Blue, Black and Aqua Energems suddenly jumping into them and displaying holograms of their respective dinosaurs.

"You see?" questioned Kendall, summoning her Pink Energem, glancing over to see Jake holding out his hand, "Jake, you're not bonded to the Purple Energem, it's not coming to you."

"Plesio, I need a bit of trust here," coaxed Jake, "Come on, don't be shy."

Suddenly, the Purple Energem shot to Jake's hand, who grinned from ear to ear. However, it faded rapidly when, instead of a Plesiosaurus, the Energem displayed a hologram of a hand flipping Jake off, before the Purple Energem shot back to its slot.

"Fucking bastard," grunted Jake, "I trusted you!"

"I wish I had some popcorn," grinned Chase.

"I wish I'd recorded it," added Emma, "That would have made Noah laugh his ass off."

"That sounds painful," commented Koda, grimacing.

"Don't worry, mate," assured Chase, putting a hand on Koda's shoulder, "It's just a figure of speech."

"Sorry, I guess 100,000 years makes you forget things like that," replied Koda, smiling.

"I helped Keeper track down Chase after he bonded to his Energems," explained Kendall, "The others came after that."

"Welcome your team," spoke Koda, returning the Blue Energem.

"You are official Power Rangers," added Chase, following Koda's example, "Welcome to the Power Rangers DinoCharge."

"As unusual as we seem," continued Emma, "I'm sure we're going to get along."

"Power Rangers, you have to be kidding me," denied Riley, shaking her head.

"Yeah, I want to dig up dino bones, not bond with one," agreed Shelby, however before anyone could respond the alarms sounded, all nine of them crowded around the hologram of the northern hemisphere.

"The seismic activity's got worse," informed Kendall, manipulating the holoscreen to show Amber Beach and the surrounding areas, "We need to check out Mt. Sampson, it's seems to be the epicentre."

"This is all very sudden and kinda overwhelming," spoke Riley, "But I'm in."

"Good," smiled Kendall, before handing Riley a Dino Blaster, "You'll need this as well, since you bonded with your Dino Blade, but you can continue using it to morph."

"Sure," thanked Riley.

"Jake, Emma, stay behind, anything could happen, just to be safe," instructed Kendall, Jake and Emma nodding in agreement.

As everyone began to scatter, Koda soon realised Shelby hadn't moved or even spoken, "Shelby, you okay?"

Hearing Koda speak, the others turned to face Shelby, who looked quite flustered to have all eyes on her.

"Is something wrong?" asked Jake.

"I'm scared, okay?" responded Shelby, "Why shouldn't I be, you turn up out of nowhere and tell me I'm supposed to be a Power Ranger, I'm sure the Megaforce team didn't have to go through this."

"Oh, we did," smiled Emma, while Jake grinned beside her, "Our mentor practically press-ganged is into being Power Rangers."

"Yeah, we quite literally got teleported off the street, given morphers and became Power Rangers in under ten minutes, no warning," added Jake.

"Wait, you were part of the Megaforce Rangers?" questioned Shelby.

"Pink," replied Emma, "Both times."

"Black then Green," continued Jake, "It may have been one of the hardest I've ever had to do, but I don't wish I was never a ranger."

Thinking hard, Shelby finally spoke, "Fine, I'll be a Power Ranger, besides you guys need me, I know more about dinosaurs than any of you, apart from maybe Ms. Morgan."

"It's decided then, we've got our Red Ranger," grinned Tyler, summoning the Scarlet Energems from the fourth hollow and grabbing his Dino Chargers, "Let's go!"

"How many Energems are there?" asked Riley.

"Twenty-four we reckon, we've only got nine," answered Kendall, as she, Chase and Koda grabbed their Energems and Dino Chargers.

"Don't forget your Energems," reminded Chase, handing Riley and Shelby a Dino Buckle each, "You can put them in here."

"Got it," replied Riley, placing her Dino Chargers into the buckle and summoning the Green Energem, "Cool!"

Holding out her hand, Shelby frowned when the Red Energem refused to move, flashing wildly, "I think something's wrong."

"That's not good," remarked Kendall, "Shelby, you're going to have to stay behind with Emma and Jake, just until Keeper can stabilise it."

"Fine," murmured Shelby, looking put out, "You guys go on without me."

-DinoCharge-

(Power Chamber)

"Glad you could make it," spoke Jason as Kimberly and Joel appeared in streams of pink and green respectively.

