chapters:

1. what I owe you

Holy shit.

For years, he would remember that this was his first reaction to seeing Dr. K. He could break that girl over his knee. Seriously, she'd probably fall down if he walked up to her and flicked a finger against her forehead.

And he fucking wanted to. She'd given him enough grief that he could have cheerfully punched her in the face. He hadn't felt naturally homicidal at any point during the last year, but there were only so many times even the calmest person could be shot into a wall before they broke. He wanted to fire one of those damn cannons at her, right now, and see how she liked it.

His second reaction was, Hah. Scott could never let it go, the fact that he hadn't been able to stop calling Dr. K "she." He tried, he made the effort, he'd even managed to fake the habit, but invariably he would slip up and Scott would be listening. He couldn't help it; machines were "she" to him.

Dr. K had long seemed, in his mind at least, more like a machine than he was.

"Lemme get this straight," Ziggy blurted out. "You're Dr. K? Like, creepy Doc K computer screen Dr. K?"

"You designed the operator series." Scott's disbelief was flat and withdrawn.

The tiny girl in an oversize lab coat and obnoxious headset only raised her eyebrows at him. So the attitude wasn't just a product of virtual interaction. Good. He wouldn't feel so bad about socking her.

It was funny, though. When he heard their questions, his only reaction was: obviously. For the first time since they'd met, no doubt had crossed his mind when that synthesized voice spoke.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Summer asked. Tell them what, he had no idea... that she was human? That she'd been on the base the whole time? That she looked like a pixie?

Flynn wanted to know, "Why now? Dillon acts a bit crotchety--which, if I might add, nothing new there--and suddenly that's it, mystery solved?"

"I assure you," she said coolly, "the erratic temperament of Ranger Operator Series Black had nothing to do with my decision."

She caught his eye when he shifted, and he demanded, "Can you pass all those tests you put us through?"

She didn't bat an eye. "I'm the standard against which your test results are measured."

What was even stranger was that he almost believed her.

2. only there in negative

Ziggy hadn't stayed alive this long by trusting people. He didn't worry much about whether people trusted him, either, as long as they weren't actively causing him grief. The Rangers had let him stay on their base, so he tried to do what they asked in return. Some of the time. When it wasn't too inconvenient. Whether he trusted them, or they him, didn't really matter in the long run.

He hadn't realized Dillon was different until he wasn't anymore. He must have started trusting Dillon at some point, accidentally, without even noticing. Trust was sneaky like that. Or so he'd been told. He didn't have a lot of experience with it, and Dillon didn't seem like the type to inspire it without trying.

But he had. Dillon had picked him up, probably saved his life in the wasteland outside of Corinth, possibly saved it again in prison, and had certainly kept him alive on the city's front lines (how did he keep ending up there?) several times since. For no reason, that was what got him. Dillon got nothing out of his continued survival except a roommate he obviously could have done without and something else to argue over with Scott.

Maybe that made it worth it right there, who knew. Ziggy wasn't into the confrontational side of posturing--it didn't go well for him--so he wasn't always sure what counted as an asset and what was just a liability. It wasn't like he couldn't be an asset. But Dillon didn't want anything, didn't ask for anything, mentioned nothing Ziggy could get or talk to or settle up on his behalf.

All evidence, then, pointed to him being a liability. One which Dillon continued to carry, and Ziggy wasn't sure when he'd stopped expecting the bill to come due. But he had.

He knew he had: because when Dr. K emerged from her little control booth for the first time, he felt betrayed. Which was a feeling he was about as accustomed to as trust, since you couldn't have one without the other. But his first reaction (after "...really?") was, "Wow, that was stupid."

Unfortunately, the logical continuation of that thought was, "Wow, I was stupid." It wasn't just the other Rangers who trusted Dillon, it was him, because he hadn't expected that at all. He hadn't seen that coming. And trusting Dillon was the biggest mistake any of them had lived to make.

Even though nothing happened. Not right away. They just kept on, with Dr. K doing her version of "Yeah, really," and everyone else going, "Seriously?" Ziggy wasn't stupid enough to fall back, to call attention to himself by getting quiet, but for several long minutes he hated Dillon for making him feel like this.

Tenaya. Dillon. Venjix technology, metal detectors going crazy, the way they fought and fought and never got tired, and the only difference--the only difference--was that the Rangers had discovered Dillon while Ziggy had discovered Tenaya. So Dillon stayed. Dillon got a morpher, and Tenaya got hers taken away.

Or maybe not the only difference: Tenaya had wanted that morpher, after all. Dillon hadn't. And until now, Ziggy must have subconsciously thought it made a difference.

Until he realized what Dillon did want.

Dillon wanted Dr. K.

3. sleeper agent

For the third time that day, Dillon walked into a room and Ziggy flinched. Oh, he didn't move, didn't give any obvious sign, but he was stiffer and his breathing had changed. Like Dillon's presence suddenly freaked him out. Once could have been a weird Ziggy thing, twice, maybe, a coincidence...

"Okay, what?" Dillon demanded, staring at him.

Ziggy looked up from the notebook he was scribbling in. "What what?" he wanted to know, all wide eyes and startled innocence. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Whatever. He didn't play Ziggy's games. "If you've got something to say to me," Dillon grumbled, looking around for the Ranger ID Scott had shoved into his hand days earlier. "Just say it."

"Are you here to assassinate Dr. K?" Ziggy blurted out.

Dillon snorted. "If she keeps shooting me every time I walk through the garage? Yeah, I'm considering it."

"No, I mean--" Ziggy sat up, turning away from the desk to hang over his chair. "Do you have, like, a secret mission or something? Because it's totally cool if you do. I just figured, Ziggy is the guy in the know, right? I feel like I should be in on it."

Dillon stared at him.

"Or not," Ziggy said, holding up his hands. "Keep it to yourself, it's all good."

"You think I have a secret plan to kill Dr. K?" Dillon couldn't decide which was stranger: the fact that he seemed that subtle, or the fact that it was Ziggy who'd confronted him.

"Well, you seem like a guy with a goal," Ziggy offered. "Nobody runs the Venjix barricade for the fun of it. And you were awfully, how should I say this, blasé about staying for someone who went to all that trouble to get here. Almost like you were trying to convince someone."

"Huh," Dillon said. "Why Dr. K?"

This time, Ziggy really was surprised. Dillon could tell because his expression went all neutral and non-judgmental. Ziggy was a con man, and the last thing he was going to do when he didn't understand the con was to let on that he didn't get it. "Uh, why not, right? I mean, she's here. She's human, supposedly, so it's not like she can't, you know, kick the bucket."

"So are the Rangers," Dillon pointed out. "Why not just kill them? Whack 'em in the kitchen. Or, hey, I hear Summer doesn't lock her room. I could kill her tonight. While she's sleeping."

"Yeah, but Dr. K would probably notice," Ziggy said. He sounded completely serious. Or at least as close to it as he ever got. Dillon had never made the mistake of assuming that a guy who went to that much trouble to appear harmless actually was.

"I mean, look at how much they trust you already," Ziggy was saying. "You complain a few times, and Dr. K just walks out of her ivory tower like she's doing you a favor. Obviously that's worth waiting for. Not that you couldn't have killed the rest of them, like, the first day, but she'd just replace them so what's the point?

"No," Ziggy continued, wagging a finger in his direction. "You're too smart for that. She's the real front line, and everyone knows it. So you work your way in, you play the reluctant hero, and they figure anyone who doesn't want it as much as you, uh, don't... well, he's gotta be for real."

Dillon stood, frozen, running the scenario back and forth in his mind. Ziggy had bragged about how he managed to "convince" Tenaya to audition. The reluctant hero.

"Assuming that's the plan," he said at last, "would I know about it?"

Ziggy braced his elbow against the back of the chair and frowned. "Not if you were a sleeper agent, I guess. But Tenaya wasn't, so... probably? I mean, do you?"

"No," Dillon said shortly. He grabbed his jacket and a water bottle and headed for the door. "Apparently I should get off this base."

"Ranger Operator Series Black." Dr. K's voice greeted him the moment he stepped through the door, and it was undistorted. Her actual face had replaced the name and fake soundwave pattern on the garage screen, and he winced.

She looked fucking small. And really absurdly young.

"Your zord maneuvering skills show consider room for improvement," she informed him as he strode across the catwalk toward the stairs. "You and Series Green will take part in this evening's road test. Seven o'clock."

"Turns out I'm here to kill you," he snapped, swinging his jacket over his shoulders and taking the stairs two at a time. "So how about you don't piss me off, I leave, and we'll call it even."

He didn't know whether it said more about them or him that no one so much as moved. Summer and Flynn looked at each other across the pool table, and Scott--if Scott was here somewhere, and he couldn't be sure--didn't stick his head out. Dillon made it to his car before Ziggy's voice called down from the catwalk. "So that's really a no, then."

"What's going on?" Summer wanted to know.

Dillon flung himself into the driver's seat and slammed the door shut after him. He could hear Ziggy explaining even through the closed windows. He gunned the engine in an effort to drown them out, but the door didn't open, and he stared mutinously at it for a long moment before putting his window down and craning his neck around the garage.

"Doc," he said, in his most dangerous voice, "this counts as pissing me off."

"I'm not your automatic garage door opener," she retorted. "And I'm not about to enable your cowardice by providing an easy exit."

He didn't move. "What did you just say?"

"Stand and face your fear," she told him. "The unknown, the potential for disaster; it's in us all. It doesn't make you special. The operator technology does. I advise you not to underestimate it. Or me."

Dillon glared through the windshield at the door that refused to let him go. "Confident, aren't you."

"Someone has to be," she said archly.

That did it. The day someone outswaggered him was the day he admitted he'd stolen Scott's clearly inferior car for any reason other than deliberate provocation. He shoved the door open and got out, not sure who to glare at first. "Don't think I'm doing your stupid road test."

"See you at seven," she answered.

The screen winked out before he could reply.

4. road test

Ziggy actually felt kind of bad about it afterwards. Another feeling he wasn't so familiar with. There were things that had to be done, of course, and things that should be done, and they weren't always the same. At the end of the day, he tried to do one or the other of them the best he could--and whichever one it was, he didn't make a habit of regretting it.

This thing, though. The thing with Dillon. He'd done that on purpose, and not just out of curiosity. He'd asked because he wanted Dillon to know that any loyalty he had went to whoever it was in his best interests to support. As the strongest of the Rangers, Dillon was definitely the one Ziggy would side with in a shootout.

He figured his chances of surviving said shootout would be increased if Dillon knew that.

It had seemed to upset Dillon more than anything, though, and now he didn't have any better idea what the guy was thinking than he had before. He didn't regret it, exactly. But he did feel a little bad, because after making fun of Scott, mocking Dr. K was Dillon's favorite pasttime... and with the exception of the hand incident, Dillon went out of his way to avoid Dr. K for days.

They'd lost contact with her during the road test. Busy, Scott said. Dr. K had too much to do to monitor them every second. He'd sounded confident, but Summer and Flynn were silent, and Ziggy could see the slight dip in Dillon's head on the monitor in his (extremely cool) zord. Even through the helmet, it was a look that said Dillon was Not Impressed with this explanation.

"Flynn," he said a moment later.

"Ranger Blue," Scott corrected.

Dillon ignored him. "What did you do with that hand?"

"What?" Flynn sounded surprised. "I didna do anything with it. Gave it a bit of a stomp as we left, that's all. Dr. K must've cleaned it up."

"She in the habit of doing that?" Dillon asked. His tone was grim, and Ziggy's board thing flashed what was probably a warning as Zord 5 broke formation.

"Well, no," Flynn said, like he hadn't noticed anything. "Now that you mention it."

"Black," Scott's voice snapped. "What are you doing?"

There was no answer.

"Dr. K," Summer repeated, her voice more urgent this time. "Please respond."

Ziggy waited until Scott activated the zord recall, mostly because he wasn't sure he could make it back up the streets any faster on his own. Dillon obviously could, though, because he and Dr. K were facing off in the garage by the time they got there. There was a black-gloved hand between them that looked even worse than it had the last time Ziggy saw it.

"I was running tests on that," Dr. K said calmly. She looked kind of ridiculous standing across from Dillon, actually. He had to be, like, three feet taller than she was.

"Yeah, well, it was winning," Dillon muttered, going down on one knee to yank something out of the place where a wrist would have attached. A wire or something.

How did he do that, Ziggy wondered? How did he make it look like he always knew what he was doing? Ziggy had coveted that look for years before he accepted the fact that his skill lay in looking exactly the opposite.

"Self-repair," Dr. K remarked, eyeing the hand as Dillon stood up with it again. "Fascinating."

"Deadly." Dillon pressed his thumb and finger together in the middle of the "palm" until they met. Ziggy winced at the crackle of who knew what, and maybe it was his imagination but he thought Flynn flinched a little too. "Can you get a burn permit in this city?"

Dr. K lifted her chin, which Ziggy might have found cute if he wasn't still trying to picture a giant K and a weird soundwave imitation where her face was. "I should think it would be obvious," she said, glancing around the garage. "I can get anything."

"Great." Dillon handed her the, well, hand. "Good luck with that."

Apparently tired of being left out, Scott demanded, "Is everything okay here?"

"Of course," Dr. K said. She looked remarkably composed for someone who might or might not have recently fought a disembodied robotic hand. "I assume you didn't complete the road test."

"Ah, no offense, Doc," Flynn said kindly, "but the fact that you don't know? Is kind of the reason we didn't."

"I hope this answers your question," Summer murmured, obviously counting on Dillon to hear.

He did. So did everyone else. Summer just tossed her head, pretty gold hair swirling over her operator suit. She was smiling in spite of the frown Dr. K gave her.

"If you're implying that I did not have this situation completely under control," the doctor said stiffly, "I assure you, nothing could be farther from the truth."

"Besides," Dillon added, "I could have been testing her. Not like I can judge her physical abilities in simulation."

"Do you ever stop?" Scott sounded incredulous. "Be dark and tortured on your own time. We have a road test to finish."

And they did, but what Ziggy thought was even more interesting was the fact that Dillon only smirked at Scott for the scathing retort. No other comeback, no protest: just a wry acknowledgment that made Scott roll his eyes. Or at least, Ziggy thought he was rolling his eyes. Scott's eye rolls were usually accompanied by a little shake of the head, and that Ziggy could detect from behind.

He didn't see Dillon alone with Dr. K for almost a week after that.

5. rudimentary level of control

It was easy enough to pass off his training to Ziggy at first. Since Dillon was no longer Dr. K's least favorite Ranger, she didn't seem to spend quite as much time trying to piss him off. She was making Ziggy's life miserable, though, and he used that as leverage when she finally demanded that he train or leave.

He figured the leaving part was an empty threat: they'd made it pretty clear they needed him. But he had reason to know exactly how many cannons were concealed around the garage, and if he told her to bill him one more time, she probably would. Violently.

The good doctor had ways of making them train.

So Dillon informed her that he and Ziggy would be training together from now on, and if she had a problem with that then she could consider it part of her training. How to instruct multiple operators, how to teach a class, how to behave like a human being... he didn't care what she called it. She was going to do it.

"What?" Ziggy said, hand arrested halfway to his mouth. He was swiping Flynn's strawberries again, though how he'd gotten them into the training room Dillon didn't know. Dr. K must have had bigger things to complain about.

"That's inefficient," Dr. K told him. "I need to concentrate on each of you individually in order to maximize your performance."

"Yeah, you're doing a great job of maximizing his performance." Dillon leaned back against one of the containment cases, mostly because he knew she didn't like it. "You said we have to believe our special powers will work."

"They're not special powers," she said sharply, cutting him off before he could finish.

