Disclaimer: I blame Saban for the two-day study break that got this written during finals.

Second Chance
by Starhawk

The first thing Carlos was aware of was light. The next was the distinctive sound of atmospheric entry--usually only a dimly felt whisper, the noise assaulting his ears was now a muted roar.

Blinking against the brightness, he struggled to move. It was only then that he realized he was lying down, and that his arms and legs were not responding as they should.

The feel of the decking beneath him registered then, and he concluded that he was on the floor. Bringing the walls into focus with an effort, it was a moment before he recognized them. It wasn’t often that he was belowdecks on the Megaship, and never had he had the dubious thrill of waking up there.

*What the--* His first coherent thought cut off as the deck trembled below him. It stabilized briefly, then started to shake with more insistence.

*This is not good,* Carlos decided, trying again to bring his body into at least a sitting position.

This time his limbs responded, albeit sluggishly, and he managed to haul himself up against the wall. No sooner did he get to his feet, however, than the Megaship *hit* something--hard, from the way the ship groaned around him.

Thrown to his knees again, he thought he could feel something grinding against the hull before the ship shuddered to a halt. *Andros’s landings could use some work,* he thought wryly, wondering what could possibly be happening to cause such a rough set-down.

He looked automatically for his communicator, but it wasn’t on his wrist where it should have been. *Not that it would help anyway,* he remembered suddenly, glancing over to where it lay beside the fracture repair kit. *It quit working about five minutes after the shields went down... and then there was that hull breach--*

Ashley. Ashley had been belowdecks with him. The bulkheads had protected him from the vacuum of space--but where was she?

He clambered to his feet once again, driven by worry for her and a growing sense of concern for the condition of the Megaship. How could they have been fired on inside the damping field? Where were they now? And what had happened to the others...

Force of habit made Carlos retrieve his communicator before doing anything else. When he tried to fasten it around his wrist, though, he found that his fingers weren’t responsive enough to manage the clasp. After several seconds, he gave up and held it in his hand as he surveyed his surroundings.

The red light on DECA’s camera caught his eye, and he was surprised she hadn’t spoken yet. "DECA?" he asked.

The light blinked at him, but no other response was forthcoming. *Audio response must be disabled,* he thought, staring at the camera a moment longer before turning his attention to the nearest bulkhead.

The first thing to do was to get out of here, and find a way to contact the others. Since his communicator wasn’t working, he didn’t want to count on teleportation. That left the lift system, which was on the other side of what was probably two or three consecutive bulkheads.

Just as he reached the closest one, though, there was a banging on the other side, and he let out a sigh of relief. He wouldn’t have to go after the others--they had found him.

His fingers obeyed his commands at last and curled into a fist, which he promptly used to pound a couple times on the bulkhead. There was an answering knock, followed by silence, and then the welcome sound of grinding metal as the bulkhead lifted away from the floor.

Cassie stood on the other side, a smile on her face as she greeted him. "I’m glad to see you moving around," she told him. "It took you longer than DECA thought it should for you to wake up."

"Yeah, well," Carlos answered, "suffocating will do that to a person." He could call to mind in vivid detail what it had felt like to breath and breath with no effect, and he suspected it would be the stuff his nightmares were made of for the next few nights.

Cassie expression was concerned. "Will you be all right?" she asked. "At least for the next few minutes? We’ll have DECA check you out, but Andros and TJ may need some help getting to Ashley first..."

"Yeah," he said, managing what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "I’ll be fine--"

His gaze slid past Cassie, catching sight of the person standing in the shadows behind her for the first time. His eyes widened, and he could only stare at the figure he had seen so briefly the day before. Not that he hadn’t seen the Phantom Ranger on many occasions--but the person who stood with them now was not morphed, and his true form was far less familiar and completely unexpected.

Nonetheless, Carlos managed to drag his attention back to Cassie. Phantom had offered no explanation, had not spoken at all, even, so Carlos refrained from comment or question on his appearance. "What happened?" he asked instead, locking gazes with his teammate. "All I know is that the hull breached close enough that most of the air got out before the bulkheads came down."

