Purple

Spores: Part Five

As entertaining as the situation unfolding all was, not moments after Jason went to retrieve Billy from straight up murdering a whole bar of hillbillies, Alpha picked up reports from the local police radio that a large toad-like creature was seen terrorizing a farm close to the trailer park. When Zack heard that, he immediately perked up. His mother was at home and her health was not strong enough to handle being startled by a giant monster in their yard. Or worse. Alpha tried to stop him, but Zack was the only available ranger lucid enough to make a dent. So he ignored Alpha's pleas to wait for Jason's return and teleported out.

He was suited up, his axe at the ready as he entered an old barn not even a mile down the dirt road that led to his home. He scanned the ground for any evidence, and found nothing but a bunch of feathers littering the ground. A chicken jumped out of its hiding place, startling him and knocking him back just a little bit. Other than that easily frightened poultry, there was nothing of note.

That is until he made it around back. There was a trail of what looked to be slime heading from a window of the second story of the barn headed into the woods. The trail seemed to be headed off rather than coming in. And it was in the direction he feared. Toward the trailers.

"Mom..." He said, huffing it as he began to run into the woods. He followed the trail as far as he could, but oddly enough, it stopped at the other end of the woods, right at the treeline of the far edge of the trailer park. He looked around, trying to see where a creature that size could possibly have gotten off to, but all he was met with was silence.

He stood, facing away from the trailers in case anyone was watching, and tapped the side of his helmet so that it opened up and he could see with his own two eyes rather than just through the visor.

"Alpha?" He said, activating the communicator.

"Do you have any of those like... sci fi scan thingies you can do?" He asked. Alpha's surprisingly sarcastic voice came through his earpiece with his response.

"Do you mean a heat signature?" The robot responded in kind, having already started a scan of the area. Zack just sat down and waited, whistling while he skipped rocks across the dirt floor of the woods.

After a few moments, red and blue lights swirled behind the android while he worked on his computer. Billy started to slouch, somehow feeling a little winded by the journey.

"I'm fine!" He said defiantly, shrugging off Jason despite coming to an understanding with him just moments before. Jason held his hands up and backed away as Billy sat back on one of the rising platforms of the command center and moved to see what Alpha was doing.

"Where's Zack?"

"Right here, buddy." He responded through the viewing screen displaying his vitals.

"That Terror Toad attacked a farm while you boys were out." Alpha nodded his little chrome dome as his conical fingers typed at the strange alien buttons.

"I'm doing a heat scan of the woods to see if I can pick it up."

Jason pursed his lips as he looked over the screen, watching it zoom out to a general map of the area. There was a black dot where Zack was. No yellow for Trini. Whatever goop that frog had her in must be jamming the signal. Slowly, small red dots began to heat up all over the map, showing small patches of wildlife. Nothing too big. Likely deer or foxes. Maybe even a bear.

"There's so many animals out there, how will we know the right one?" Jason asked. Alpha gave a little laugh and nodded his cylindrical head once more.

"Ooooh boy. You'll know."

"Amphibians are cold-blooded, dumbass. If it shows up it'll be a massive cold spot. God." Billy hissed from where he sat. Good to know that even with the bad attitude, he was still the smartest person in the room.

"Ding ding ding!" Alpha agreed. Still as they watched the map, nothing was happening.

"Can I go now? I'm so booooored." Kim's voice rang out from the cage in the background.

"And why does he get to be out there?"

Jason was going to respond but then Billy slouched over. When he looked up Kim also was looking a little pale.

"These spores... they don't just affect their behavior do they?" Jason asked, looking up at the moving wall. Zordon materialized and assessed his rangers, a stern look on that giant face.

"It's also a slow acting poison. I did not tell you initially because panicking could cause it to react faster. I've seen it take a few days but from what Kimberly said they received a pretty large dose."

Jason was suddenly annoyed, but all his focus was on Billy at this moment. He was about tired of Zordon keeping secrets. They had been rangers for a few months now and he still felt like he hadn't earned his trust. They would have a talk. But later. There were more important things now.

"Let's find this damn frog." He said, turning back to the screen, taking a more proactive approach and activating the touch screen himself. He moved the screen about a few more times, but still nothing was coming up.

"Dammit!" He shouted, gripping fistfuls of his hair.

As soon as he turned away, a small beeping started on the screen. Suddenly the area on the map immediately behind Zack was turning blue. It was fast and it was large.

"Zack turn around!" Jason shouted. Zack could only hear garbled noise.

"What?" He said, standing up and holding his fingers to his ears to see if that made a difference in the sound quality.

"The toad! It's there!" He shouted. Still, all Zack heard was feedback. That was when the shadow grew over him. He turned around, looking straight into the serrated jaws of the terrifying gelatinous creature.

Then the line went dead.

Jason's eyes narrowed. He didn't even give Alpha or Zordon a heads up. In a flash of red light, he faded away. Jason was gonna get that damn horn and save his friends. All of them. With or without Zordon's approval.