"This is something I have to see for myself," replied Kim, "Sorry about being late, had to see Riley off."

"Yeah, you owe me twenty as well, I knew she'd be a Green Ranger," grinned Joel, prompting Jason to had him a twenty dollar note.

"A great addition to the second best colour," spoke Adam as he and a brunette women walked up behind them, "Black was always the best."

"Adam!" exclaimed Kim, hugging him tightly, "I haven't seen you since the wedding, what are you up to now?"

"You wouldn't believe it, I'm a professor at Whitemont University, as of three months ago," answered Adam with a grin.

"The Whitemont University?" questioned Kim, getting a nod in reply.

"As much as I like get-togethers, I didn't travel back in time to watch you guys catching up," commented Z Delgado, dressed in civilian clothes, with a definite inclusion of red.

"Did you bring the morphers?" asked Jason, becoming serious.

"Yep, I had Boom repower them completely," answered Z, raising a metal briefcase in her left hand.

"Really? Ethan and Cam could even get them to repower at all," stated Joel, looking suspicious, "Not after that prick damaged them."

"Boom's the Head of Technology at SPD Earth for a reason," responded Z, "Kat was promoted to Head of Technology at Galactic Headquarters."

"Wait, I thought you were the Blue SPD Ranger?" asked Kim, looking confused.

"It was a bit of a surprise but Sky retired from SPD when Charlie got pregnant, he didn't want to be putting his life on the line with a kid at home," explained Z, "I guess he didn't want his kid growing up fatherless like he did, after that Bridge was made Commander and I was promoted to Red Ranger."

"I thought Charlie was the evil Red Ranger?" queried Jason.

"Kinda, turns out she was dying from Gamma Radiation and Grumm promised to save her if her and the rest of the A-Squad Rangers served him," informed Z, "About eighteen months ago they escaped and we chased them across the galaxy, turns out they were heading to Aquitar to heal Charlie. Sky gave them a chance to prove that they were good, and they saved Aquitar from an escaped Grumm."

"And then Sky and Charlie started making kissy faces at each other," spoke Tori, stepping out the shadows, dressed in her Sensei Uniform.

"You were there?" questioned Kim, frowning.

"Yeah, we borrowed Tori and Maddie from the past for a bit, we thought it was best considering it was a planet of nearly 100% water," answered Z, opening her briefcase, "But onto more serious matters."

Stepping forward, Adam and Tori took the Black Power Morpher and Blue Wind Morpher respectively from the briefcase, the latter strapping hers to her wrist.

"Man, I've missed this old thing," smiled Adam, glad to have his first Morpher back, after the destruction of the Red Zeo Sub-Crystal, the others had lost a large portion of their power, only the Gold Zeo Powers had been unaffected, however the Gold Zeo Staff was destroyed six months earlier.

"I'll be take these," spoke Kim, taking the Pink Turbo Morpher and Key.

Picking up his Green Rescue Morpher, Joel took a moment to stare at it, before strapping it to his wrist, murmuring, "I'm sorry."

"We'll avenge Angela, I promise," assured Kim, placing a hand on her husband's shoulder, "Byakko will pay for his crimes."

"It's funny, we'd been divorced over five years when Byakko killed her, but I never blamed her for ending things," spoke Joel, "She couldn't handle the waiting to find out if I was coming home, or end up dead at Byakko's feet."

"I know," soothed Kim, "We make sure the bastard dies, painfully."

"Yeah," agreed Joel, kissing Kim softly, "I love you."

"I love you too," smiled Kim.

"What are these?" asked Jason, picking up a set of Zeonizers from the briefcase.

"The Gold Zeonizers, Boom built them as the morpher instead of a new Power Staff," explained Z, "You'll still have a staff to fight with, but the Gold Zeonizers can harness nearly twice as much power than before."

"Thanks, I guess," spoke Jason, strapping them to his wrist, "Alright, the mission is simple, we go in as quiet as we can, when it all goes to shit we smash and grab the package and the hell outta there, understood."

Hearing a general murmur of agreement, Jason raised his Zeonizers, "IT'S MORPHIN TIME!"

"ZEO RANGER VI - GOLD!"

"SPD EMERGENCY!"

"NINJA STORM, RANGER FORM!"

"LIGHTSPEED RESCUE!"

"BLACK RANGER POWER!"

"SHIFT INTO TURBO!"

-DinoCharge-