Cassie nodded, stepping backward and motioning for him to follow. He did so, and Phantom flowed ahead of them, his dark clothing blending into the dim illumination of the lower decks.

"We don’t know exactly how it happened," Cassie said over her shoulder, "but somehow the fleet outside the damping field got a target lock on us. With our shields down, they breached the hull twice before we escaped into the gateway."

"The gateway?" Carlos interrupted, ducking under a bulkhead that hadn’t lifted all the way. "I thought it took some pretty careful calculations to use those things."

Cassie shrugged, and he saw her glance after Phantom. "I don’t think we did it quite right, but we didn’t have a lot of choice. We ended up crash-landing here--wherever ‘here’ is."

"And Ashley?" he asked, assuming from her earlier comments that everyone else was all right.

"You and she were the only ones we couldn’t reach," Cassie answered, stepping around a panel that must have blown out when the atmosphere rushed into the void of space. "DECA found you, but a couple of her cameras were damaged by the decompression, and she couldn’t get a visual for Ashley. TJ and Andros are looking for her now."

"Her morpher--" He stopped. Ashley had been having the same problem with her communicator that he had; there was no way they could use it to teleport her out of wherever she was.

"Not working," Cassie finished for him, and he nodded.

There was a hissing sound that came from somewhere just ahead, and as the three of them rounded the corner they saw Andros removing his morpher from the access panel beside another bulkhead. The scrape of metal signaled his success, and one more bulkhead inched away from the floor.

Eyes fixed on the scanner in his hand, Andros didn’t even look up as Carlos, Cassie, and Phantom joined TJ. He started forward before the hallway had completely cleared, glancing up and straight ahead as he strode down the narrow corridor. "She’s on the other side of that bulkhead," he said, pointing with the scanner.

The five of them hurried after him, and Carlos found himself holding his breath as Andros pressed his morpher to the access panel. The indicator light flashed green--but the bulkhead didn’t move.

"Let me try," TJ said, stepping forward. He pulled his own morpher off his wrist and touched it to the panel. The light didn’t change, but he had no more luck than Andros had.

"Step back, TJ," Andros ordered, flipping the catch on his morpher open. "I’ve had enough of this."

He hit three numbers in succession, the holographic gold lighting the hallway. The last button cause a flash of blinding crimson, and a fully morphed Red Ranger stood in Andros’s place.

Unholstering his astroblaster, Andros stepped back himself and sited down the barrel. Before anyone could say a word, he fired on the access panel. A cascade of sparks burst outward, and the bulkhead shifted a little.

Andros fired again, and the bulkhead lifted a few centimeters off the floor. Carlos could only watch in amazement. There was no reason for that to work on the Megaship--only Andros’s sheer frustration had made him try. But it *had* worked, and none of them were going to question it.

Leaping forward, Carlos helped pry the bulkhead farther from the deck. It was about a meter off the ground when Andros refused to wait any longer. He dove underneath, his Ranger uniform disappearing in a shower of sparkles as he did so.

Cassie followed immediately, and Carlos glanced over at TJ. The Blue Ranger just shrugged, and they both gave in and let go of the bulkhead. Crouching down, Carlos ducked underneath with TJ, noting out of the corner of his eye that Phantom had done the same.

Ashley’s prone form was a good thirty meters down the corridor, much closer to the next bulkhead than this one, but Andros and Cassie were already at her side. Carlos ran to join them, and heard TJ hard on his heels. The two of them knelt beside their fallen teammate, looking her over for obvious injuries, and finding, to their relief, that she appeared unscarred.

She was unconscious, however, and Andros did not look relieved. He gripped her hand tightly in one of his, staring down at her face. "Come on, Ashley," Carlos heard him whisper. "Don’t do this to me."

Cassie reached for her friend’s other hand, and placed one finger on her wrist. Carlos caught her eye, and she nodded--Ashley’s pulse was good. If he looked closely, he could see the rise and fall of her chest, which comforted him as much as anything.