When he raised his eyebrows at her, Dr. K frowned. "Well. Only in the most literal sense of the phrase. There's no need to make it a pejorative."

"You said," he repeated, eyeing her, "that we have to believe they'll work. Ziggy here is less convinced every time I see him."

"That's hardly my fault," she snapped.

"It's all your fault," Dillon corrected. "I don't know if you've listened to yourself lately, but you don't exactly inspire confidence. You ever tried letting someone know when they do something right?"

"I don't think people should be complimented for doing their jobs," she informed him. "I run a lab, not a day care center."

"Cover your ears," he told Ziggy.

Ziggy was looking back and forth between them, strawberry forgotten in his hand. "Huh?"

"Don't listen," Dillon said. "Put your hands over your ears and, I don't know, hum or something."

Ziggy held up his strawberry. "Can I go get another strawberry?"

"No," Dr. K said.

"Yeah," Dillon said.

Ziggy looked from one of them to the other, then edged toward the door. He put the strawberry in his mouth, covered his ears when Dr. K didn't reprimand him again, and sidestepped out of the room. "Don't forget to hum!" Dillon yelled after him.

"I fail to comprehend why you think my insistence on your training meant I wanted you to come in here and interfere with his," Dr. K said.

"You know what I don't get?" Dillon said. "I don't get how you can be so goddamned smart and have no people skills at all. I mean, I thought I was bad, but you. You take 'fuck off' to a whole new level."

She regarded him coolly. "I don't see that profanity makes your point any clearer."

"Uh, guys?" Ziggy said loudly. He was standing in the door, kitchen behind him, hands still over his ears. "Can I come back in now?"

Dillon waved him in. "What do you want him to do?" he asked Dr. K.

"Ideally?" She glanced down at the clipboard in her hand. "Teleport himself and someone else from where he is to a place he's never been before while under fire and with minimal power."

He felt the corner of his mouth quirk. "Realistically, then."

She looked up. "Teleporting from one side of the room to the other without injuring himself or anyone else would be a step in the right direction."

Ziggy was chewing and humming at the same time, which he somehow made seem even more obnoxious than it should have been. Dillon strode over to him and pulled his hands away from his ears. "Listen," he said.

"Should I stop humming now?" Ziggy asked innocently.

"Yeah." Dillon glanced at Dr. K, then back at Ziggy. "Dr. K thinks you're trying too hard. You're trying to do too much at once. You both know you can teleport around the room just fine, but you gotta practice the easy stuff so she can figure out how to track you. Keep it small until her equipment catches up, okay?"

He could feel her glaring daggers at him without turning around. Ziggy shifted uncomfortably, and Dillon let go of his arms. "That's the thing," Ziggy said, no trace of strawberries now. "I can't actually--"

"Teleport reliably outside of the garage?" Dillon interrupted. "Good. We'd never find you anyway. Just practice in here for now. Dr. K says you show a lot of potential with the short-range..." He waved his hand, momentarily at a loss. "Beaming thing."

"Really?" Ziggy's gaze darted over his shoulder. Dillon could just imagine the look on Dr. K's face, but Ziggy straightened and nodded once. "I mean, yeah. Of course. A lot of potential, that's me. I'm filled with potential. In fact, you might want to stand back. I just might decide to take you with me."

"Attaboy." Dillon clapped him on the shoulder, then took a step back. "Remember, just across the room. So Dr. K can calibrate her scanner things."

"Right." Ziggy nodded again. "Just a... just a test run. No problem. I do it all the time."

"Absolutely," Dillon agreed.

The suit sealed around Ziggy, and he did something to his morpher. Huh, was Dillon's first thought. Dr. K had been holding out on him. He hadn't known there was a morpher activation option.

His next thought was, hey, that's kind of cool. Because there was Ziggy, standing on the other side of the room without having moved at all. His helmet tipped back, then down, and he patted his hands down his chest like he wasn't sure he was all there. Then he looked around, just to be sure--

"Yeah!" Ziggy pumped his fist, exuberant exclamation and all, and then lifted his hands above his head and did a little victory lap. In place. He just turned in a circle, pretending he was running, and waved to an imaginary crowd. "Who's the best? That's right! I am!"

Dillon folded his arms, unable to hide a smile.

"Congratulations," Dr. K said, in a voice that was thoroughly unimpressed. "You've managed to achieve the most rudimentary level of control over technology that's designed to merge seamlessly with your will."

"She means good job," Dillon offered. "I'll make you a translation sheet."

"That won't be necessary," Dr. K said, not looking up from the notes she was taking.

Ziggy's helmet disappeared, and their eyes met across the room. Dillon smirked at the Green Ranger's undeniably triumphant expression. "Yeah," he said, "I think it will."

6. dr k decoder ring

Ziggy knew perfectly well that Dillon wasn't training with him because he wanted to protect him from Dr. K. In fact, he was pretty sure Dillon was counting on Ziggy to protect Dr. K from him, which was weird and kind of flattering at the same time. He sure made training more productive, though... and as a bonus, he and Dr. K were hilarious together.

Dillon hadn't been kidding about that translation sheet. Ziggy figured that whatever he'd done, he was forgiven when he found the piece of paper on his pillow after dinner that evening. Written in Dillon's annoyingly perfect handwriting, the page read, "Dr. K decoder ring: simple translations of common phrases." Dr. K-isms had been painstakingly copied underneath, with little arrows pointing to Dillon's interpretation of what they meant.

Ziggy thought Dillon must have been listening the other day, because the list included "I don't like you"... which, according to Dillon, meant "Good morning." It also included Dillon's least favorite reprimand, "You owe me training time." Dillon seemed to think this meant, "I'm bored."

Would he get in trouble if he posted the list somewhere, Ziggy wondered? It would help everyone, really. He didn't think Dillon would mind: the only thing he liked better than annoying Dr. K was annoying Scott, and Scott probably wouldn't appreciate decoder rings any more than she would.

Ziggy added one thing to the list and went in search of some tape.

The next morning, Summer and Dillon were standing by the screens in the conference area across from the kitchen--or more specifically, in front of the list Ziggy had stuck up next to the screens with electrical tape. They were arguing over something, and Ziggy paused. What if they thought Dillon had done it? He hadn't worried much about that.

Well, Dillon had done it, but Dillon hadn't posted it. It was just obviously Dillon's handwriting on the list. He probably should have copied it over himself. Ziggy crept down the stairs as quietly as he could.

"She could have tested the zords from here," Dillon was saying. "They allow for remote operation, right?"

"I'm just saying, you'd think Scott's dad would have corrected him at some point." Summer had her hands in her pockets as Ziggy came around the corner, and she added, "He's big on correcting people."

"Aye, but he's military," Flynn said. He was behind the kitchen counter with a bowl of cereal, and he raised his spoon in greeting when he saw Ziggy. "He's used to keeping secrets."

"Uh, hey guys," Ziggy said carefully. "Morning, what's up, how's it going..."

"Hey," Dillon said, catching his eye briefly. It seemed to be more of an acknowledgment than a complaint. "Did Doc K really say she doesn't go outside?"

"Oh, yeah." Ziggy hesitated. "Well, probably. I mean, if you believe Benny. Which I totally do, he's completely trustworthy. Besides, she didn't exactly deny it."

"Well, she took exception to you repeating it," Summer said, nodding at the wall.

Ziggy winced, but he gamely went over to look. It was Dillon's list, all right. Unedited except for the line he'd added at the bottom. "I don't go outside" was still there, but his translation had been crossed out and a new one was written in. He didn't recognize the handwriting, but he could guess. The list now read:

Dr. K decoder ring: simple translations of common phrases

I'm Dr. K. --> I hope you appreciate the honor it is that I'm speaking to you.
I don't like you. --> Good morning.
Shall we begin? --> You're going to hate this.
You must have absolute faith. --> I'm smarter than you.
Don't touch that. --> I leave untested weapons lying around to entertain myself.
You owe me training time. --> I'm bored.
You are incompetent. --> I could do better.
You are only partly incompetent. --> I am the only one who could do better.
You performed adequately. --> (No one knows. She's never said it.)

I don't go outside... unless I really like you! EXCEPT TO TEST THINGS THAT COULD CAUSE UNSPEAKABLE DAMAGE.

"Huh," Ziggy said, considering the changes. "That's not how I interpreted it at all."

7. pulling pigtails

"You can't really think you're going to kill her," Summer remarked, hands in her pockets as they strolled down the sidewalk.  "I mean, it's not like you haven't had the chance, and you didn't, so."

"I couldn't take you all," Dillon said.  "Not on your territory.  And I haven't been alone with her since she turned out to be human, so what does that prove?"

Summer shrugged, casual in the sunlight.  "You're alone with me now."

"No offense," he said, "but you're not as valuable as she is."

Ziggy had given them a list of people and businesses he had been personally responsible for extorting.  Dr. K insisted that no one on her team have outstanding felony charges on their record, so settlements had to be made.  Ziggy had offered to do it himself, but Dr. K was vehement that his reappearance would only make the situation worse.  So Dillon had volunteered.

Summer had seconded before Dr. K could make more than one sarcastic comment about the other team convict being exactly who cartel victims needed to see.  So Dillon found himself out on the street, wandering through a mostly respectable neighborhood, with reluctant gratitude for his companion's ability to both sweet talk and strong arm grudging business owners.  It was better than being shot at by Dr. K's cannons of doom for the five hundredth time.

"You have a crush on her," Summer said, out of the blue.  "Don't you."

Dillon looked around automatically, but he didn't see anyone she could be talking about.  "Excuse me?"

"Dr. K."  Summer sounded amused.  "You haven't been able to stop pulling her pigtails since you met her."

He frowned.  "She doesn't have pigtails."

"No," Summer agreed, pointing to the sign for Jungle Karma Pizza.  "She doesn't.  Want me to do the talking again?"

Dillon waved for her to go in front of him.  "Be my guest."

The air shifted as they walked through the door, and Dillon froze.  Summer stopped too,  giving the fairy lights strung along the walls a quizzical look.  "The light's different," she remarked.

"The air's different," Dillon muttered, turning.  Drier.  The air was drier.  Who dehumidified a restaurant and then left the door--

"Summer."  The door they'd just walked through had been propped open.  This one wasn't.  A single step and his hand was on the door, shoving it out: the stairs were gone, the sidewalk was farther away, and there was a courtyard between them and the street.

"Where are we?"  Summer kept her voice down, her tone calm, even as Dillon stepped through the door and squinted up at the sky.  It was blue.  It was actually blue, not filtered to appear blue under a dust-laden atmosphere that broke white and scattered yellow.

"No dome," Dillon said under his breath.  He felt her gaze, and she didn't question him but he felt compelled to say, "I can tell.  I can see it, even through the sky.  There's no dome here."

"Hi!"  An oddly cheery voice, probably directed at them, made them both turn.  Sure enough, a girl with glasses and actual pigtails was beaming at them.  Dillon exchanged glances with Summer.

"Welcome to Jungle Karma Pizza!" the girl chirped.  Baseball cap, green t-shirt, orange apron with little purple and yellow flowers on it.  Engagement ring on her left hand.  Tall.  Older than she looked, Dillon decided.  "May I offer you a menu?"

"We're going to need to speak to the owner," Summer said firmly.  "We're here on behalf of Dr. K?"  She held up her badge, and Dillon grabbed for his and echoed her gesture.  The whole mysteriously changing environment thing had thrown them.  Dr. K would be disappointed.

"I'm afraid I don't know who that is."  She was still smiling, but Dillon got the feeling she was more than just a waitress.  Something told him they wouldn't get anywhere without making nice with her.  "I'll have to get a better look at your badge, please."

He held up a hand when Summer shot him a sideways look.  Pulling his badge off over his head, he offered it to the girl with the flowery apron.  "Believe me," Dillon told her, "we've been working with Dr. K all this time and we don't know who she is either.  We're Power Rangers.  We're here to settle some old debts for Ziggy Grover?"

"Oh!"  The girl looked from the badge to his wrist, and Dillon pulled his sleeve back to reveal his morpher.  "Oh," she repeated, handing the badge back to him.  "I'll go get RJ.  Why don't you have a seat?  I'll be right back."

"Power Rangers, yes; Dr. K, no?" Summer murmured, as they took a booth near the door.  "That's a first."

"This can't be Corinth," Dillon said quietly, glancing around the room.  "Look at the napkins."

"Yeah."  Summer held up a toothpick, snapped it in half just to make her point.  It splintered.  "Real wood."

"Who else has air this good?" Dillon wondered.

At the same time, Summer said, "Maybe we went back in time."

They exchanged incredulous glances, but Dillon got his question out first.  "Back in time?  That's your logical explanation?"

She shrugged.  "Flynn can do it.  It explains the sky, the non-recyclable things, and the sign.  That waitress did say 'Jungle Karma Pizza' when we came in."

"No," Dillon said, concentrating.  "The magnetics are off.  We're at a different latitude than we were before."

"You said some kinds of radiation throw off your perception of geomagnetism," Summer reminded him.  Like he didn't know the difference between interference and an actual reading.

"I can tell," he told her.  "Besides, it's too dry.  Corinth was built to mimic endemic regional humidity.  This is desert level.  The salinity in the air is the only thing that's even close."

"West coast," Summer guessed.

He was relatively sure he'd be able to detect a continental shift, so he just nodded.  Summer looked thoughtful.  "Time and space, then," she said.  "There's no way this is the year we came from."

"Greetings!"  Another woman in green, this one with the orange apron at her waist to reveal a JKP logo on her shirt, slid into the booth beside him.  "Fran says you're Power Rangers.  I'm RJ.  Welcome... to the best pizza place in town!"

"Summer Landsdown."  Summer smiled a little, holding out her hand over the table.

RJ frowned at her own fingers, then patted a flour-covered hand on her apron and took  the one Summer offered.  "Pleased to meet you," RJ said.  "You'll be the... Yellow Ranger, then?"

"Yes."  Summer glanced at Dillon.  "Ranger Operator Series Yellow.  And this is my teammate, Dillon.  Series Black."

"Hey."  Dillon offered his hand only because Summer had, but RJ took it with no less enthusiasm and considerably more strength than he'd expected.

"Tell me, RJ," Summer said.  "Are you familiar with the Scorpion Cartel?"

RJ lifted one finger, tilting her head as though about to produce a list of wrongs done to her business by the cartel over the years.  "No," she said at last.  "Should I be?"

He looked at Summer and found Summer looking back at him.

"I see," RJ said, before either of them could answer.  "Because of something they've done?  Or something you expect them to do... in the future?"

"Well," Summer said carefully.  "That depends.  This may sound like an odd question, but--could you tell us what year it is?"

"Ah," RJ said with a smile.  "More reliable than seeing a morpher.  This is 2009.  February 23rd, if it helps.  Can I get you a pizza?  It's on the house.  I find it sometimes... focuses my thoughts."

"That's today," Dillon said.

"Here," RJ agreed.  "Is it today where you came from too?"

"Yes," Summer said, frowning.  "Which means something stranger than time travel happened when we stepped through your door."

"Something to do with the Scorpion Cartel?" RJ suggested, apparently unperturbed.

"I doubt it," Dillon said.  "Dr. K's probably testing one of her--"

Someone shrieked, and Dillon stopped talking.  Summer's gaze flicked to the back of the restaurant.  A slight nod prompted him to turn.  He was in time to see a tiger come skidding across the floor, causing surprisingly little fuss for a species so exotic and... extinct.  Dillon knew without having to ask that there shouldn't be any tigers anymore.

"We have a holographics system," RJ was explaining.  "Because of the jungle theme, of course.  One of the girls out back must have thought you--"

The tiger lifted its head and snarled at him.

"Ah," RJ said.  "I believe we have a moratorium on growling, actually.  Ever since that time with Kaylee's daughter, you remember..."  He seemed to be talking to the tiger, which was a little weird.

