Streaks of Purple Saga/Spectrum Force by Heather Ray (classic books for 13 year olds .TXT) 📖

simply a resemblance. You could be twins!"

She grimaced. That just can't

be a coincidence.

Alpha turned toward a doorway, and Jocelyn watched as the doors slid open, revealing a cozy kitchen.

She smirked with amusement. "Do you guys live down here?"

"I do, but the Rangers still live at home. A long time ago, the Rangers did live in the Command Center, so these headquarters were designed with all the facilities humanoids need to survive: meal room, bathing rooms, living quarters, training room… the works. But Zordon had decided that it was too much to expect the Rangers to leave their homes, unless their lives were immediately threatened. On one of the previous teams, one member in particular was bitter about leaving his family and life behind. It… ended badly."

Alpha's tone switched from reflective to chipper as he stood at what looked like a wall-mounted microwave. "So, what can I get for you? Coffee, tea, hot chocolate, warm milk?"

"Hot tea, please."

"Black, green, oolong, white, or herbal?"

Jocelyn's eyebrow rose. "Uh… just your regular Lipton tea is fine."

"Sugar, honey, milk, lemon?"

She felt the urge to scratch her head. "Just a little honey. If it's not too much trouble, that is."

Alpha typed in the commands, and Jocelyn stared as a flash of light passed through the clear lens of the door. When Alpha opened it, a mug of steaming tea greeted her.

"Here you go," he said cheerfully.

Jocelyn accepted the cup, staring at it suspiciously. She took an experimental sip, and then stared at the cup anew.

Alpha giggled at her wary stare. "The synthetron still has some bugs to work out, but it's very good at simulating most beverages and simple foods accurately. We're working on programming the more modern foods; my current culinary priority is perfecting the cheeseburger. Would you like anything to eat?"

"No," she answered quickly. "I don't have much of an appetite."

The small robot scuttled to her side, laying a padded hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry. Zordon will figure out how to get you home, fit as a fiddle."

She stared at the synthetic being, peering at its neck and head to determine some

way to remove the casing to reveal a real person. Could a robot possibly be so compassionate?

"If you're ready, I can show you to the main Command Center," Alpha invited. "We do need to figure out our next steps."

She nodded, taking another long sip of the tea. The warmth flooded her, easing some of her tension. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."

Chapter Twenty-Six

Zack had to admit it; he was impressed. Alpha had strolled in, politely introducing Jocelyn to Zordon, and the girl didn't even blink at the gigantic floating head looming over her. She only smiled and waved in greeting.

Who knows what kind of weird aliens she's seen in her dimension?

"So, are you a non-corporeal spirit creature, or is this tube some sort of projection device, sending an image of you from somewhere else?" Jocelyn asked.

"BOTH, ACTUALLY," was the response. "ONCE I WAS A MAN, BUT NOW THIS IS THE ONLY WAY I CAN COMMUNICATE WITH MY RANGERS."

Jocelyn nodded, and smiled at each of the Rangers in turn. They were far less intimidating without their uniforms, and she could even make eye contact with each one… except the hostile one in a white tank top and cargo shorts, who looked away almost immediately.

A rueful smile emerged as she went back and looked at each teen one more time. "Do you guys always wear outfits in your color, or is this just a weird coincidence?"

The observation won an embarrassed blush from the one in a striped shirt and blue jeans, a roll of the eye from the girl in a purple crop top, and a deep chuckle from Zordon.

"I told

you guys we need to work on that," the purple one grumbled, folding her arms irritably.

"No one's figured it out before," the one in red stated, an amused grin on his face. He then approached Jocelyn, and extended his hand. "You've matched faces to colors, but you still don't know what to call most of us yet. I'm Jason."

Jocelyn shook his hand, secretly grateful for his easy-going demeanor and genuine grin. The welcome helped set her at ease.

"These are the rest of the Power Rangers: Alexis, Billy, and Tommy… and you met Trini and Zack earlier."

"Right," Jocelyn said, smiling at the two who were the first to let their guard down earlier. Her hazel eyes lingered on Tommy, who seemed to be closely inspecting something on the tip of his sneaker.

He has every right to be upset. They all do, really. They have no idea what happened to their friend.

"Have you guys figured anything out?"

"Nothing useful," Trini explained. "All we've been able to conclude is that the portal was inter-dimensional, and that it was very unstable."

"Unstable?" Jocelyn repeated, her heart sinking. "That doesn't sound promising."

"It means it'll be much more difficult tracing the portal to determine its origin," Alpha explained. "More stable portals can be properly analyzed and reactivated without too much difficulty. Preliminary analysis suggests this is an entirely different kind of portal."

"One thing that may help is knowing what happened from your perspective," Billy commented. "You said you saw a screen, and you saw an image of Tommy. Is that correct?"

"I saw Tommy and your friend Kim," she elaborated. "In fact, we all saw them."

"Who's 'we'?" Alexis inquired.

"Me and the rest of the Spectrum Force. We were investigating an energy reading at the North Pole, and we found the Denebian princess toying around with some sort of magic…"

She stopped when she noticed the blank expressions on the Rangers faces.