TJ had the scanner Andros had been using earlier, and it was aimed at Ashley. "She should be fine, according to this," he reported quietly. "I don’t understand why she’s not awake."

"Carlos didn’t wake up right away either," Cassie pointed out, glancing over at him. She didn’t continue with that thought, though, and none of them wanted to be the one to point out the obvious flaw in it--Carlos was awake *now*, while Ashley remained unresponsive.

"Ashley," Andros murmured again, smoothing her hair away from her pale face. The gesture surprised Carlos, who had never expected Andros to display his affection so openly. As he studied their leader more closely, he was even more startled to see tears shining in the Red Ranger’s eyes.

"Don’t you dare go comatose on us, Ashley Hammond," Cassie said suddenly, sternly, as she looked from her friend to Andros. "Look at this place--do you understand how much work we’re going to have to do to get the Megaship back together?"

"Yeah," TJ agreed, joining in the spirit of the teasing with an ease Carlos envied. "No shirking, Ash."

The yellow-clad girl didn’t move, but the weak smile on Andros’s face said he appreciated their attempt at humor. "You’ve never been one to avoid what needed to be done," he told her quietly, adding his own gentle rebuke to theirs. "There’s a lot of unfinished business around here, Ash--you have to wake up."

Ashley’s fingers twitched, and her head moved a little on the deck. Andros put his hands behind her shoulders and squirmed closer, lifting her head into his lap. Again, Carlos was surprised at his actions, but Cassie didn’t seem fazed.

Reaching across her friend’s body, she touched Andros’s arm to get his attention. "Keep talking," she urged him quietly. "She’s responding to you."

He swallowed, then nodded his understanding. "Ash," Andros said, his voice perfectly audible to all of them in the silence of the damaged corridor, "you can’t stay like this. There’s too much still to do--we need you. *I* need you."

If Carlos had doubted at first, those last three words convinced him that Andros wasn’t talking about the ship anymore--if he ever had been. Watching the leader he had come to admire in life as well as in battle, the Black Ranger saw a single tear escape Andros’s control and trickle down his cheek.

"I should have told you this morning," he whispered, staring at Ashley’s closed eyes as though there was no one but the two of them within hearing distance. "I’m sorry I was too scared to do it then--I regret it more than anything now."

Hearing Andros admit to being scared, Carlos was beyond surprise. His respect for the Red Ranger was increasing with every minute, but he couldn’t help but feel that they were all overhearing something that wasn’t any of their business.

That suspicion was confirmed with Andros’s next words. Ignoring the other Rangers, he touched her face gently, and spoke in a soft tone that nonetheless carried clearly to everyone assembled. "I love you, Ashley."

An intangible weight lifted from Carlos’s shoulders as he watched Andros. The Red Ranger’s face was serious and completely open as he looked down at Ashley. *He really does,* Carlos thought. *He really does love her... and I think he would do anything right now to be able to let her know.*

He owed Ashley an apology. She had been right when she said Andros would never do anything to hurt her--he could see it in the Red Ranger’s expression. They truly did have something special between them, and while Carlos might not have been wrong to question it, he *had* been wrong not to trust her.

She stirred, and Andros leaned forward. "Ashley?" he asked, his tone hopeful and apprehensive at the same time. And no wonder--he had just confessed his love to all and sundry, without knowing what her reaction would be if she heard.

Ashley’s eyelids fluttered open, and Carlos heard a collective sigh of relief from all of the Rangers. Cassie was beaming at her friend, but she only had eyes for Andros.

"I could hear you, talking to me," she murmured, staring up at him. "From a long way away... it was almost as though you called me back."

"As long as you *are* back," Andros said fiercely, squeezing her shoulders.

"What--" She struggled to speak. "What did you say, just a second ago?"

 Andros hesitated, but having decided to do something, he did it all the way. "I said I love you," he told her, not looking away from her face. "I think that I’ve loved you for a long time without realizing it, and I didn’t want you to go any longer without knowing."

Carlos couldn’t help but be impressed by Andros’s courage. He found himself waiting along with everyone else, Andros included, for Ashley’s reply.