Not nearly as weird as the tiger's reaction, though.  It climbed into the booth with them, next to Summer, scrambling to brace its paws on the table and lean directly into Dillon's space.  RJ looked surprised.  Summer looked faintly annoyed.

Dillon just raised his eyebrows, eye to eye with a massive and very non-holographic cat.  Seriously, he could feel its breath.  This wasn't any light manipulation; this was a living being staring back at him.

"Yes," RJ said.  "Well.  It's not actually supposed to do that."  Dillon didn't miss the emphasis on the last two words, and he thought RJ was talking to the tiger again.  "We'd better go out back and see if we can adjust the projectors."

The tiger didn't move.

"Let's go," RJ said, with what sounded like forced lightness.  She didn't move, though, meaning Dillon was pretty much stuck where he was.  Summer wasn't moving until the tiger did.  And the tiger showed no more sign of disappearing now than it had before.

"Casey," RJ said softly.  She leaned forward under the guise of standing up, and Dillon heard her hiss, "Kitchen.  Now."

The tiger turned its head, fur brushing RJ's face as it slunk off of the table.  "Come on," RJ said, cheerful again as she stood up and waved them out.  She didn't watch the tiger go.  "Special demonstration for such... distinguished guests.  Allow me to offer you a complete tour of our facility!"

There was no trace of the tiger when RJ ushered them through the purple swinging door into the kitchen.  Dillon couldn't help noticing that none of the customers looked very surprised.  There was a table of gigglers watching their every move, and a couple of gossips pretending not to, but otherwise, most of the customers looked indifferent.

Maybe they were holographic, Dillon thought.  Maybe they were in an alternate dimension where holographic things were real and real things were holographic.  Maybe he and Summer would turn into holograms if they stayed here too long.

Maybe he should stop listening to Ziggy talk about his dreams.

"Casey," RJ declared, lifting both hands to indicate a skinny guy in a ballcap.  "Summer and Dillon, Power Rangers from... today.  Apparently."

"He's the wolf," Casey said.

RJ paused, mouth open as though caught mid-sentence.  "What?"

"Yeah," Dillon said, raising a hand in acknowledgment.  "Series Black is the wolf.  Why is that, by the way?" he added, nudging Summer with his elbow.  "Dr. K got a thing for animals?"

"It represents the inclusiveness of the unified biofield," Summer murmured.

Dillon eyed her, but she just shrugged.  When he looked back at RJ, she was staring at Casey--who was still staring at him--so he scanned the rest of the kitchen.  Fran was keeping an eye on them from the table where she was pounding out dough.  There was a dark-haired woman on the other side of the kitchen, pretending to ignore them much more successfully... and giving off a weird "used to being ignored" air herself.

"What does that mean?" RJ was asking.

"It means the wolf is here," Casey said.  "And it came with him."

Dillon looked back at him, and why hadn't he noticed that the guy had a creepy gold cast to his eyes?  "You're the tiger," he said.  It was so obvious he actually felt stupid for saying it aloud, but he hadn't planned to.  It just came out.

"Yeah," Casey said.  There was a brief pause, and then he added, "Sorry about that."

"The tiger," Summer repeated.  "The... tiger we just saw in the restaurant?"

What tiger did she think he meant, Dillon wondered?

"Yeah," Casey repeated.  "I didn't mean to freak you out."  He didn't offer any further explanation, though, and Dillon was a breath away from pointing out that he hadn't freaked them out when Summer did it for him.

"You didn't," she said.  "Since we're having the cryptic part of the conversation, could one of you tell us where we are?"

"You're at Jungle Karma Pizza," RJ said.  She was still watching Casey, who finally turned to look at her, and she added absently, "Ocean Bluff, California.  The United States of America.  On Earth, if it helps."

If it helps.  She wasn't even paying any attention to them anymore, and she was still throwing out common knowledge like people off the street asked for it every day.  More reliable than seeing the morphers, she'd said.

"You've worked with Power Rangers before," Dillon said.

"We are Power Rangers," Casey said.

"No, that's imposs--"  Summer broke off, then rolled one shoulder in rueful acknowledgment.  "Improbable," she amended.  "I don't suppose you've ever heard of Corinth City?"

"For certain definitions of 'we,'" RJ offered.  Dillon didn't think she was even listening anymore.  "Camille isn't.  Your eyes are gold, by the way.  Was the tiger involuntary?"

Correction, Dillon thought, rolling his eyes.  She wasn't listening to anyone except Casey anymore.  "Hey," he said, taking Summer's arm.  "We need to go test something.  Everyone good here for a minute?"

"It barely recognizes you," Casey said.  "Not compared to him."

Summer took a step back, pulling Dillon with her.  He saw Fran open her mouth, then hesitate, looking from them to her coworkers and back again.  No one else said anything, so he and Summer ducked out of the kitchen, caught each other's eye, and headed for the door.

They were just going to try it.  Or at least, Dillon was just going to try it.  He wanted to see what happened.  And nothing did, at first: they stepped through the door at the front of the restaurant and found themselves in the courtyard.  Just like he had the first time.

Then Summer pointed to the street.  He'd let go of her on the way to the door, and now it was her turn to grab his arm as they crossed the courtyard.  Smart, really.  Who knew when or how--

The air pressed in on him the second they stepped past the courtyard gate.  The seaside street that had spread out in front of them a moment before was gone, replaced by the crowded bustle of a Corinth sidewalk.  Dillon stopped.  Summer pivoted and stopped on his other side.

They stood back to back beside a street in a mostly respectable part of town, watching Corinthians hurry past under a filtered blue sky.  "We're back," Summer said unnecessarily.

"Yeah."  Dillon glanced up at the JKP sign, swinging innocently over a door at the top of three steps they had gone up but never come down.  "I got that."

He could hear the frown in Summer's voice.  "I guess the question is, where were we?"

Obviously, neither of them were going to answer that question.  He hit his morpher.  "Doc K," he said.  "Can you look something up for us?"

"Of course," her voice answered immediately.  "Because I'm your personal assistant, and I have nothing better to do than respond to your every whim."

He looked over his shoulder and saw Summer doing the same.  He couldn't quite catch her smirk, but he figured it matched his own.  "Oh," he drawled.  "You busy?"

She didn't sigh.  Dr. K rarely bothered; he figured she thought it was a waste of time.  "What do you want, Series Black."

"One of the businesses on Ziggy's list," he said.  "A Jungle Karma Pizza.  You got anything on it?"

"Other than the fact that it paid protection money to the Scorpion Cartel?  Why would I care?"  There was a pause, and he knew better than to say anything while she looked.

"Jungle Karma Pizza?" she repeated after a moment.  "Doesn't exist.  Are you sure you gave me the right name?"

"You sure you typed it in correctly?" he countered.  "You don't even know where the backspace key is.  Of course I gave you the right name."

"Did you visit this Jungle Karma Pizza recently?"  She didn't wait for him to answer.  "Because both your biofields fell off the tracking scan fourteen minutes ago."

"We just left it," he reported.  "I'm looking at the sign right now."

There was no hesitation this time.  "Return to base.  I want to run some more scans.  And I'll need the data from your morphers."

"Really?"  Dillon was eyeing the door.  "I think we should go back in.  See what happens."

"Return to base," she said sharply.  "Before I quarantine that entire block with you inside."

He heard the connection click off, and he lowered his morpher.  Craning his neck again, he asked, "Did she just threaten me?"

Summer was poking the sidewalk sign for Jungle Karma Pizza like she expected her hand to go right through it.  "You're pulling her pigtails again," she said, running her fingers over the lunch specials.  Some of the chalk came off on her skin.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Dillon told her.  "You know that, right?"

She looked up, showing him her fingers in case he'd missed it.  "Sure you don't," she agreed.  Taking her own morpher from her belt, she held it up and started pushing buttons.  Or one button, at least.  Over and over.

It took exactly a second and a half for him to figure out what she was doing.  "You've gotta be kidding me," Dillon said.  "You've got a camera on that thing?"

"So do you," Summer said, twisting to take pictures of the door.  "It can be activated remotely, by the way.  Better not to learn that the hard way."

He considered the implications of that for a moment, then shook his head.  "I don't think I want to know."

Summer smiled, closing her morpher and replacing it on her belt.  "Smart man.  Let's get going before Dr. K goes from threatening to actively harassing."

"How would we know?" Dillon muttered.

"Trust me," she said, clapping him on the shoulder.  "You'll know."

8. dillon decoder ring

"Okay," Ziggy said, coming around the kitchen corner to confront the briefing area.  It was empty, derailing a perfectly good complaint about the unpredictable nature of reality.  He closed his mouth, frowning, and glanced at the door to the training arena.

His badge let him in without him having to do anything, and sure enough, there was the rest of the team.  "Okay," he repeated, coming up behind the group while Dr. K was passing out small mysterious things that probably blew up when you looked at them sideways.  "So, you know when you walk into a flower shop and suddenly you're in another dimension?

"Yeah," he continued, not giving anyone a chance to interrupt.  "That's what just happened to me, and I want everyone to know I handled it really well.  If anyone tells you there was screaming, that is a total lie.  There might have been some small amount of surprise, calmly expressed by yours truly, but I think that's to be expected, don't you?  Come on, who knows what I'm talking about?"

Everyone last one of them raised their hand, with the exception of Dr. K who just looked at him like he was a moron.  Since that was how she always looked at him, though, he was inclined to consider it a neutral expression.  "Really?" Ziggy asked.

"Okay," Scott said.  "New plan.  Dillon and I will go with Ziggy.  Summer, you're with Flynn.  Don't take your tracking bugs off, and no one go in together.  Let's go."

"Wait, what?" Ziggy protested.  "I just got here!  What's going on?"

"Tell you on the way," Dillon said.  His hand landed on Ziggy's shoulder, there was a beep, and when Ziggy looked down he saw a little glowing circle attached to his jacket.  That couldn't be good for the leather.  "You got a pen?"

"Uh..."  Ziggy glanced around, but everyone was already heading for the door, so he ran after Dillon and grabbed something off the kitchen counter.  "Pencil?"

"Good enough."  Dillon paused by the screen in the conference room and put his hand on the wall.  His writing hand, Ziggy realized after a moment.  Peering over Dillon's shoulder, he realized the Dr. K decoder ring already had one addendum and Dillon was now adding another.

"Dillon!" Scott yelled from the garage.  "Ziggy!  We're not going out to lunch here!"

"Oh, yeah," Ziggy called back automatically.  "That's why we're stopping in the kitchen.  I've been out not extorting people all morning; I really worked up an appetite."

The list now included the phrase "you weren't chosen" and the translation "I hate to admit that I don't control everything in the entire world, so I'm going to make your life too miserable for you to notice."  Dillon had added another phrase beneath this one: "I can't explain that," and was in the process of drawing an arrow.

Scott appeared in the kitchen even as Summer's motorcycle roared to life in the garage, and Ziggy heard her and Flynn shouting at each other about helmets.  "Is this really important?" Scott demanded, as soon as he figured out what Dillon was doing.

At the same moment, Dr. K came out of the training arena with her head bent over a clipboard, and she looked up in surprise.  "Are you still here?"

"No," Dillon said, straightening up.  He tossed the pencil casually on the briefing table, pointed at Scott, and announced, "Your car has no backseat; we're not taking it."

"We're not taking anything at the rate you're going," Scott retorted, and Ziggy took a second to glance at the list while they strode out into the garage.  Huh.  Dillon must be pissed; he'd resorted to capitals.

Apparently "I can't explain that" meant "I don't leave the base because I HATE TO HAVE FUN."  Ziggy wondered what that was about.  Dr. K was staring at him, though, and he figured asking her was probably not the way to go.  He lifted one hand in a half-wave and escaped to the garage with the others.

Scott had taken his seat.  Ziggy frowned, but he slid into the back and his frown disappeared when he saw the box of lollipops partially hidden under the seat.  Not so bad after all.

"Is someone going to tell me where we're going?" he asked, fastening his seatbelt and digging into the box before Dillon could do anything crazy like... drive.  The way Dillon did.  "I mean, not that this isn't fun and all, but I've got a little glowing thing on my shoulder and Dr. K wasn't her usual font of admittedly incomprehensible jargon so--"

The tires squealed, and seriously, Ziggy couldn't tell if Dillon thought he was still driving in the desert or what.  He didn't lay out nearly as much rubber on the street, so maybe he was just making a point.  Again, not really getting the confrontational part of posturing.

"You tell us," Dillon said, over the sound of the engine as they shot through the doors.  "We all went interdimensional earlier.  Doc K wants us to go back to where it happened and use her special scanners to run tests.  Where's this flower shop you were at?"

"Okay, that doesn't make any sense," Ziggy said, but he gave directions around his lollipop and found some satisfaction in the fact that Scott was clearly more freaked out by Dillon's driving than he was.  He wanted to say, You think this is bad?  Try riding with him while he's tossing EMP bombs out the window.

When they pulled up outside Flowers Gone Wild, Scott was out almost before the car had stopped moving.  Considering what Dillon called a full stop, Ziggy had never been that brave, but he supposed fear affected people in different ways.  He scrambled to keep up when Dillon swung casually out of the driver's seat, joining Scott on the sidewalk.

"You guys stay here," Scott ordered.  "I'll go in first."

Dillon held up some sort of machine thing and waved it at him.

"That from Dr. K?" Ziggy asked, coming to stand beside him as Scott walked into the shop.

"Yeah," Dillon said.  "Monitors the tracking bugs."  He nodded to the glowy thing on Ziggy's shoulder.  "They're supposed to collect information or something."

"So, what, you're saying everyone ended up somewhere weird this morning?"  Ziggy tilted his head, then continued, "First off, I bet you didn't scream.  And second, weren't you and Summer... uh, you know?  Touring my old business route?"

"Yeah," Dillon said.  "That Jungle Karma Pizza place.  Really weird."

"Really?"  Ziggy frowned.  "They were always pretty nice.  I don't remember anything weird about them.  Except for the nice part, I mean."

"Front entrance is only handicapped accessible from the inside?" Dillon said.  "That didn't strike you as strange?"

"Huh?"

"There's stairs going in," Dillon said.  "No stairs coming out."

"Well, not if you--"  Ziggy broke off.  "Wait, what?  The front, you mean?  There are stairs.  I remember.  I was always tripping over them."

"Going out?" Dillon asked.

Ziggy nodded.  "Yeah, of course.  Who cares if you trip going in; you're falling up.  Easy to catch yourself.  It's falling down that sucks.  Especially if you have a coat full of money."

Dillon looked from his monitoring thing to his watch.  "Should have set a time limit," he muttered.  "Dr. K doesn't want us going in after each other; says it's too dangerous."

Ziggy couldn't help the laugh that escaped.  "Oh, that's great!  That's wonderful!  Something she thinks is too dangerous; I never thought I'd see the day.  I'm just going to wait in the car, okay?"

"I'm sure it's perfectly safe," Dillon said.  He was almost smiling.

"Oh, yeah," Ziggy scoffed.  "'Cause Dr. K is such an alarmist."

Neither of them said anything for a moment, and Ziggy was just congratulating himself for his wit when Dillon remarked, "Summer thinks I have a crush on her."

"Who, Dr. K?" Ziggy joked.  Yeah, he could see the Summer thing.  She was pretty and kind of full of herself.  She probably thought everyone had a crush on her.

"Yeah," Dillon said, and Ziggy blinked.  He had to rewind the conversation to get it to make any sense.

"Oh," he said, for lack of a better response.  "Do you?"

Dillon looked at his watch again.  "How would I know?"

"Uh, well."  Ziggy shrugged.  "I guess, you'd... like her, for one thing."