"Maybe I should start from the top?"

"THAT WOULD BE HELPFUL."

"Okay… um, a couple weeks ago my friend Rachel was picked by this alien hero Spectra to assemble a team of humans to fight off the Denebian Empire. The Denebians are these power-hungry aliens bent on taking over the galaxy, and they set their sights on Earth to add it to their Empire so they can squash the resistance. Anyway, Rachel picked me and four of our friends to become the Spectrum Force."

Jocelyn held up her hand, revealing her ring. "We each have a ring like this, that transforms us into an Enforcer. We each have a different color; not unlike you guys, actually. There're six of us, and we've each been assigned a color of the rainbow: red, orange… that's me… yellow, green, blue, and purple."

"So there aren't any Power Rangers in your world?" Zack asked.

"Nope. Not that I know of, anyway."

"AND THE DENEBIANS YOU BATTLE, ARE THEY VERSED IN MAGIC?"

"I don't know if they all are, but the empress Phaedra definitely is. She even took over my body once, if you'd believe it."

"And what about this 'princess' you mentioned?" Tommy asked, "What's she capable of?"

Jocelyn grimaced. "I don't know; this is the first time we met her. She's pretty small for a warrior, but she's tough as nails in a fight. When we got to the North Pole, she was just waiting for us."

"When Kim and I got to the Pole, there was no one there; only the portal we found," Tommy informed the others. "That must mean the point of origin was in her reality."

"That makes sense," Jocelyn agreed. "Spectra, that's our mentor, she said she never saw anything quite like the portal we saw. I mean, it didn't look all that special, but the cave was a total mess, and there was this really creepy carving on the ground filled with blood."

Zack winced. "Ugh. Definitely doesn't sound like the kind of magic I

want to come across."

"WAS THIS CARVING DIRECTLY BENEATH THE PORTAL?"

"Yes, it was!"

"Do you know what it means, Zordon?" Trini wondered, her voice hopeful.

"THE EVIDENCE SUGGESTS THE DENEBIAN PRINCESS INTENTIONALLY OPENED THE PORTAL THROUGH A RITUAL OF SOME SORT. HOWEVER, I CANNOT SEE WHY SHE WOULD CREATE A PORTAL TO SEND JOCELYN HERE."

"Yeah, that doesn't make sense," Alexis murmured. "I mean, if she wanted to banish the entire Force, why didn't she send them all through?"

"Well, she didn't exactly send

me through," Jocelyn admitted. "I think it was my fault. I got too close to the portal voluntarily."

"That's what Kim did!" Tommy added urgently. "The portal just suddenly reacted to her."

"It's more than just proximity," Billy hypothesized. "Otherwise you would've passed through as well, Tommy."

"Unless proximity is required on both sides?" Trini wondered. "It sounds like both Jocelyn and Kim got too close, and together their presence activated the portal."

"I tried to jump

through; you can't get closer than that," Tommy pointed out. "And Jocelyn said her teammates were with her. They must've reacted the same way I did."

"Look, we've established that Kim and I look alike," Jocelyn stated, "so maybe this portal only makes even exchanges? Let's say Kim and I are

more or less the same person, on whatever cosmic level that applies here. Then the only way anyone else can pass through is if their… 'equivalent', for lack of a better term, also touches the portal at the exact same time."

"Sounds like a pretty useless portal," Zack realized, "I mean, let's say this princess wanted to banish someone to an alternate dimension. What're the odds that person's double happens to be walking by? In the North Pole, of all places?"

"PERHAPS THE INTER-DIMENSIONAL PORTAL IS A SECONDARY FUNCTION," Zordon surmised. "THE SPELL THAT CREATED THE PORTAL MIGHT HAVE ANOTHER, MORE SEVERE EFFECT."

Jocelyn's eyes widened. "Like what?"

"UNFORTUNATELY, WE DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH INFORMATION TO DETERMINE ANYTHING ABOUT THE INTENTION OF THE SPELL."

"I could go back to the North Pole," Tommy suggested. "Maybe there's something I missed?"

"THE STORM CONTINUES TO INTERFERE WITH OUR SENSOR RELAYS, AND MAKES TELEPORTATION IMPOSSIBLE. I WILL NOT SEND YOU BLINDLY TO THE POLE. WE CANNOT PREDICT WHAT MAY HAVE MANIFESTED THERE SINCE YOU LEFT."

"The portal closed, though." Tommy argued.

"JUST BECAUSE THE WINDOW HAD VANISHED FROM THE VISIBLE SPECTRUM DOES NOT MEAN THERE ISN'T STILL A CONNECTION BETWEEN OUR TWO WORLDS. UNLESS IT WAS INTENTIONALLY CLOSED FROM THE OTHER END, IT IS LIKELY TO STILL EXIST… AND POSE A DANGER TO ANY WHO EXPLORE THAT CAVERN."

"Then we should wait until the storm calms down," Jason decided. "Better to be safe than sorry. We can all teleport to the cave, and make a quick exit if we find something we can't deal with."

"Fine," Tommy sighed. "Then what do we do in the meantime?"

"It is