She put her hand over his, smiling up at him. Her eyes shone, whether with unshed tears or sheer happiness or a combination of the two, Carlos couldn’t tell, and she whispered, "I love you too, Andros."

Carlos fought back an insane urge to cheer, and saw TJ doing the same thing. Cassie had less restraint; she actually clapped her hands together before she realized what she was doing. Hanging her head, she apologized, "Sorry, guys. But you’re just so sweet..."

She sighed, and TJ laughed at her. "This isn’t a soap opera, Cass."

"Not that you’d know it," Carlos added.

Andros was blushing, and Ashley giggled. "Power Rangers in Love," she murmured. "I can see it now... Wouldn’t that make a great TV show?"

"No!" Andros exclaimed, echoed by TJ and Carlos.

Ashley just giggled again, and Andros shifted. "You need to get to the Medical bay," he told her firmly.

"What, are you afraid you’d be cast in the lead role?" she teased, and a smile crept across his face before he could hide it.

Seeing that Andros could sit there, smiling at Ashley, for most of the afternoon, Carlos intervened. "You really should get DECA to check you out, Ash. Just to make sure you’re all right."

Cassie snorted. "You’re not one to talk, Carlos. You were in pretty much the same situation a few minutes ago, remember?"

He opened his mouth to argue, but Cassie had that look in her eye, so he just sighed. "I’ll get checked out if Ashley does," he offered, knowing Ashley wouldn’t escape a trip to the Medical bay anyway.

Cassie nodded, and beside her, TJ got to his feet. He proffered a hand, which she took, turning to help Ashley up once she was standing. Carlos stepped out of the way as Andros helped her up from the other side, and reached out instinctively as she swayed.

Andros caught her arm, frowning. "Are you all right?"

She nodded, but the way she held one hand out in front of her as though she weren’t quite sure what she’d hit gave her away. "Just a little dizzy."

Andros’s frown deepened. Holding up his hand, he asked, "How many fingers?"

Ashley sighed. "That’s silly, Andros."

Carlos raised an eyebrow. "Answer the question, Ash."

With another sigh, she squinted at his hand, and Andros shook his head. "You’ve got a concussion." He took hold of her arm again and tugged gently. "Come on; we’re taking you to the Medical bay right now."

The fact that she went to follow without complaint alarmed Carlos as much as the way she stumbled when she tried to lift her feet. He was at her other side in a second, catching her arm and resisting the temptation to put his arm around her waist to support her. Andros did that, and between the two of them, she could balance well enough to walk.

Cassie and TJ hovered at the edges of Carlos’s vision, and Phantom melted out of their way as they moved slowly back toward the half-raised bulkhead. "Wait," Ashley said suddenly, dragging her feet and turning her head to follow Phantom’s movements.

Carlos looked in his direction as well. To tell the truth, he had forgotten the mysterious Ranger was there--but Ashley’s confusion ran deeper than that.

Giving the other a puzzled look, she asked, "Who are you?"

Everyone’s gaze on him, he hesitated only briefly before stepping forward. "You know me as the Phantom Ranger," he said quietly, his hand reaching for the ruby pendant he wore on a chain around his neck.

For an instant, his armor flickered into view, surrounding him and removing any trace of individual identity. Then the visor turned to the side, glancing away from Ashley. The uniform vanished again, and Carlos realized he had been looking straight at Cassie.

"Oh," Ashley said at last, breaking the silence. "Well... It’s nice to meet you."

Carlos had to admit that that seemed the appropriate response. But no further reaction was possible, as Andros’s communicator beeped insistently.

He raised his left hand, but his right was still supporting Ashley. Before he could do move, Ashley freed her own left hand and tapped his communicator for him. He gave her a startled smile, then addressed his wristpiece. "This is Andros."

"Andros!" Alpha’s incessantly "up" voice came back. "DECA’s detecting an interdimensional distortion nearby!"

"What?" Carlos exclaimed, exchanging glances with Cassie and then TJ.