"I don't," Dillon said.

Ziggy shrugged again.  "I wouldn't worry about it, then."  He could never tell how much Dillon really didn't know and how much he was just pretending not to understand.  "Hey, want to get Chinese tonight?"

That was when Scott emerged from the flower shop, looking not at all freaked.  He sauntered over to them, giving the sky a casual glance as he did so, and stopped next to Dillon.  "Drier," he said.  "Somewhere south of here; the sun was higher.  And I'm no botany expert, but there were definitely too many exotics in there for Corinth."

Dillon handed over his little monitoring thing without a word.  Ziggy assumed the fact that no one had told him how it worked meant he wasn't supposed to have to use it.  He further assumed that the fact Dillon was now walking toward the store meant he was going next.

Scott didn't say anything else, just kept his eyes on the device in his hand as Dillon walked through the door.  Then he looked up, frowned, and looked down again.  He still didn't say anything, though, and Ziggy edged closer.  Maybe the thing would have a helpful "expectedness" meter somewhere.  On a scale of one to ten, how much were things going according to plan?

"Did my biofield disappear when I went in?" Scott asked abruptly.

"What?"  Ziggy stared at him, then glanced back at the door.  He couldn't see inside from here.  "Uh, I don't know?  Why, did Dillon's?"

"No," Scott said shortly.

Ziggy frowned, looking back at him.  "You didn't scream, did you?"

Scott gave him an incredulous look, and Ziggy held up his hands.  "Forget I asked."

The door opened a second later.  Dillon looked out, looked right at them, then turned around and went back in.  He reappeared almost instantly, though, and he shook his head as he came over to join them.  "Nothing," he said.

"Did my biofield--"

"Disappear when you went in?" Dillon finished for him.  "Yeah.  I'm guessing mine didn't."

"No," Scott said, but he didn't sound quite as stern about it this time.  "You didn't see anything, huh?"

Dillon shrugged.  "It's a flower shop.  Nothing strange about it.  No flowers I didn't recognize.  Same air, same light.  Same latitude."

"Who was behind the counter?" Scott wanted to know.  "Did you see a couple guys with vests?  Tall guy, glasses, slouches a lot..."

Dillon was shaking his head.  "No vests.  Woman with a headband behind the counter, curly red hair, gold earrings, 5'5".  Helping a short girl pick arrangements from a book.  5'1" with dark hair and pink highlights.  Blue shirt."

And that was Dillon summarizing.  Ziggy tried to watch what he said around Dillon because the guy could reproduce conversations word for word, and he remembered everything he saw.  Or at least, everything he'd seen in the last year.

"So," Ziggy said brightly.  "I guess I get to try now, huh?"

He absolutely did not freak out this time.  After all, he knew what he was walking into.  On the expect-o-meter, this was a 9.9.  Even when he almost ran into a woman with a giant basket of white flowers, leapt out of the way and was almost run over in turn by the tall guy with glasses.  The sloucher Scott had mentioned.  Wearing a vest.

"Ziggy!"  It was Max who grabbed his arm and maneuvered him through the madness, letting the two with the flowers get out while a blonde woman leaned against the counter and shook her head.  "Glad you're back, man--we didn't get your last name.  And a pick-up date for your order.  You said you don't want them delivered, right?"

"Honestly," the blonde woman said, tossing her head in a very Summer-like way.  "I don't know how the three of you manage to run a business."

"It's Flowers Gone Wild," Max reminded her, leaping up onto the counter and pulling out a binder from beside the register.  "Not Flowers Got Organized.  Sheesh."

"Um, hi," Ziggy said, waving at her a little.  He wondered if it said anything about Scott that he'd described both the men in the store and totally ignored the women.  Maybe she'd just arrived.

"Hi."  The woman looked him up and down, then shook her head.  "You're a brave man."

"Taylor!"  Max slammed the binder shut and whacked her on the shoulder with it.  Kind of hard, Ziggy thought.  "No scaring the customers!

"Sorry," he added, rolling his eyes at Ziggy.  "Taylor's just mad that she always has to order her own flowers.  Her husband's kind of..."  He pulled an exaggerated face that could have meant anything.

"Practical," the blonde woman snapped.  "Finish your order so I can show you what I want."

"What do you need me for?" Max retorted.  Fishing something out of his pocket, he dangled a keychain in front of her face.  "Go pick out your own flowers."

She snatched the keys, and Max added, "Make sure you write down the numbers.  You always get the names wrong."  She was already heading for what was probably the door to the greenhouse, and Max called after her, "Don't cut them yourself!"

"Can you do that?" Ziggy asked, curious in spite of himself.

Max just rolled his eyes again.  "Taylor thinks she can do anything," he said.  "Hey... your jacket.  There was a guy in here a few minutes ago, same design?  Red stripes instead of green?"

"Oh, yeah."  Some imp made Ziggy add, "Probably came to make sure I got the order right.  I'm kind of forgetful sometimes."

Max just grinned.  "Seriously, it's only flowers.  They think we can't do anything on our own."

"Tell me about it!" Ziggy exclaimed.  "You make one mistake and it's all, wow, how did you end up with a morpher?  Come on, man."

He stopped talking when he realized Max was looking at him strangely.  "What?"

"Did you say... morpher?" Max asked.

Ziggy held up his badge and shook it, but Max frowned.  So he pulled back his sleeve, and Max seemed to get that.  "You're a Power Ranger?"

"Ranger Operator Series Green," Ziggy said proudly.  "Actually the coolest one, no matter what anyone tells you about Red.  Can he teleport?  I don't think so.  I, on the other hand, can go anywhere!  Which, okay, doesn't always work out so well, but once I get the concentration part down..."

Max was still looking at him strangely, and he trailed off.  "Are you with the Silver Guardians?" Max wanted to know.

Ziggy stared back at him.  "The who?  Oh," he said belatedly.  "I'm not from around here.  Sorry.  I don't know all the local, uh, enforcement."

"Well, that explains it," Max said, shaking his head.  "So, your... the guy with the red stripes?"

"Team leader," Ziggy confirmed.  Who was probably wondering what the hell he was still doing in the flower shop.  "Which reminds me, I should go.  What did I forget earlier?  My name?  Grover.  Ziggy Grover."

"Right," Max said, opening the binder again.  "Pick-up date?"

"How soon can they be ready?" Ziggy wanted to know.

"I think Kendall's out straight today," Max said.  "Tomorrow okay?"

"Yeah, tomorrow's fine."

"Morning or afternoon?" Max asked, writing something in his binder.

"Morning," Ziggy said.  "When do you open?"

"Earliest pick-up is 9:30," Max told him.

"I'll be here," Ziggy promised.  "Thanks, man!"

"No problem."  Max waved his pencil as Ziggy backed toward the door, and the last thing he saw before he stepped outside was Max throwing the binder down on the counter and swinging his legs over to jump off the other side.

The wide street outside became a narrow Corinth sidewalk, and there was Dillon, arguing with Scott over by the car.  "Look," Scott interrupted, just as Ziggy saw them.  "There he is.  Okay?  No one has to do anything stupid."

"Sorry," Ziggy offered, putting his hands in his pockets as he wandered over to them.  "Had to finish my order.  Hey, was the second guy you saw in there Max?" he asked Scott.  "Blue vest, cool shark design on it?"

Scott and Dillon were both staring at him.  "You ordered flowers?" Scott demanded.

Ziggy looked over his shoulder, but yup, it was definitely a flower shop.  "Yes?" he said, turning back to them.  "Turns out our Ranger ID works in other dimensions, too.  Dr. K's pretty smart.  You think she ever considered a life of crime?  'Cause those credit things would go for millions on the black market."

"You ordered flowers," Scott repeated.  "I don't even want to know what Dr. K's going to say about that."

"You think there's an interdimensional exchange rate?" Dillon asked.

Ziggy's eyes widened.  "Oh, man, I didn't even think of that!  What if there's an extra, like, foreign currency fee or something?"

"Relax," Dillon said, smirking at him.  "It's not like they're gonna be able to find you."

Ziggy decided not to tell them that he'd promised to go in and pick up his flowers the next morning.

"So, the point here," Scott said, "is that when Ziggy and I go through that door, we go somewhere else.  Somewhere Dillon doesn't when he goes through the same door."

"Which I tried," Dillon added.  "When you didn't come out, Scott wouldn't go in after you, so I gave it a shot.  Same scene as before.  No you."

"Yeah," Ziggy said, "Max remembered Scott, but not you."

"I guess that explains how all these people can come and go without noticing anything weird," Scott said, watching the traffic on the street.  Passersby were giving them a wide berth, and it was hard to tell whether it was their jackets or the hulk of Dillon's car that did it.  "The interdimensional part doesn't work on everyone."

"It worked on me before," Dillon said.  "Why not now?"

"Maybe you're not special anymore," Scott said, pocketing the scanner Dr. K had given them and heading around the other side of the car.

Just for that, Ziggy thought, Dillon drove faster than usual on the way back.  Not that it was easy to tell, with the way he took corners--one speed was pretty much as bad as the next--but Ziggy was watching the lollipop box and he was pretty sure it didn't usually tip over the exhaust shield in the middle of the floor.  Scott wasn't quite as quick to get out this time... probably had to pry his fingers off of the door grip before he could get his seatbelt off.

Summer and Flynn were already in the training arena when they got there.  They were standing in front of one of the targets, discussing something that seemed to involve special powers and possibly Flynn's reflexes?  Ziggy didn't overhear enough of it to say before Scott and Dillon's interaction with Dr. K became more interesting.

She'd been ignoring Summer and Flynn, and she seemed perfectly willing to do the same to them.  She held out her hand, though, not taking her eyes off of the screen in front of her.  Scott put the monitoring device in her hand, but when he went for the tracking bug on his shoulder she finally looked up.  Just a quick glance from one of them to the other, and then she was eyeing the screen again.

"Keep those," Dr. K said.  "In case the interdimensional portals start moving around.  At least I'll be able to keep track of where you vanished, and we can send someone after you if necessary."

"You want us to wear tracking devices?"  Dillon sounded unimpressed by this idea.

Dr. K looked up again.  "What do you think your morphers are?"

"Don't tell him that," Scott interrupted.  "I've only just gotten him to start carrying his ID.  The last thing we need is a Ranger wandering around the city without his morpher."

"Actually," Dr. K said, glancing at the screen to her left, "the last thing we need is a Ranger being replaced by an imposter from one of these interdimensional portals because he wasn't wearing his tracking device.  And for that imposter to walk into the base, lower the city's defense shield, and invite Venjix for a tour."

Sparing them another glare, she repeated, "Don't take them off."

Dillon held up his hands, turning away, and Ziggy craned his neck to look down at the tracking bug on his shoulder.  Asking what to do when he took his jacket off didn't seem that important right now.  Especially if Scott and Dillon were going to leave, meaning that Dr. K was now glaring only at him.

"Busy now," she informed him.  "Goodbye."

Okay.  When he turned around, he realized that Summer and Flynn had already snuck off--how did they do that?--so he quickened his pace to catch up with Dillon and Scott.  Strength in numbers.  At least they presented multiple targets if Dr. K decided to hurry them along with cannons.

"You've started a trend," Summer was telling Dillon when he came out.  "This is new.  We were never allowed to put anything up by the screens before."

"Oh," Ziggy blurted out, as the doors closed behind him.  "I didn't know."

"Part of the deal," Flynn offered.  He was hanging over the counter, arms braced under him while he watched Dillon stare at the list in the briefing area.

The two lists, Ziggy realized.

"We get to decorate our space," Flynn was saying, "Dr. K gets to decorate hers."

"I'm going to start a list for you," Summer decided, hopping up onto a stool beside him.  "'It's just a wee scratch' translates as 'you won't be driving this for a week.'"

Scott, standing next to Dillon, laughed.  Turning away from the new list on the wall, he added, "Yeah, and 'could have been worse' means 'we're still alive, aren't we?'"

Flynn shrugged it off.  "I canna help it if I'm an optimist, now, can I?"

Ziggy squinted past Dillon at the piece of paper that had been carefully affixed to the wall beside Dillon's guide to Dr. K-isms.  This one had no visible tape seams, but the lettering wasn't as neat, either.  The heading read, "Dillon's decoder ring -- more precise wording for that which we typically hear."

Oh, Ziggy thought, it's on now.

A sideways glance revealed no expression on Dillon's face.  Ziggy did not in any way take this to mean that no retribution was coming.  He did assume that it meant he had time to read the whole list, because Dillon hadn't decided exactly what that retribution would be yet.

Dillon's decoder ring -- more precise wording for that which we typically hear

Call me Dillon.  -->  Stop interrupting my wallow with your pointless questions.
I don't trust you.  -->  Good morning.
You can't trust me.  -->  My only technical skill is knowing how to hotwire cars.
You've got to be kidding me.  -->  I am not clever enough to have thought of that.
Heard of it.  -->  Was pretending to listen just now when you said it.
Don't buy it.  -->  Don't feel like thinking about it.
Working on it.  -->  Oh, am I supposed to do more than stare vacantly off into space?
Bill me.  -->  I'm inexpressibly bored by my inability to keep up with your superior intellect.
I owe you an apology.  -->  (Yes, you did.  Thank you.)

Ziggy grinned.  "That's actually pretty good," he said.  Then he glanced at Dillon again and tried to look innocent.  "Oh... did I say that out loud?  I probably did.  I didn't mean to."

Dillon was still staring at the list.  "What does this mean?" he asked, reaching out to press his finger against the paper.  Under the last two words.

Ziggy checked, just to make sure.  "It means she appreciates your mostly sincere attempt to apologize for accusing her of being a Venjix operative?"

When Dillon turned that stare on him instead, Ziggy shrugged.  "Uh, I mean... I'm just guessing."

"I didn't say she was a Venjix operative," Dillon said.

"You implied she might be," Summer pointed out.  "It's pretty much the same thing around here."

"Never heard the doctor say thank you before, though," Flynn added.  "She's got a bigger audience now.  She's reaching new heights of sarcasm."

"All right, that's enough," Scott said.  "We're not mocking Dr. K."

"Not where she can hear us, you mean," Flynn muttered, and Ziggy turned in time to see Summer hide a smile.

"End of discussion," Scott said firmly.

"So," Ziggy said.  "That means it's the beginning of lunch!"  He rubbed his hands together and headed for the refrigerator.  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dillon follow--reluctantly, but he was drifting toward the kitchen.

Then Scott said, "Hey, give me that pencil.  I need to add something to Dillon's list."

Before he could go any further, Dillon leveled a finger at him.  "Just because your name isn't up there yet doesn't mean it can't be."

Scott grinned.  An actual grin, that wasn't directed at Summer or Flynn.  Wow.

"I'll take my chances," he said.

9. things you pick up

He hadn't expected to find Summer outside that night, on the side of the street under Corinth's hazy moon, but in retrospect maybe he should have.  Her motorcycle had been in the garage when he pulled out, alongside Scott's car and the monster Flynn drove, and maybe he'd gotten too used to being the only one awake in the small hours of the morning.  Their days were long and the schedule grueling--he expected to be alone during those few hours when the base was silent and the screens had gone dark.

He spotted her right away, though.  Leaning up against a light post, right where the folding sidewalk sign had stood during the day, her gaze swung toward him as his car idled into the space.  The Jungle Karma Pizza sign was still and unlit above the entrance behind her.

Dillon didn't ask.  He just opened the door and got out, coming to stand beside her.  His eyes slid past the sign to the stars, or what they could see of them through the dome and the ruined atmosphere beyond: a fuzzy blur of light unfocused by more than distance, dimmed by pollution long before it reached the city's self-contained microclimate.

He felt the air whisper as Summer glanced at him again.  "You wore your morpher?" she said, her voice hushed but skeptical on the quiet street.  "Didn't anyone tell you Dr. K can track those?"

He raised his eyebrows.  "Isn't the point of those tracking things that she wants to?"

"You wore your tracking bug?"  Summer sounded more amused than incredulous this time.  "Why?  Because she told you to?"

Dillon leaned against the other side of the light post, staring up at the dome again.  "Maybe you should clarify the chain of command for me."

"Scott," Summer said.

Dillon scoffed, and she heard him.

"In the field," she emphasized.  "When we're not taking fire, we all get a vote.  Scott's vote, your vote, they're the same.  When we are under fire, we need one person making the decisions.  That's Scott.  It's what he was trained to do."

"Trained by Dr. K," Dillon said.

"He was military before Dr. K recruited him," Summer told him.  "He knows what he's doing, Dillon."

Like he cared.  Scott's issues were Scott's issues, and Dillon was just as happy to keep them that way.  Happier, in fact.  If she hadn't made fun of him for listening to Dr. K, he wouldn't have asked at all.

Except.

No.  It didn't matter.  It wasn't any of his business.

But he couldn't forget Scott drawing the line this afternoon.  We're not mocking Dr. K, he'd said.  When Dillon questioned her loyalty, Scott was the one who confronted him.  He'd defended Dr. K when she was just a letter and a voice, and his behavior, out of all of theirs, hadn't changed since they'd met her.

No matter what Summer said, Dr. K was in charge of "Project Ranger."  Clearly, though, Scott's attitude made her job easier.  Dillon hadn't realized how much it mattered until just then: Summer was in this for Scott and Corinth itself, not for a scientist she barely knew.

He wondered briefly about Flynn before reminding himself that he didn't care.

"It's locked," Summer said a few minutes later.  "If you're curious."

He stopped staring at the stars long enough to glance at her, making sure she was still looking where he thought she was looking.  She was.  "After hours," he said, raking his gaze over the door to the pizza shop.  "Should have expected that."

"Oh, I don't know."  Summer sounded deliberately casual.  "You wouldn't think interdimensional portals could be closed."

Dillon shifted.  He knew that tone: she was going to break in.  He was trying to decide whether he wanted to help or not when she added, "Flynn thinks it's earlier where they are.  Time zones, if nothing else."

Three hours wasn't anywhere near enough to get them into regular business hours, but he couldn't resist asking, "He off on the other side of the city, then?  At Storm Chargers while his tracking bug says he's at the garage?"

Summer only shrugged.  "I wouldn't know," she said.  "He got the part he went for, so probably not."

"Yeah," Dillon said, "and you're standing out here in the middle of the night because you want a piece of pizza."

She didn't answer right away, but when she did the flippant tone was gone from her voice.  "You just got here, Dillon.  Some of us haven't been outside this dome in a year.  And you know what it's like: this may be tame and artificial, but it's better than standing under a sun with no ozone, breathing chemicals and soaking up radiation.

"A sky like that?" she added quietly, nodding at the JKP sign.  "We've forgotten what it looks like."

"Yeah, I saw it," he muttered.  "No guarantees it'll work, though.  I went into Ziggy's flower shop twice and nothing happened."

"Hey, I had to wait ten minutes for Flynn to finish bonding with Lion Guy 'cause I couldn't get into his place," Summer said.  "Maybe different portals are keyed to different people."

Just like that, it clicked.  Something Ziggy had said earlier, something that had been bothering him ever since: a coincidence that couldn't be.  "Lion Guy?" he repeated.

"Apparently there was a stuffed lion on the counter next to the register," Summer said.  "Flynn makes a joke, some guy thinks it's funny, and the next thing you know they're best friends.  I finally went in looking for him."

"But it didn't work," Dillon said.  "You didn't find him.  Just like Ziggy's been in and out of this place a hundred times and never noticed anything strange."

"Yeah," Summer said.  "Like I said.  Different portals for different people."

He thought she was joking.  His animal theory didn't make any more sense, though, so he kept it to himself.  He straightened up, sliding his hands into his pockets as he turned away from the building.  "I'm gonna go.  You want a ride?"

"I think I feel like walking," she said.  "Thanks."

Dillon shook his head.  "Call me if you need bail money."

He could hear the smile in her voice when she said, "Sure you don't want to come?"

He wasn't sure he knew the answer to that, so he settled for the obvious.  "Tracking bug," he reminded her.  "She'll see it as soon as it falls off the grid."

He thought if Summer was going to call him on it, she'd point out that he could just leave it here.  It wouldn't do any harm, say, stuck to the light post.  Instead she remarked, "Even Dr. K has to sleep sometime."

Dillon blinked.  The thought had literally never occurred to him.  "You think?"

She laughed like he'd made a joke.  "You couldn't prove it by me," Summer said.  "But we're not supposed to ask questions when the screens are off unless it's an emergency.  And believe me, doom on he who disobeys."

No one had ever shared that rule with him.  Although, like the "no posting things in the conference room" rule, there seemed to be plenty of things that he and Ziggy were just supposed to pick up.  "Right," he said aloud.  "I'll keep that in mind."

He had his hand on the driver's side door when she called his name.

"What did you mean," Summer asked, when he paused.  "Earlier, about the air?"

He'd mentioned air five times today.  "When?"

"Where did you think we were?" she pressed.  "The first time we went through the portal, and I thought we were back in time?  You said something about the air."

"That it was drier," Dillon said.

"No."  He could hear her frowning.  "That it was good.  You said, where else is the air this good.  And I said maybe we were back in time.  Then we got distracted."

You got distracted, he wanted to say.  But he had meant for her to be distracted at the time, and he wasn't thrilled that she'd remembered now.  So he just stared down at the top of the car and wondered where Dr. K slept.

"Dillon."  She was definitely onto him.  "You thought the strange thing about us possibly being outside the dome was how good the air was.  Not how many people there were."

He wasn't having this conversation, but he couldn't let it go.  Couldn't just drive away.  "Not everyone gives up just because they don't have a magical city to hide behind," he muttered, pulling open the door.  He got in before she could begin, gunned the engine before he could hear her reply.

The city streets were quieter at night.  He'd lost the mood for cruising, though, and he found himself following the ever-more familiar route back to the garage.  He'd closed the big doors behind him when he left, knowing there wasn't anyone up to keep an eye out in his absence.

He'd assumed there wasn't, anyway.  With Dr. K working and everyone else sleeping... except that Summer wasn't sleeping.  And apparently, Dr. K might not be working.  Where was she, then?  She didn't have a room off the garage.  He'd been in the training room late at night, too; she didn't sleep in there.

She couldn't sleep in the control room, could she?

Dillon wasn't big on sleeping himself, but he was pretty sure that no one as consistently thorough as Dr. K would take a half-assed approach to anything.  She didn't make do.  Making do was for survivors.  Dr. K was a creator.

So, not the control room.  Not the training room, not the garage, and not any of their rooms.  She must sleep on the base.  Therefore, she slept somewhere he hadn't seen. His first guess would have been the hydroponics loft--if he'd never met Dr. K.  Unified biofield or not, she wasn't the outdoorsy type.  If he figured she wasn't sentimental about windows, either, there were two options: auxiliary zord control, or the mystery space behind the back wall of the garage.

He left his car out front and strolled casually around the corner of the building.  The inside back wall didn't meet the outside back wall, and it wasn't lost on him that the space would share a third wall with the control room.  He'd assumed it was for storage... but it did have an exterior door.  A second fire exit.  One that couldn't be opened from the outside.

Dillon paused outside the blank door, the one with no handle or knob, and considered the probable latch mechanism based on a quick mental inventory of garage technology.  There was a light high on the corner nearby, but he didn't need it.  He pulled his ID off over his head, calculated approximate height, and slid it into the crack between door and frame.

He heard something click, felt it give.  He was probably one of the few people in Corinth who could apply the appropriate force with their fingers, and he took advantage of it.  Coaxing the door carefully out of place, he got his hand around it and eased it open.

Starlight greeted his eyes.  He blinked.  No vertigo, just a sudden sense of reorientation in the darkened space.  Shadows stretched, oddly gentle as they shrouded the walls and high ceilings, but the floor was full of simulated stars.  They were the only light in a room that easily accounted for all the missing space at the back of the garage.

It wasn't filled with equipment.

Dillon let the door close again just as carefully, holding the latch open with his ID until it was back in place to keep it from clicking.  She didn't look like a light sleeper.  Still.  She didn't look like a lot of the things she'd turned out to be.

He walked carefully back to the front of the garage and sat in his car for a while, staring out at the night.

10. useless gestures

Ziggy wasn't allowed to leave the base alone after the whole ghosting thing.  When he asked Dr. K how long he had to have a bodyguard, she said, "Until you being in trouble is no longer my default assumption when I don't know where you are."  

Before he could ask how long that would be, she'd added, "Or forever.  Whichever takes longer."

So he figured the next day wasn't quite long enough, and he made Dillon come with him to the flower shop.  And to the orphanage afterwards.  He dragged his friend inside, introduced him to everyone, and then spent a lot of the visit being astonished that Dillon and the kids actually seemed to like each other.

"You should come with me all the time," Ziggy decided, while they were getting into the car afterwards.  "I haven't had an uninterrupted conversation that long in... well, ever."

All Dillon said was, "You forget someone?"  He jerked his thumb over the seat, and Ziggy craned his neck to see that the pussywillows were still in their careful bouquet.  Kendall had thoughtfully added some little white flowers and something fern-like around the edges.

"Nope," Ziggy said, settling back into his seat.  "Those are for Dr. K.  Pussywillows are her favorite.  Never let it be said that Ziggy doesn't look after his friends!  Plus, I figure she deserves something for rescuing me from the cartels.  Not that I didn't totally have it under control, but, hey, you go to the trouble of cloak and dagger--well, cloak and sonic blasting cannon--you should get some kind of return, you know what I'm saying?"

"How do you know that?" Dillon asked.

"Uh, well, I don't want to brag," Ziggy began, "but I've been the one in the cloak carrying the dagger, if you know what I mean.  Nothing says thank you like a totally useless gesture."

Dillon shook his head.  "Okay, first, I meant the pussywillows, and second, that doesn't make any sense.  Don't--"  He held up his hand even as Ziggy opened his mouth.  "Try to explain.  Just answer the question."

"How did I know they're her favorite?" Ziggy guessed.  "Oh, that's easy.  I asked her.  It's too early for them here, but Max gets them for a friend of his, so he knows a supplier."

He paused, but Dillon didn't reply.

"Useful gestures are also good," Ziggy continued anyway.  "But I find that it's best to combine them with useless ones for maximum sincerity."

"Totally impractical," Dillon said.

He grinned, because he'd been right.  Dillon was curious.  "That's what makes them so great," Ziggy said.  "If there's no practical purpose to something, the only point of doing it is because you want to.  And a thing we do just because we want to is the most powerful gesture there is."

This received no response.  When they got back to the base, though, Dillon followed him into the kitchen and grabbed a tumbler off of one of the top shelves.  He twitched it back when Ziggy reached for it absently, asking, "Useless gesture?"

It startled Ziggy into laughing.  "No," he pointed out, "because it's helpful.  You're helping me do something I would have done anyway.  It's a nice gesture," he added quickly, "but it has a purpose.  It's not useless."

Dillon shrugged, but he put water in the tumbler and watched while Ziggy fussed over the flowers.  Ziggy lost track of him for a minute, and when he looked up Dillon was holding a note.  A note presumably meant to be attached to the flower arrangement.

For Dr. K, it said.  Love, Ziggy.

He rolled his eyes, but he couldn't help grinning when Dillon gave him an inquisitive look.  "I don't think it counts as a gesture of gratitude when you're making fun of me," he said.  "No matter how useless it is."

Dillon smirked at him, and Ziggy put the note in the flowers anyway.

It wasn't until he was trying to decide where to leave the tumbler that he realized Dillon was still writing.  On a full sheet of paper this time, and Ziggy sidled up to the counter to peer over his shoulder.  Dillon didn't make any effort to keep him from seeing the words "Ziggy decoder ring" at the top of the page.

He beamed, ridiculously pleased despite the fact that it was probably going to be a really embarrassing list and he wasn't sure he wanted to know what everyone thought he was saying all the time.  But just having a list was kind of like... well, at least it meant someone was listening, right?

Dillon held up the paper after only a single line, and Ziggy read, This is a completely pointless gesture -->  I like you a lot.  He might have read it too literally the first time, thinking that Dillon was in fact translating something he'd said instead of saying it himself.  But it didn't matter, because he got the gist.

"There, see," Ziggy said, pointing at the paper and utterly unable to suppress a grin.  "That's what I'm talking about, things like that.  That is a completely useless gesture."

"Yes," Dillon agreed, giving him a look that was kind of amused and kind of... well, friendly, in whatever way the word could be applied to Dillon.  "It is."

11. team meeting

"Scott."  Dillon caught him in the transition between training room and garage.  "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Now?" Dr. K's voice demanded.  She tilted her head so it was just visible around the monitor, frowning at them from the other side of the transparency.  "His training is over.  Yours is beginning.  Please be social on your own time."

"You know, you could take a break," Dillon told her.

She rolled her eyes and disappeared behind the screen again.  She didn't say anything else, though, and Scott looked as surprised as Dillon felt.  But he jerked his head back, away from the garage, and Dillon nodded.

"This doesn't make any sense," he warned, following Scott into the corner.  "But those interdimensional portals?  People on the other side of them have the same animals we do.  And some of them are Rangers."

"Wait, whoa," Scott said, putting his hands on his hips.  "Back up.  Power Rangers?"

"All three of the people Summer and I talked to at that pizza place were Rangers," Dillon told him.  "One of them was a tiger.  One of them was a wolf."

Scott frowned.  "And the third one?"

"I don't know," Dillon muttered, shaking his head.  "But that guy Ziggy got the flowers from?  He gave him a discount: one Power Ranger to another."

"And he had a shark on his vest," Scott said slowly.

"Yeah."  Scott might be obnoxious and cocky, but he caught on fast.  "And Summer says Flynn got to chatting with a guy at the store.  About lions.  Turns out they both have this weird fascination with the king of the jungle."

"Another Power Ranger," Scott guessed.

Dillon shrugged a little.  "Maybe.  Pretty big coincidence if not.  And if he is--"

"It's even bigger," Scott finished.  "Too big.  Look, have you talked to Summer this morning?"

Dillon didn't bother to lower his voice.  Dr. K probably had cameras on them even if she couldn't hear them from where she was, and if Scott was going to bring it up he wasn't going to be the one to avoid it.  "Not since last night."

"Yeah, she told me about that.  Guess who she ran into after you left?"

He folded his arms.  "Another Power Ranger?"

"Former," Scott said.  "Care to guess their animal association?"

"Bear," Dillon said.

"Bingo."  Scott glanced past him at the transparent wall.  "Dr. K needs to know."

She agreed, but of course it was the part about Summer and the Bear Ranger that made her narrow her eyes and summon the rest of the team to the training room.  Flynn always managed to look like he'd been working; Ziggy, just the opposite.  Summer was shrugging into her coat as she came, clearly expecting trouble.

"All right," Dr. K told them, "as entertaining as this myth about the morphers is, it's not true.  I can't track them around the city unless you're using them.  That's why I gave you tracking bugs.

"If you must leave them behind, for whatever reason--"  She glared at Summer.  "At least take your morpher with you.  You don't do the project any good if you're out there without equipment, even a phone that could be used to notify you of emergencies."

"Or to call for help," Scott added.

Ziggy shifted uncomfortably at that.  "Why are you looking at me?"

"Second," Dr. K said, "if you're going to do ill-advised things like walk through an interdimensional portal without backup or supervision, you could at least report afterwards so that I get some useful information out of it."