"It’s probably a scanner malfunction," TJ offered. "We took some major damage in that last attack."

"Still," Andros put in, "someone should check it out." His arm around Ashley, he hesitated for the first time all morning.

"I’ll go," TJ volunteered, suiting actions to words before anyone could protest.

Phantom started after him, but Cassie stopped him with two words. "No way," she said firmly, catching his arm. "Don’t think I’ve forgotten the trouble you had breathing earlier. You’re going to the Medical bay with the rest of us."

Helping Ashley make her way across the deck, Carlos glanced away from her for a moment to frown at Phantom. "Are you all right?" he asked, addressing the other for the first time.

He nodded, but Cassie overrode him. "No. He seems to forget that he was *shot* yesterday."

"I was morphed," he reminded her.

They had made it to the bulkhead Andros had blown open to get to Ashley, and Carlos realized they might have some trouble getting past this particular obstacle. The access panel was literally shot, and the reinforced steel was little more than a third of the way off the ground.

"So was I," Cassie countered, pausing to see if Andros and Carlos would need any help. "But those weapons were a lot stronger than they should have been, and you weren’t recovered enough to heal right away."

At first, it looked like Ashley would make it without a problem. She ducked underneath the bulkhead, her fingers tightening on Carlos’s hand but not using him to stabilize herself. As she tried to straighten up on the other side, though, the sudden movement must have been the last straw. He felt her stumble, but as she lost her balance she jerked her hand away from his to catch herself, and he could only watch as she tumbled forward.

Luckily, Andros’s arm steadied her somewhat, and his other hand caught her shoulder to keep her from falling. She grabbed at him, and the way she wavered even with both hands on something solid made Carlos wonder if she was a lot worse off than she had let on.

Andros must have noticed too, because he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her without a word. She clung to him for several seconds before she started to relax. "I’m okay," she murmured at last, making no move to push him away.

Andros hugged her tighter for a moment, and Carlos couldn’t help smiling at the two of them there. He glanced over at Cassie, and they grinned at each other. Everyone knew that Ashley had had feelings for their leader for some time now, and lately it had been obvious that he reciprocated--it was good to see him acknowledge their mutual affection so openly.

Carlos shot a look in Phantom’s direction as well, wondering what their ally thought of this. But Phantom’s expression was completely unreadable as he gazed at the couple, and after a moment Carlos turned back to them.

Andros activated his communicator, moving far enough back from Ashley that he could raise his left hand between them. "DECA," he said, "we need an intraship teleportation. Can you send the four--five--of us to the Medical bay?"

"Of course, Andros," the computer’s voice replied, sounding strange coming from the morpher instead of directly from a camera. "I cannot contact either Carlos or Ashley, but I am reading their Power signatures in your vicinity."

Carlos sighed in relief. "So we can still morph," he said, looking at Andros for some sign of agreement.

He nodded. "It must only be the electronic component that’s damaged. Your connection to the Astro powers is as strong as it was before."

"Confirmed," DECA answered. "Teleporting now."

The world disappeared from around Carlos, replaced by a shimmering, vibrant black that wasn’t so much the absence of light as it was the presence of something too bright to look directly at. Then the wash of color was gone, and he was standing in a Medical bay that seemed suddenly much more crowded than usual.

Andros helped Ashley onto the patient bed immediately, and while she refused to lie down, she did seem glad to be off her feet. While Andros tended to Ashley, Cassie ran a second medscanner over Carlos. She frowned at the readings, and looked over at Andros.

Carlos couldn’t help fidgeting, trying to peer at the scanner himself while she was distracted. Cassie turned back to glare at him. "Hold still," she told him sternly.

He froze, giving her his most innocent look. She rolled her eyes, but her attention was diverted by a movement to his right. "And you," she said to Phantom, just as threateningly. Slapping an autorelease next to the door, she caused a second patient bed to unfold. "Sit."

Surprisingly enough, he did, and she turned back to Andros. Tapping his shoulder to get his attention, she asked, "Are you getting the same readings I'm getting?"