Summer raised her hand, looking more casual in her team jacket than Flynn did in his oil-stained shirt.  "I went through the portal at JKP last night," she offered.

"Yes," Dr. K said.  "So I heard."

Dillon's training was postponed for half an hour.  It was enough time for Dr. K to interrogate Summer, for the rest of them to get bored, and for Ziggy to start quizzing Scott and Flynn on laundry.  Dillon raised an eyebrow, but he listened.  People in Corinth had a significantly higher standard of cleanliness than he was used to.

It was also enough time for Summer to tell a typically weird story about a Ranger who had been waiting for her on the other side the portal.  The woman had apparently been expecting her, and she'd had some crazy explanation about animals and spiritual energy and balance, and every time Dillon looked away from the laundry discussion he saw Dr. K wearing an expression that said, Why are you bothering me with this?  

She'd asked, though, and she knew it.  So she listened.  So did Scott, despite his occasional interjections on the laundry.  Dillon couldn't help overhearing, and he figured someone would fill Flynn in later.

Ziggy would be his responsibility.  But then, Ziggy usually was.

12. phase two

Ziggy didn't think he'd graduated from phase one training so much as Dr. K had just gotten tired of seeing his face every day.  He started training more with Scott, anyway, and he got field orientation and a sparring partner who wasn't made of metal.  Both were a big step up, as far as he was concerned.

He also got a first aid refresher, a lecture on How Not To Abuse His Ranger Credit Line, and tips for sounding either mysterious or menacing.  As the situation dictated, Scott said.  Ziggy thought this was pretty cool until they came back to the garage one afternoon and he saw Dillon wearing a new shirt.

He stopped where he was, staring at the figure hunched over a piece of paper at the kitchen counter.  "You're wearing a new shirt," he blurted out.  Dillon had worn one of two shirts ever since he arrived: the one he'd shown up in, or the one that came with his uniform.

Once Ziggy had realized he was washing them "the desert way," he'd decided to get serious about learning the laundry procedure on base.  It was easy enough to toss Dillon's stuff in with his, and Dillon hadn't said anything.  Ziggy hadn't realized clean clothes were all it took to make him get something new or he would have tried it before.

Dillon looked up, then down at himself as though he'd forgotten what he was wearing.  "Oh," he said.  "Yeah.  Summer and Flynn took me to the..."  He gestured vaguely.  "Store."

He said it like it was a foreign word.  Which, hey, maybe it was.  But Ziggy thought there was something more important that deserved clarification.  "This afternoon?" he demanded, coming into the kitchen and climbing up on the stool beside Dillon.  "While we were training?"

Dillon shrugged.  "Yeah."

Ziggy tried to frown at Scott, but it was hard when Scott was raiding the refrigerator and paying absolutely no attention to him.  "I think my teacher needs to take lessons from your teachers," he grumbled, trying to read over Dillon's shoulder.  "Hey, are you making another list?"

"Help," Dillon told him, shoving the paper in his direction.  "You spend enough time with him; do you have any idea what he's saying?"

A Scott decoder ring.  Ziggy grinned down at it.  "A little," he said.  "A few.  No worries; I got it.  Can I have that pen?"

He was so distracted he didn't even notice Dr. K standing on the other side of the counter until she said, "And this is really the most productive use of your time."

He jerked up, startled, but she was already staring at Dillon.  "You got a new shirt."

"Hey, yeah," Ziggy said, grinning in spite of himself.  "That's what I said!"

"And this matters how?" Dillon demanded.  He sounded a lot like Dr. K there for a second.  "It's a black shirt.  It's just like every other black shirt.  I don't see what the big deal is."

Dr. K shrugged, turning her attention back to Ziggy.  "Ranger Red deems you fit for graduation," she said.  "Congratulations.  You've passed phase one training."

"Sweet!" Ziggy exclaimed.  "So now I'm like, a real Power Ranger and everything?"

"No."  She frowned at him.  "Now you're in phase two training.  You'll patrol with Ranger Red starting tomorrow.  Try not to be late."

"Hey, what about me?" Dillon wanted to know.  "When do I graduate?"

Dr. K gave him an obviously unimpressed look, and Ziggy would never know how she managed to glare up like that.  "Due to your physical and mental enhancements, you passed phase one training the day you began it," she said.  "As you know.  Are there any other pointless questions you'd like to ask me?"

"Now that you mention it," Dillon said, straightening.  

Oops, Ziggy thought.  She'd just hit the "challenge" button.  Accidentally or on purpose, he couldn't tell.  Dr. K wasn't great at manipulation--he didn't think she really understood people enough to use it effectively--but if there was one of them she could wind up every time, it was Dillon.

"Why don't you lock your door?" he was asking.  Which Ziggy thought was sort of a strange question, since the main doors locked automatically and the door to the control room didn't even have a handle.  The training room was locked whenever it was closed, too, and only their Ranger IDs would let them in.

Funny, though, Dr. K hesitated longer than he'd expected.  Like at all.  "It's a fire exit," she said a second later.  "Locking it would defeat the purpose."

"So put in a pushbolt instead of a deadbolt," Dillon said.  "Do something.  You know what's on our streets.  I don't get why you're not worried about anyone just wandering in."

She raised her eyebrows at him.  "Is anyone likely to?"

"It only takes one," Dillon told her.  "And yeah.  I think it's safe to say there's at least one person who could do it."

"Um, hello," Ziggy said, waving his hand between them and almost hitting the vase with the pussywillows in the process.  "What door are we talking about here?  Is it on the base?  Why isn't it locked?  Because I seem to remember a very stern talking-to on exactly this subject..."

"Thank you," Dillon said, not that he had any idea what he was being thanked for.  "A stern talking to.  That's what this is."

It seemed like a strange thing for Dillon to say, but even stranger was the way Dr. K just raised her eyebrows at him.  "Was that supposed to be a joke?"

"Was it funny?" he countered.

"No," she said, looking down at the list in front of Ziggy.  "Do you trust me?  I'm about to do something particularly reckless."

"Say what?"  Ziggy looked nervously at the counter, then at her.  He glanced at Dillon when the "something reckless" wasn't immediately obvious.  "Did I just volunteer to be target practice?"

"Ranger Red," Dr. K said.  She reached out to tap her finger on the counter, and her hand landed at the very top of the paper.  "I've observed that any mention of trust from him is usually a harbinger of reckless behavior to come."

"Why, Dr. K," Scott drawled, observing them from across the kitchen.  "I think I'm flattered."

"I think you're somewhat predictable," she replied.  "Do make sure Series Green learns something other than how to make his hair stick up and One Liners 101."

Scott strolled over to the counter, agreeing with confident ease, "On it."  It would have been the perfect moment for Dr. K to roll her eyes and continue on her way to the training room, but for once she didn't and Scott added, "After Summer, I can train anyone."

Ziggy tilted his head thoughtfully.  "I don't know whether I've just been complimented or insulted."

He could feel Dillon shrug at his shoulder without having to look at him.  "You've seen her fight," Dillon said.  "I'd take it as a compliment."

"I've seen her train," Dr. K countered.  "I'd be worried."

Ziggy figured that was probably good advice.

Dillon, however, stretched one arm along the counter and leaned on it.  Dr. K looked at him--they all looked at him, even Scott--and he smiled, just a little.  "Doc," he said, "was that a joke?"

She didn't answer, and Ziggy was trying to figure out why it was so weird when Dillon continued, "I'm just saying, it was kind of funny.  If that's the standard we're using."

"I believe that is the established criteria for a joke," Dr. K replied.

And just like that, Ziggy got it.  He debated just blurting it out for maybe half a second, but ultimately he went with it because if he didn't he'd never be able to ask Dillon anything again.  "Are you guys flirting?"

Scott almost spit out his juice trying not to laugh, and Ziggy figured that was a win right there.  He already knew what the answer was going to be, after all.  Even if the way Dillon instantly straightened said that the answer would be a lie.

"No," Dillon said.

Dr. K's look was no less surprised.  "Excuse me?"

"You totally are," Ziggy informed them.  "You, with your cryptic exchanges, and your fake fights!  Why didn't I see this before?  It's great; it's like a movie.  The two main characters are--"

"You need to stop talking," Dillon warned him.

"Fighting for totally different things," Ziggy continued, sliding off his stool when Dillon reached over to shove him.  "Until they end up on the same side--"

He bumped into Scott and scrambled back when Dillon got up.  "And, while wildly dissimilar in terms of physical appearance, academic interest, and attention span, they manage to bond over--eep!"

Dillon grabbed for him and he darted away, laughing.  "Their mutual disregard for others!" he shouted over his shoulder.  "Summer was right, by the way!  She was totally right!"

Of course Dillon caught him; the man was twice as fast and completely unstoppable.  Besides, Ziggy wasn't willing to throw down in a warehouse full of Ranger equipment.  Who knew what would blow up if you fell on it wrong?

When he found himself stuffed into Dillon's car, a lollipop in his mouth, he grinned and tipped the seat back contentedly.  Leaning across the driver's side, he flicked the lock, then pushed the one beside him too and put his feet up on the dashboard.  No way was he doing any more training today.

13. carry the weight of you

It was strange to come back to the garage and find other people in it.  Dillon was already too familiar with Colonel Truman, and he would have walked right past the man if Scott's dad hadn't stopped him with the words, "You might want to check on Dr. K."

Summer was at his shoulder, and when Dillon caught her eye they both changed course without a word.  Ziggy and Flynn had stayed to flank Scott, and Dillon could hear Ziggy's automatic protest as they crossed the floor.  "Why, what's wrong with her?  Is she okay?"

"I don't think she's been getting enough sleep, son."  The colonel's reply was secondary to the door opening, and he and Summer burst in, ready for--more soldiers, or shouting, or something.  He didn't know what they expected.

Not Dr. K quietly asleep in her chair, certainly.  But that was what they got.  It turned out that it was possibly the one thing they weren't prepared to handle.

They were still standing there when the rest of the team gathered in the doorway behind them.  "What's going on?" Ziggy said in a stage-whisper.  "Is Dr. K really asleep?"

"Shh," Summer murmured.  "She won't be for long if we all stand here talking."

"She should be in bed."  Scott's voice managed to be firm even when quiet.  "Dillon."

Arms folded, waiting for the rest of that sentence, Dillon was surprised when it didn't come.  He glanced at Scott, who nodded toward Dr. K's station.  Dillon stared at him.  "What?"

Scott raised his eyebrows.  "You know where she sleeps, don't you?"

"What?" Dillon repeated.  "How did this become my responsibility?"

"You said at least one person could get in," Scott said.  "I'm guessing that's you."

He eyed Scott.  "The whole point of the conversation was that it isn't locked."

"Guys, cut it out," Summer hissed.  "Dillon, we don't know where she sleeps.  If you do, now would be a great time to show off both your secret knowledge and all that extra strength."

They didn't know where she slept.  The fact that he couldn't even question that, given that he hadn't realized she slept at all, was enough to make him shake his head and stride across the training room toward her chair.  She'd probably wake up before he got there anyway.

"So, maybe this isna the time," Flynn's voice whispered, and of course Dillon could hear him, "but how does Dillon know where she sleeps?"

There was a long pause, long enough for him to reach Dr. K's station and for her to definitely not wake up, before Ziggy said, "Why are you all looking at me?  I have no idea.  He's Dillon; he knows all."

"Besides," and the smug tone in Scott's voice told Dillon he wasn't going to like this at all, "he was totally flirting with her the other day."

"Hey, Dr. K," Dillon muttered.  Ziggy wouldn't wake up for his name, but not everyone was Ziggy.  "You awake?"

She obviously wasn't, and she didn't look any closer to it just because he was talking to her.  Unfortunately, his words didn't quite cover Summer's stifled laughter.  He could hear Flynn's amusement too, quietly wondering who would flirt with a woman who carried weapons bigger than she was.

Dillon put a hand on her shoulder, and when she didn't move, he sighed.  He was going to pick her up, then.  She would wake up as soon as he did, and the best possible outcome would be her snarking at him and everyone else laughing.

Like it mattered, he reminded himself.

She was lighter than she looked.  Which was kind of disturbing, since she looked tiny.  But that ridiculous lab coat gave her an illusion of solidity that picking her up completely dispelled.  If he had to, he didn't doubt that he could carry her in one arm.

He didn't have to.  She was still asleep, for one thing, and if her never knowing about this was even a possibility, he was going to do everything he could to keep her that way.  If he kept both arms around her, he also had the very small satisfaction of glaring at the other Rangers and jerking his head to get one of them to open doors for him.

Summer responded first, coming around the corner and pulling open the door to the control room.  She looked so incredulous, though, that he figured it wasn't worth the effort of explaining.  He stepped past her, glanced around the little booth, and located the obvious door on the other side.

Seriously, they had never been in here before?

It didn't take a genius to figure out Dr. K's electronic latch system, and this door slid the same way the ones in the training room did.  The room on the other side was dark, but the light from the control room was more than enough.  It wasn't like she left stuff lying around to be tripped over.  Apparently.

He was looking down to make sure this was true when the floor disappeared beneath him.  He froze, taking a breath and a split second to confirm that he wasn't moving.  His eyes said there was nothing under his feet.  Every other sense in his body told him he was still standing right where he'd been before: on the floor of Dr. K's room, which had just become a very convincing night sky with no warning at all.

"Sorry!"  Summer's whisper drifted to him from the door, and he glanced over his shoulder.  She pulled an apologetic face, pointing at a panel just inside the room.  "I thought it was a light."

"Don't touch anything," he muttered, stepping carefully over the stars to the bed.  It was made--of course--and he was so not pushing this.  She still hadn't woken up.  He'd like to keep it that way.

He laid her down on top of the quilt covering her bed, pushing extra pillows out of the way to keep her head from being at an awkward angle.  She didn't so much as twitch, and it might have made him nervous if he couldn't literally feel her breathing.  He could also feel how warm she was... people got cold, right?  When they slept?

There was a blanket at the end of the bed.  He shook it out and let it fall over her, making sure her legs were covered.  When he turned around, it wasn't just Summer: the entire team was clustered in the door, trying to peer around her.  She pushed them back when he approached, shooing them away so Dillon could get out.

He left the stars on and closed the door behind him.  "Move," he said, when they weren't fast enough.  "I don't feel like being stuck in the control room with all of you if the base suddenly goes into lockdown."

That, it turned out, was more motivating than he'd expected.  He still had to face them all in the training room, but at least there were a couple of doors between him and Dr. K now.  If she decided to flip out about being carried around like a child, he'd have some warning that she was coming.

"We should keep an eye on her," Scott said quietly.

It was not quite the last thing Dillon had expected him to say.  But everyone else was nodding like it made sense.  Like they'd been thinking the same thing.

"She'll just go back to work when she wakes up," Scott continued.  "I don't know when she last slept, but I'm guessing it wasn't last night.  We'll keep watch until this afternoon, make sure she knows we don't need her for a while."

Flynn, too, was all business.  "Scott says there's another door?" he asked Dillon.

He just nodded, too surprised to speak.

"She won't use it," Summer said.  "The only reason she'd leave is to work.  She'd have to do that here."

"Can she, uh, access the computers from her room or something?" Ziggy asked, glancing at Dillon.

Why they thought he would know, he had no idea.  He shrugged.

"Doesn't matter," Scott said.  "We're trying to help her rest, not force her to."

Dillon didn't say it, but he wondered how many of them were thinking it: if the croc carrier malfunction was any example of what happened when she didn't sleep, he had no problem forcing her.

"You want us to physically keep watch?" he said, looking at Scott.