Andros turned toward her, and they compared medscanners. Carlos glanced at the readout over Ashley's patient bed, but Cassie's scanner was operating independently, and the only readings displayed there were Ashley's. Without having anything to compare them to, the results of the scan meant nothing to him.

"That's strange," Andros said at last. "The effects of the damping field?"

Cassie nodded in agreement. "What else could it be? With the shields down, the lower decks were most exposed."

Ashley caught Carlos's eye, and he shrugged. "If you don't tell us what's going on," she warned Cassie and Andros, "you're going to have two very unhappy Rangers."

"Sorry," Andros apologized, sitting down beside her and tilting the scanner so she could see it. "You and Carlos have similar readings, here, and here."

He indicated something on the tiny screen, and Ashley squinted at the medscanner. She was clearly having trouble reading it, but just as clearly didn't want to admit it.

Carlos was about to say something, but Andros glanced at her expression and must have realized what was going on. "The readout for your nervous system shows two sudden drops," he explained, not withdrawing the scanner, but no longer pointing at it either. "One for signal transmission and the other for stimuli response."

"Which means…" Ashley prompted, when he paused.

"It means the damping field was affecting the two of you through the hull," Andros said. "The lower decks aren't nearly as well insulated as the main decks are, and with the shields down, it looks like there wasn't anything to keep the effects of the field from influencing the interior of the Megaship."

"That's why our communicators stopped working," Carlos agreed. "But what does it have to do with us?"

Andros gave him the Look, and Carlos raised an eyebrow. He wondered if Ashley could make him stop doing that…

"The human nervous system runs off electricity," Andros told him, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. "The only reason we can move is because neurotransmitters carry messages from our brain to our limbs, powered by electric action potentials."

*Someone paid *way* too much attention in physics class,* Carlos thought, about to brush off Andros's explanation with, "Whatever you say…"

But the flash of guilt on Andros's face when he looked at Ashley silenced him. *He's mad at himself, for letting her get hurt,* Carlos realized suddenly. The insight made it easier to forgive the Red Ranger's condescending tone, and then Cassie spoke into the brief pause, distracting him.

"Your scan shows the same thing," she told Carlos. "I think we can give you something to counteract the effects, but you should probably take it easy for the next few hours."

"Great," Ashley groaned. "So what you're saying is that on top of a concussion, I'm going to have horrible reflexes for the rest of the day."

"*You* should take it easy in any case," Andros said firmly. "There's nothing to do for a concussion but rest and recover on your own, and I expect you to do it."

TJ's voice, filtered through the Megaship's comm system, cut off any reply she might have made. "Andros, Cassie, you guys had better come to the Bridge."

Cassie, being closer to the door, touched the comm panel. "What's going on, Teej?"

"That distortion signal?" His voice was tight with excitement. "I don't think it's a scanner malfunction."

Andros scrambled to his feet, dropping the scanner on the counter as he did so. Staring intently at Ashley, he told her, "Stay here, all right? We'll let you know what's going on as soon as we can, I promise."

She sighed, but she must have known that getting her to the Bridge would only delay Andros. "All right," she agreed quietly. "Go--but don't forget about me, okay?"

He smiled, touching her cheek. "Never," he replied just as softly.

Then he was gone. Phantom was standing as well, and he and Carlos moved to follow the Red Ranger--only to find the door blocked by Cassie.

"Where do you think *you're* going?" she demanded. "Ashley's going to need some company, you know."

Carlos heard a noise from Ashley that sounded suspiciously like a giggle. "Cassie," he tried to reason, "there's nothing wrong with us."

Cassie folded her arms. "Sure there isn't." The determined look on her face told Carlos that he had already lost this battle. "If that's what you want to think, go right ahead. But you're both staying here."

"Cassie," Phantom began, a persuasive note in his voice that Carlos had never heard before.

She looked over at him, and for just an instant, her expression softened. But then she shook her head. "You haven't even been checked out, so don't give me that. Carlos, get DECA to make up some serum for you and Ashley, and you--"

She glared at Phantom, not very convincingly, in Carlos's opinion, but it worked. Phantom sat down again, and she aimed the medscanner at him. "Don't move," she warned.

DECA was way ahead of them, and the medical synthetron was flashing when Carlos reached the counter. There were two doses of something that looked very much like color-coded cough medicine inside, and he removed them with a dubious glance at DECA's camera. "This is going to boost my nervous system?"

"And did you have to color-code them?" Ashley demanded, accepting the gold-colored liquid with a murmured thank you to Carlos.

DECA's camera blinked. "Yours also contains a pain reliever, Ashley. A headache is the most common symptom of a concussion, and the serum will counteract it, along with improving the diffusion rate across synapses in your nervous system."

Ashley looked over at Carlos, mouthing, "Diffusion across synapses?"

He gave her a wry grin and a shrug. "Drink up," he advised, swallowing the unappealing liquid in one gulp.

He tried not to choke as the taste hit him. "DECA!" he yelped, when he could speak again. Setting the tiny cup back in the synthetron, he shot an evil look at her camera. "That's the most vile stuff I've ever tasted!"

Ashley passed her own cup over to him--empty--with a disgusted look on her face. "And she was doing so well with the food, too," Ashley muttered.

DECA's camera blinked at them, but the computer did not respond.

By the other patient bed, Cassie sighed. "It's just the effects of the bruising," she told Phantom quietly, obviously not intending to broadcast the diagnosis to Carlos and Ashley. "It's healing really quickly, but it isn't as fast as it would be on one of us."

"You have two separate energy reserves," he pointed out in a low tone. "Your own, and the one granted to you by the Power. My energy is a hybrid of the two, and it does not give me the same healing ability that you have."

Carlos turned away from what he assumed was a private conversation. "Ash," he said quietly, sitting down next to her.

"Yeah?" she asked, her gaze focusing on him from somewhere far away.

"I wanted to apologize for what I said to you this morning," he told her, looking for any sign of understanding in her eyes. "I should have trusted you. I'm sorry."

She blinked, but she didn't look particularly upset. "Thanks, Carlos," she said, studying him. "That means a lot to me."

"Friends?" he asked, and felt better when a smile spread across her face.

"Forever," she agreed, leaning over to hug him.

When they separated, he saw Cassie watching them with a speculative look on her face. "I meant to ask you, Ash," she said, too casually. "How's it going with Andros?"

Ashley shot a piercing look at Carlos, and he held his hands out to the side. "I didn't tell her," he assured his friend.

"What, about this morning?" Cassie asked, and Ashley's eyes widened.

"TJ," she muttered to no one in particular. "I swear, when I get my hands on that boy…"

"Come on, you can't blame him," Cassie chided. "There's not that many of us, after all, and we're with each other constantly. So--what about you and Andros?"

Ashley sighed in exasperation. "I didn't sleep with him!"

It was then that it occurred to Carlos to glance over at Phantom, and he had to stifle a laugh. Still seated, to the left of and slightly behind Cassie, the look on Phantom's face was priceless.

Carlos's amusement must not have been as unobtrusive as he thought, however, for both Cassie and Ashley turned to look at him, and from him to Phantom. Sensing their regard, Phantom opened his mouth, but didn't say anything. Finally, looking directly at Ashley, he began, "You and Andros--"

He stopped just as suddenly. "Forgive me. It is none of my affair."

Ashley just laughed. "That doesn't stop anyone else, believe me."

"Cassie!" TJ's exclamation made everyone in the Medical bay look up. The Blue Ranger burst into the room, not even slightly out of breath. "Cass, we need you."

Andros was right behind him. "We have to go," he announced, speaking at least half to Ashley. "The distortion signal is real--we came out of the gateway several hundred light years in front of Divatox's army."

That was a little too much of a coincidence for Carlos. "How is that possible?" he asked skeptically.

"Remember the probability curve you plotted for the fleet's destination?" TJ demanded. "It didn't do us any good at the time, but that course was the last set of coordinates entered into the nav computer before we went through the gateway."