"Sit outside her door, yeah," Scott confirmed.  "If we're anywhere else, she could be out here for hours before we noticed.  We'll take shifts: starting now, an hour each gets her to almost six total.  Enough to make up for last night, anyway.

"You want the first one?" he added, no trace of a smile when he looked at Dillon.

He should say no.  He should say, why?  He should say he didn't care, that it didn't matter to him.  Because it didn't.  She was just a crazy genius who didn't know when to quit, and it really didn't matter who was outside her door right now.

"Yeah," he muttered, loud enough for Scott to hear.  "Sure."

14. deserving

The first time Dr. K woke up, she stepped through the door while Ziggy and Dillon were playing cards in the control room.  It was technically Ziggy's turn to "keep watch," but Dillon was keeping him company.  Or preventing him from poking at unlabeled buttons out of sheer boredom.  Probably both.

The door didn't get Ziggy's attention, but Dillon glanced at his watch and remarked, "That wasn't even three hours."  Without looking up, he used his other hand to point over Ziggy's shoulder as he added, "Back to bed."

The argument that followed was truly spectacular.  It involved a coldness that Dr. K usually reserved for actual incompetence and more swearing than they'd heard from Dillon in weeks.  Ziggy came very close to leaving, except who knew what would happen without a witness?

The most startling thing about the confrontation was that, in the end, Dillon appeared to win.  Dr. K disappeared again and Ziggy's hour was up before anyone heard anything else from her.  Dillon stayed, but he lost two games of Gin Rummy in a row before Ziggy took pity on him and switched to Go Fish.

The second time Dr. K woke up, Flynn came out to the kitchen to get her something to eat.  He couldn't promise that he hadn't left anything work-related open in the control room, but he'd changed the height of the chair so he could sit comfortably in it.  He claimed that alone should be enough to distract their fearless mentor with thoughts of retribution.

The real problem came when Dillon went out for a walk and realized that just because Dr. K wasn't in the control room, that didn't mean she was sleeping.  Maybe they should have watched the other door after all.  Especially if she was going to sit there next to it, head on her knees, a motionless target for anyone who wandered by.

He tried to get her attention before she snapped at him just for seeing her.  "Dr. K?"

"Please go away."  Her voice was muffled but perfectly audible.

He folded his arms, leaning up against the wall where he was and casting a wary eye over their surroundings.  "Call me crazy," he said, "but I have a problem leaving the head of Project Ranger alone in an alley for any passing nutjob to pick on."

She didn't answer, and he stood there for a long time.

Eventually she lifted her head, leaving her arms crossed over her knees, and told the space in front of her, "I was sorry about the carrier malfunction, you know."

No, he hadn't known, but he wasn't sure it mattered.  He shrugged.  "Things happen."

"Yes," she said, staring at something he couldn't see.  "The Venjix attack bot was more important."

That made him frown.  "Than what?" he asked.  "The carrier?  Or the people the carrier could have killed?"

"Anything," she said.

That was disturbingly obsessive.  "Why?"

"Venjix is the enemy," she informed him, like he didn't know.  "It went wrong; it's out of control."

"You can't control everything," he said irritably.  He didn't know how she got to him, every time.  "Hell, you can't control Scott.  Doesn't make him the enemy.  Things go wrong; it's not the end of the world."

Her tone was dark.  "Venjix was."

"The world isn't over," he growled.  "So it's different now.  Things change."

"You don't even remember," she said.  "You don't know."

"I know Venjix isn't the enemy because it's out of control," Dillon snapped.  "It's the enemy because it doesn't care.  We gotta care, or we're no different."

She looked at him for the first time, and he was startled to see the look of hurt that flashed across her face.  "I care."

"About what?" he demanded.

She got to her feet, turned, and let herself back into the garage without another word.  Without even a second look.  He stared down at the pavement that had been between them, and it occurred to him to wonder: how much had she given up to ensure that Corinth lived?

Why was she so alone that she could live on a base without visitors or vacations, without the people she lived with even knowing she was there?  Where were the people she'd worked with before?  Why the hell did someone who went to the trouble of handpicking the city's defense communicate with them through a faceless screen?

What did "K" stand for, anyway?  Did any of them even know?

Whatever.  Like it mattered to him.

He went back inside to tell Summer she could take off.  She looked up from her book with a smile, and he hung on the door as he leaned into the control room.  "She's not sleeping," he said briefly.  "No reason to wait around."

She raised her eyebrows.  "How do you know?"

"Just saw her outside."

"I thought she didn't go outside," Summer said, putting her book down.  "Did you tell her we want her to rest?"

"Yeah," he said dryly.  "I think she got the message."

Summer frowned.  "But she's not doing it."

"Not anymore," he agreed.  "You know what they say... you can lead a scientist to reason, but you can't make them give up their shiny toys."

Her face crinkled in amusement.  "Is that what they say?"

"It's what I say," he told her.  "Now."

"How did she seem?" Summer asked.  "Did she look okay?"

He gave her an incredulous look.  "What am I, her keeper?  A guy makes one joke and suddenly you're marrying us off.  What's wrong with you people?"

"Okay, first off," she said.  "You were the last one to see her.  Kind of logical to ask you how she is.  Second, a joke?  What did you say?"

"I said this whole team has mommy issues," Dillon grumbled.  "What does it matter?"

"It matters because Dr. K needs a keeper," Summer said.  "And if you're interested..."  She trailed off, shrugging.  "She likes you as much as any of us."

"She doesn't need anything," he said.  "Least of all other people.  And I'm not interested, so it'd be great if you could stop acting like I've fallen for someone I could wipe the floor with."

"Let's be fair," Summer said, clearly more amused than chastened.  "You could wipe the floor with all of us."

"Yeah, and I'm not falling into bed with you either," he retorted.  "I took a morpher.  It's permanent, so apparently you're stuck with me.  Don't make it worse."

"Oh, grow up, Dillon.  You may be moody with a flair for the dramatic, but you're not the worst teammate we could have had.  And you're pretty much the best Ranger Dr. K could have asked for.  Don't think she doesn't know that."

"I couldn't care less what she thinks," he said.

"Well, we care," Summer snapped.  "Hard as it may be for you to understand, Dr. K has been there for us since the defense shield went up.  We happen to like her.  So I hope you're lying to me right now, because if you're not?  Screw you.  You don't deserve her."

"No one deserves her!" he exclaimed.  "She's a fucking lunatic who'd destroy this city for the chance to defeat Venjix!"

He heard the door start to move several long hundredths of a second before it actually slid open, and why would he assume those walls were soundproofed?  Nothing else on the base was.  They had to be able to hear the alarms from anywhere.

Dr. K didn't look like she'd been listening to them argue.  She looked like she always did: hair straight, lab coat unwrinkled... no trace of the woman who had pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her head in her arms.  Or the sleeping girl they had been tiptoeing around for hours.

"Kindly get out," she said, in a tone that said "kindly" was an opener, not an adjective.  "Rangers are not permitted in the control room."

Summer didn't protest.  It was a sign of how badly they'd screwed up that she didn't even hesitate.  Dillon was forced to get out of her way, and Dr. K could have slammed the door shut behind them.  There wasn't anything they could say and they all knew it.  Closing the door might have offered some kind of symbolic satisfaction, though.

She didn't do it.  He didn't know if that made it better or worse.

15. charming and likable

When Ziggy screwed up, he apologized.  At least as a general rule.  He knew that wasn't exactly the standard among confrontational guys, but he figured that even if guys like that didn't admit it, most of them made an exception when it came to women.

Not Dillon.  He endured three days of punishing training sessions and utter silence from Dr. K at all other times, until Scott sent him on a reconnaissance mission outside the dome.  Overnight.

Ziggy kind of got it.  Scott was trying to do him a favor, get him away from Dr. K's unflinching wrath.  Give him some time where he felt most comfortable.  Dillon did okay in Corinth, but everyone in the city knew Ranger Black had Venjix technology inside him and his personality didn't exactly endear him to the population.

Summer was back in Dr. K's good graces--or as near to it as any of them ever got, as far as Ziggy could tell--after saying she was sorry for waking her up.  Dr. K didn't look at her, just shook her head and kept typing.  But that afternoon, a new piece of paper appeared on the wall in the briefing room.  It was titled Summer decoder ring, and it only had one line on it.

We happen to like her, it said.  An arrow had been drawn, following Dillon's original convention, from that phrase to an identical phrase on the other side of the page:  We happen to like her.

So Summer was forgiven.

Ziggy wasn't the only one to suggest a similar approach to Dillon; he overheard Flynn telling him that Dr. K had been called worse and wouldn't hold a grudge.  Dillon had told him flat-out that he wasn't apologizing for something that was true, and Ziggy winced.  Dr. K had probably heard that from the control room.

After the third day of actual explosions in the training room, which couldn't be good for it no matter what kind of abuse it was designed to take, Dillon was starting to look a little the worse for wear.  He did bruise, and he'd been cut when the suit failed and he was flung into one of the metal door frames.  He was still wearing his torn shirt, sitting on the floor with jacks and a bouncy ball when Scott knocked on their door.

"Come in," Ziggy called.  And as an aside, "Dude, you can count hundredths of a second and hand-eye coordination is practically programmed into you.  Why is this fun for you?"

Dillon took the question way more seriously than he'd meant it.  He was shaking his head as Scott let himself in, idly scooping up jacks and catching the ball without looking at it.  "I don't know."

"Hey, Ziggy," Scott said, nodding to him in greeting.  "Dillon.  You okay?"

Ziggy half-waved, but he got that this wasn't about him.  He wasn't surprised when Dillon gave Scott a weird look.  "Yeah," he said.  "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because Dr. K's beating the crap out of you in training," Scott said.  "I've told her to back off, but she just says phase three is about limits and endurance and finding out how far you can go."

"So," Dillon said with a shrug.  "We'll find out how far I can go."

"Yeah, maybe," Scott said.  "But if she kills you accidentally, we'll all feel bad.  Barricade activity has been rising for weeks and our scanners only do so much--we need someone on the other side to take a look.  You game?"

Ziggy expected Dillon to fight, to complain, to mock Scott for the suggestion that his precious city couldn't take care of itself.  But Dillon just shrugged again and said, "Sure.  You want me to look for anything in particular?"

"Whoa, wait," Ziggy interrupted, immediately recognizing the exit plan for what it was.  "You're just going to sneak out of the city, take a look around, and sneak back in?  Do you know how crazy that is?"

"Wasn't really planning to sneak," Dillon said, dropping the ball again and arranging the jacks into a geometric pattern in the seconds before he caught it.  Because just picking them up was too easy, Ziggy thought.

He disappeared that night, which kind of creeped Ziggy out.  Scott agreed when Dillon suggested that he could beat the solar shield by leaving before dawn, and the speed with which Dillon changed, packed, and drove off was a little frightening.  He took his morpher but left his Ranger uniform behind.

He also took water, gas, and food, and he woke Summer and Flynn up to say goodbye, which worried Ziggy even more.  Dillon never said goodbye.  But of all the things Ziggy could ask, he'd learned early on that "Are you coming back?" wasn't one of them.  He wasn't sure whether it was because Dillon didn't want to be committed to anything or because he was insulted by the idea that he might not be.

He wasn't sure Dillon knew either, if it came down to that.

So Ziggy didn't ask.  He just stood there by the stairs with Summer and Flynn.  Scott opened the doors, and Ziggy shivered.  All the screens were dark, most of the lights were off, and they were just standing there watching Dillon drive out into the night.  Alone.  It felt very wrong.

Dr. K didn't show her face at all the next morning, except to page them for things or to pass on reports.  The first time she paged Ranger Black, Scott told her he was on assignment and she didn't ask.  The second time, she wanted to know how long the assignment would last.  When Scott told her two days, she frowned.

"What could you possibly have him doing that would take two days?" she demanded.

"Exterior reconnaissance," Scott said.  "He's on barricade duty."

Dr. K flipped out.  Ziggy wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it.  "You sent him outside the dome?" she said, apparently dumbfounded by the tremendous failings of such a plan.  "He's riddled with Venjix technology and you sent him through the barricade again?  If Venjix doesn't pick him up Corinth will lock him out!"

Ziggy raised a tentative hand.  "He, uh, can't be locked out of Corinth, actually.  He fixed his morpher to amplify his biofield.  Makes him look human," he added, when Flynn gave him a weird look.

"He knows how to get back in," Scott said.  "The city won't have to lower the shield.  And if anyone can avoid Venjix, it's Dillon."

"Anyone can't avoid Venjix," Dr. K said sharply.  "In case it's escaped your notice, human influence on this planet is a rapidly dwindling island of significance.  Ranger Black is a key member of the defense that keeps this city alive."

Summer's tone was a little too dry when she said, "I'm sure we can manage without him for a couple of days."

"And what if it's not a couple of days?"  She looked angry, even through the screen.  "Ranger Black isn't exactly known for his reliability.  Even assuming he can avoid Venjix and bypass the city's defenses--an assumption I dispute--what makes you think he'll choose to come back?"

Ziggy didn't say anything, but he didn't have to.

"With respect, Dr. K," Scott said, "I think the time for questioning Dillon's loyalty has passed.  He's proven himself.  I sent him on an assignment that I fully expect him to complete."

"I want him recalled," Dr. K said.

"Can't do it."  Scott sounded so calm he might have even expected that.  "Radio silence.  It's for his own safety."

Which Dr. K should have known, Ziggy thought.  Or guessed.  She knew the barricade better than any of them.  Why would she ask them to send a signal that instantly revealed the recipient's location?

"Then go after him," Dr. K snapped.

"There's no need," Scott said.  "He'll be back tomorrow night."

"Look," Ziggy broke in, unable to listen any longer.  "We all know Dillon left because he had a fight with Dr. K.  And no offense, Dr. K, but you could... well, you could use a little help in the social niceties department.

"I'm not saying Dillon's any better," he added.  "Believe me, I know.  But you're not the one sleeping in your car tonight, either."

"He doesn't sleep," Dr. K said stiffly.  "And social niceties aren't in my job description."

"Uh, okay, I room with him?" Ziggy reminded her.  "He sleeps.  And you don't have to be nice to us when you're doing your job.  But you're not just our boss, right?  You're kind of our roommate, too.  Or our housemate."  He frowned.  "Our garagemate, maybe."

"I fail to see what my place of residence has to do with this conversation," she told him.

"Yeah, and that's exactly my point!" Ziggy exclaimed.  "We all live together, and it matters even though we pretend like it doesn't.  We should be able to get along."

"We 'get along' adequately to ensure the efficacy of our function," Dr. K said.  The quote marks were audible.

"Well, we obviously don't," Ziggy said, rolling his eyes, "because Dillon's not here.  We need him to have efficacy, right?"

She frowned, and he glanced over at Scott and Summer.  Scott had his hands on his hips and a neutral expression on his face, but Summer gave him an encouraging nod.  Flynn had slid out from under one of the cars and was sitting up, clearly listening.

"I'm not saying he's not, uh, a little hard to handle," Ziggy blurted out.  "Seriously, I get it.  But I'm not always the easiest person to live with, either--yeah, I know.  Shocking, isn't it?  And he puts up with me.  Therefore, I think we can assume that no matter what he acts like, it's actually pretty hard to piss Dillon off."

Dr. K's voice was flat with disbelief.  "So you blame me for this."

"Well, no," Ziggy said.  "No, not exactly.  I mean--yeah, kind of.  I get that he was a jerk, but you were kind of a jerk back, right?  And he's the one who left.  He broke first.  Isn't that how it works with the whole confrontation thing, you play chicken until someone veers off?  He left, so... you won.  Can't we just move on?"

Dr. K shrugged with what had to be studied indifference, as if the whole discussion was a waste of her time.  "I have no objection," she told the keyboard in front of her.