"That's how we got through without calculating any kind of vector first," Carlos guessed, and Andros nodded.

"We *had* a vector--yours. And now we're in front of the fleet, but not by much. They'll be out of scanning range within the hour."

"The Megaship isn't spaceworthy," Cassie objected, looking to Ashley and Carlos for support.

"No," Andros agreed, holding up his right arm. The Battlelizer glittered prominently on his wrist. "But the Delta Megaship is."

"I will accompany you," Phantom said, standing. "I know the Delta Megaship as well as anyone."

"Better, probably," Andros agreed, trading a look Carlos couldn't decipher with the other Ranger.

Seeing the team divide, Carlos hesitated. He didn't want to let his friends go off without him, but hard as it was to admit, they could probably handle this on their own. And he *really* didn't want to leave Ashley alone on the Megaship with a concussion.

Andros solved the problem for him. "Carlos, will you stay here with Ashley?'

The Black Ranger nodded, glad to have the decision--or the excuse--made for him. Ashley, on the other hand, started to object immediately.

"I know," Andros said, coming to stand beside her. "You can take care of yourself. That's what I used to say, remember?"

He took her hand. "None of us should be alone, Ash, and the Megaship needs someone to defend it while we're gone. Besides--" He leaned down and whispered something in her ear.

Ashley giggled, shooting a look at Carlos as she did so. "All right," she agreed reluctantly. "What I was actually going to say is that I was coming with you, but since you asked so nicely, I'll stay."

"Thank you," Andros said quietly. He looked around the room nervously before bending down to give her a quick kiss on the lips.

She reached up to touch his face as he straightened, and for an instant they shared a smile that excluded everyone else. Carlos felt a flicker of jealousy--not of Andros, but of Andros and Ashley, and the feelings that they were no longer afraid to express in front of the others.

*Will I ever have someone like that?* Carlos wondered, watching Andros ask, "Will you see us off?"

"Of course," Ashley agreed, smiling up at him. He put an arm around her and helped her to her feet--Carlos wasn't entirely convinced that Ashley needed the support anymore, but she didn't seem to mind.

Cassie caught Carlos's arm as the others filed out into the hallway. He stopped, giving her a questioning look, but she waited until the room had emptied.

"I know you guys will want to do repair work while we're gone," she said at last. "Just be careful, all right? Your nervous system isn't working as well as it should be right now, and you're both bound to be a little clumsy. Especially Ashley--with her concussion, she couldn't even read the scanner Andros was showing her."

"You saw that too, huh?" Carlos agreed, looking after the others.

Cassie nodded, and the two of them walked slowly out into the corridor. "I just don't want her to get hurt trying to do too much too soon," she said. "The rest of us would do it too--ignore our injuries and keep on working--but normally, we'd have the rest of the team to tell us to stop. You'll be the only two here."

"So the responsibility's mine," he finished, smiling. "I'll make sure she doesn't overwork, Cass; don't worry."

"You either," she said firmly. "I want you *both* to take it easy."

Carlos saluted. "Yes, sir," he said with a smile, and she laughed at him.

They caught up to the others at the Megaship's exterior ramp, already lowered to reveal a sandy landscape that stretched out beneath a dusty blue sky. The Delta Megaship waited only a few dozen meters away, looking much smaller than usual on the open plains of this desert planet.

Andros, Phantom, and TJ waited at the bottom of the ramp, and Cassie hurried down to join them. Carlos walked over to Ashley, who stood leaning against the wall by the control panel for the ramp. He touched her shoulder, and she turned to smile at him.

Andros raised a hand, and the other three followed his example. "Good hunting," Carlos called after them, and saw Cassie flash a thumbs-up in their direction.

"DECA," Andros said into his morpher. "Four to teleport onto the Delta Megaship."

"Teleporting," DECA replied, and the four disappeared in a shower of sparkles.

"Good luck," Ashley whispered, as the sparkles streaked across the desert toward the other ship. Carlos put an arm around her shoulders, and they stood watching until the Delta Megaship lifted off and disappeared into the sky.