At least, that's what Ziggy thought she was looking at when she pretended to roll her eyes like that.  It was hard to tell when she was on a flat screen.  "Okay," he said aloud.  "So, great.  Moving on."

Maybe it wasn't really a win, but it didn't feel like a loss.  And the next day, when Scott held a secret emergency meeting in his room right after breakfast, Ziggy was invited.  His opinion was even solicited, and that had to be a first.

Scott wanted a backup plan for dealing with what he called "the Dillon and Dr. K situation."  In case separating them hadn't worked, he said, and they just reverted to smacking each other around.  It wasn't like they hadn't been there before.

When one plan didn't work, apparently Scott believed in trying the exact opposite, because he suggested a team movie night.  "You were right," he told Ziggy.  "It matters that we all live here.  If we at least got to know each other a little, maybe we could avoid..."

"Setting each other off?" Summer suggested impishly.  "Since no one around here ever overreacts to anything."

"Aye, we're a rowdy lot," Flynn said.  "We'll never agree on a movie, though.  Even if we did get Dr. K to climb out of her computer long enough to watch one."

"We'll agree," Scott said firmly.  "Whatever it takes to get her there."

"What, is it really bad?"  Ziggy looked around at them.  "What does she watch?  Documentaries?  'Cause those can be kind of cool if you..."  He trailed off at the look Flynn was giving him.  "Never mind."

"We don't know."  Summer, at least, was willing to admit it.  "What about Dillon?  Will he show, if we do this?"

"Yeah, of course."  Ziggy didn't even know why she'd ask.  "You really don't know what Dr. K likes?  Why don't you just ask her?"

"'Cause you're the only one she ever answers," Flynn told him.

"Oh."  He considered that for half a second.  "Really?"

They were all looking at him, so he guessed that meant yes.  "Okay," he said, unable to hide a grin.  "Well, I am extremely charming and likable.  I'll just go ask her, then."

16. reaching out for human faith

There was no one to greet him when he rolled into the garage two hours after sundown, which suited Dillon just fine.  Unfortunately, a white-coated figure appeared in front of his car by the time he turned the engine off.  She waited impatiently while he collected water bottles and lollipop wrappers for recycling.

The second he opened the door, she was in his face.  "Your morpher," Dr. K said, holding out her hand.

He just stared at her.  "You've gotta be kidding me."

"No."  She didn't budge.  "Your morpher, please."

He stripped it from his wrist and slapped it into her hand, frustrated and angry and two seconds from getting back in the car when she turned the little device around, and then around again.  Looking at it like she'd never seen it before, she asked, "What did you do to it?"

He frowned.  "What do you mean?"

"Ziggy says you changed it to make Corinth recognize you," Dr. K said, turning it over in her hand.  She might as well try to see through the casing.  "What did you do?"

"Nothing," he said defensively.  "Just cranked it up a little.  Doubles my field; doesn't hurt anything.  Makes the sensors read normal when I come through the shield."

"Dillon!"  Ziggy's voice came from the wrong door, but when Dillon looked up he was already bounding across the landing toward the stairs.  "You're back!  What, no alarms?  How did you get past the shield?"

"The shield," Dillon repeated, watching him trip down the stairs.  "The barricade is half a mile wide, and you want to know how I got past the shield?"

"Hey, I've seen you drive!"  Ziggy didn't appear to need an actual answer, so Dillon just watched him saunter over.  "You got here at the right time; we're gonna have a welcome back party.  Movie night in Scott and Flynn's room.  Flynn's making smoothies!"

"Why?" Dillon asked, frowning.

"What, right now?"  Dr. K actually sounded surprised.

"Yup," Ziggy agreed cheerfully.  "Right now, and you totally agreed, so no backing out.  Because you're our friend, Dillon, and we needed an excuse to take the night off.    Does that cover all the questions?  Good.  Upstairs, everyone; let's go.  That blender won't wait forever!"

With that, Ziggy leaned over and plucked the morpher out of Dr. K's hand.  "You can play with your toys during the movie.  Come on!"  He took a step back when Dillon went instinctively for his morpher, then danced away again even as Dillon realized what he was doing and stopped.

Glancing at Dr. K, he found her frowning after Ziggy.  "I didn't realize this event had already been planned," she said.  "I thought I was agreeing to a theoretical instance of... teamwork enhancement."

"What good is a theory you never put into practice?" Ziggy called from the stairs.  "You promised!  I even picked out the movie just for you!"

"What movie is it?" Dillon asked under his breath.

Dr. K only shook her head.  "I haven't the faintest idea."

"Well."  He was curious in spite of himself, and he had to admit that after two days in the desert, luxuries like fresh fruit and juice were sounding pretty good.  "I guess I'm not gonna see my morpher again unless I go."

"He does find ways to be convincing," Dr. K muttered.

"Any day now!" Ziggy shouted down to them.  "The movie's starting as we speak!"

"I did promise I would watch a movie with them," she said.  She looked perplexed, as though she couldn't quite remember why.  "I could return your morpher to you, if you have something more important to do."

"Dr. K watching a movie?" he repeated, and he knew he shouldn't tease her but he just couldn't help it.  "I don't think I can miss it.  Tell them to save me a smoothie, okay?  I'm gonna take a shower first."

"Of course," she said.  For once there was no sarcastic qualification of her agreement.  He supposed the fact that she had agreed in the first place might be sarcasm enough, but if there was a hidden message there it could just stay hidden.

He tried not to enjoy the water too much.  He tried not to think about how dirty his clothes felt after just two days, when he used to go months without worrying about stupid stuff like this.  Being alive was enough.  Everything else was just a distraction from the all-important work of staying that way.

Still, he couldn't bring himself to put those clothes on again after he got out of the shower.  Since Dr. K had torn his other shirt, he took the white one Ziggy had loaned him and figured if it was good enough to sleep in, it was good enough to watch a movie in.  He left his jacket behind.

"Hey, here he is," Ziggy announced as he walked into the room.  "The man of the hour.    Possibly the year.  You could have the next smoothie, except that I just spent the last five minutes making sure Flynn gets it right."

"Which is why," Flynn said, pouring the contents of the blender into a sturdy glass, "I'm more than ready to make something for someone else now.  What'll it be, Dillon?"

"Whatever you've got," he said, glancing around.  He'd been in the room Scott shared with Flynn exactly once, and never with everyone else there.  It was surprisingly user-friendly: giant entertainment system echoing the garage screens on the wall, a big couch and a couple of oversized armchairs between their beds.

"See?" Flynn told Ziggy.  "There's a man who knows when to let an artist work.  You're welcome, by the way."

Ziggy mumbled something that might have been "thank you" around the straw in his mouth.  He wandered over to the couch, where Scott and Summer were apparently waging a silent war over who had to hold the popcorn.  Neither of them seemed to be paying as much attention to the movie as they were to trying to sneak popcorn into each other's smoothies.

It was Dr. K who got Dillon's attention, though, lifting his morpher when he looked at her and waiting until he came over to take it.  "Thanks," he said, since it seemed like the thing to say.  She looked both larger and smaller than usual: her lab coat was bold and unapologetic in the comfortable room, but her legs were tucked up underneath her in a chair meant for someone half again her size.

"Your friend is easily bullied," she informed him.

He felt the corner of his mouth quirk.  "Yeah," he agreed, shooting a glance in Ziggy's direction.  "He's too nice."

Ziggy, who had lowered his smoothie and opened his mouth as if to protest, seemed to change his mind and beamed at him instead.  It was Summer who said, "There's no such thing as being too nice.  I think we could all learn something from Ziggy."

"Thank you, Summer," Ziggy declared, with perfect if somewhat exaggerated courtesy.  "But you know my role model is you.  Every day I ask myself, what can I do to be as nice as Summer today?"

"Not easy," Scott observed.

"But something to aspire to," Flynn said, chopping fruit with the ease of long practice.  "Dillon, you're na allergic to anything, are you?  Citrus?  Strawberries?  No, of course, what am I saying.  Never mind."

"No," Dillon said anyway.

He was sliding the morpher back into his wrist brace when Dr. K said, "I'd still like to know what you did to it.  And how you knew to do it."

Dillon eyed her.  "You told us," he said.  "You're explaining how they work every time we turn around.  I just cracked it open and expanded the bioenergetic link."

"Well, yes," she said, looking taken aback.  "I repeat myself because I don't think anyone's listening the--but you said you didn't understand."

"Did you just interrupt yourself?" Dillon asked.  "That's so..."  He glanced up at the ceiling, pretending to think about it before he caught her eye again.  "Not like you."

She made a face at him.  It was just a little grimace, but it wasn't accompanied by biting sarcasm and he thought maybe she'd given him that point.  It was harder than he'd expected not to smile.

"Hey, just out of curiosity," Ziggy was asking, "how come the nice guy doesn't get any popcorn?  I mean, I realize you guys are staging some kind of smoothie contamination ploy over there--"

"So what movie'd he pick?" Dillon muttered, hitching a hip on the arm of Dr. K's chair and slouching as much as he could.  He still towered over her.

"Apollo 13," Dr. K told him.  "Disturbingly apropos.  I don't know whether to give him credit for the parallel or be worried that a successful failure has now become our greatest inspiration."

"Hey, Dillon," Scott said.  "Want some popcorn?"

Ziggy squawked indignantly from the other side of the couch, and Scott just grinned.  "Dr. K?" he added.  "Popcorn?"

Dillon glanced down at her when she hesitated, and the look on her face convinced him even before she began, "Does it have--"  He straightened up and grabbed the popcorn bowl from Scott, passing it to her without a word.

"Butter?" she finished, studying the bowl like she wanted to run a scanner over it before she ate anything one of the Rangers handed her.  What did she usually eat, anyway?  And where?

"You can't have popcorn without butter," Summer said.

"Apparently, some of us can't have popcorn at all," Ziggy grumbled.

Dr. K took a handful of popcorn and thrust the bowl back at him.  Dillon assumed this meant he was supposed to pass it back down the couch.  The best thing to do would probably be to take it to Ziggy himself, since who knew what Scott would do if he handed it back.  It wasn't like Ziggy didn't have space to spare at his end of the giant couch.

"Scott," he said, shaking the bowl in Scott's direction.  "Thanks," he added, when Scott actually leaned around Summer and handed it to Ziggy.

"Hey," Summer complained, but she laughed at the smirk on Scott's face.  "That was totally uncalled for.  Just because you can't defend one little glass..."

"Speaking of," Flynn announced.  He came around the end of the couch with two glasses, passing one of them off to Dillon and holding the other one out to Dr. K.  "Here you are.  Enjoy."

Dillon lifted his glass in a silent toast, bypassing the curly straw Flynn had stuck in it for a first gulp.  "S'good," he said, swallowing anything more appreciative.  It was the best thing he'd had in days.  He did manage to add, "Thanks."

Flynn was trying to coax Dr. K into taking hers.  "Come on," he insisted, holding it closer like maybe she couldn't reach it.  "It's for you."

"I didn't ask for one of those... things," she said, eyeing it warily.

"Well I'm na gonna leave you out," Flynn said indignantly.  "What kind of a gentleman do you think I am?  Now, no one says you have to like it.  But if you like something else, I can make you another."

"No," she said, taking the glass with a frown.  "I'm sure this will be quite sufficient."  There was a brief pause, and she added, "Thank you."  It was hard to tell whether she meant it or not.

It seemed to satisfy Flynn, who went back to collect his own smoothie and claim the other armchair.  Dillon leaned against the arm of her chair again and asked under his breath, "What's Apollo 13?"

She stared up at him in a way that seemed to indicate he might be mentally deficient.  "Earth-moon spacecraft from the 1970s?  Exploding oxygen tank?  The crew had to abandon ship and fly home in the lunar lander?"

"Why are you looking at me like that?"  He didn't know whether to be amused by her familiarity with old space age technology or embarrassed that she seemed to think it was so obvious.  "I don't know what you're talking about."

"The United States had a space program," she said, very slowly, and he gave her a look.  "What?  You don't recognize Apollo; how do you expect me to know what you know?"

"Apollo was a spaceship," he guessed, shifting against the chair.  He sucked on the straw in his smoothie to keep from snapping when she rolled her eyes.  Like he'd been brushing up on his history since Corinth closed.

"A series of spaceships," she said.  "The thirteenth one went wrong: one tiny piece of bad technology.  The ship was doomed before it ever took off.  It was almost to the moon when the oxygen tank blew up, damaging the engine and venting air."

"Do you mind?" Scott interrupted.  "Some of us are trying to watch the movie."

Dr. K narrowed her eyes at him, possibly seeing extra training in Scott's future.  "Dillon missed the beginning," she informed him.  "I'm merely providing him with the background he needs to appreciate the remainder of the experience."

"No air, no fuel, abandoned ship," Dillon muttered.  "I got it."

"They wouldn't have had anywhere to go if they hadn't been destined for the moon," she said, but she lowered her voice.  "The ship they'd taken for their lunar landing had its own air and batteries.  But it didn't have a heat shield, because it wasn't designed for an atmosphere--they used it to steer their other ship home, then dumped it once they reached Earth and rode the first ship the rest of the way."

"Sounds dangerous," Dillon remarked.

"It was incredibly dangerous."  She sounded like she was about to say something else, but she didn't, and after a moment he took his eyes off of a screen that looked a lot less exciting than whatever she was talking about and glanced at her.

Dr. K was drinking the smoothie Flynn had made for her.  Intent expression on her face, pink curly straw in her mouth, she had never looked so much like someone who should be studying history instead of making it.  He looked away again, sure she wouldn't appreciate the sentiment.

He never quite made it to the couch.  He wasn't used to having so many people crowded around him.  He just couldn't see jamming in there with everyone else when he was perfectly comfortable sitting on the floor, leaning back against a chair that was easily as solid as the couch was.  It wasn't like he needed their constant commentary, either: once he realized what the astronauts were trying to do, he found the dialogue made more sense than the other Rangers' jokes.

Not that that was saying much, really.

They were all quiet by the end.  Dillon had made a personal deal with himself that the next time Summer looked over at him and smiled, he was either going to think of something really mean to say to Dr. K or he was going to get up and walk out.  That had been three smiles ago.

His only consolation was that the others seemed to be experiencing the same inertia, and it was, after all, more comfortable to sit here than it was to be annoyed with Summer.  Scott had apparently reached the same conclusion more than an hour ago, since the popcorn-smoothie war had run its course.  Ziggy was sprawled against the cushions, asleep, while Flynn was sitting forward in his chair like he could help the characters home through remote determination.

It wasn't until some reporter asked the astronaut commander about his flight experience, and the fear associated with it, that Dillon remembered what Dr. K had said about parallels.  He didn't dare look up at her--he'd swear Summer was watching their every move out of the corner of her eye--but he listened.  He listened to the whole story about jammed radar and compromised homing signals and no running lights in the middle of a huge, black ocean at night.

"I flip on my map light, and then suddenly: zap. Everything shorts out right there in my cockpit," the astronaut was saying.  "All my instruments are gone. My lights are gone. And I can't even tell now what my altitude is. I know I'm running out of fuel, so I'm thinking about ditching in the ocean.

"And I look down there, and then in the darkness there's this, uh... there's this green trail. It's like a long carpet that's just laid out right beneath me. And it was the algae, right? It was that phosphorescent stuff that gets churned up in the wake of a big ship. And it was leading me home, you know?

"If my cockpit lights hadn't shorted out, there's no way I'd ever been able to see that. So... you never know what--what events are going to transpire to get you home."

Dr. K leaned over the arm of her chair just then, taking his straw and stacking their glasses before replacing both straws in the top one.  She didn't say anything, and he pretended not to watch.  But they were all right there, in the same room, doing something that wasn't fighting for their lives.

It was as close to home as he could ever remember being.