Power Rangers In Space, Heather Ray [books under 200 pages TXT] 📗

her worriedly. She discerned the panic in Carlos' dark eyes, and the sweat on his face.

Ashley was ready to make some wry comment, but she couldn't force air through her lungs. Instead, her mouth moved slightly, and her eyes fluttered closed.

"No!" Carlos ordered, holding her face between his hands, "Stay awake, Ashe! Keep your eyes on me!! Look at me!!"

"Aye yi yi!" Alpha shrieked, kneeling beside Ashley on the other side, "It's a good thing we managed to cut off the power to the Simudeck when we did!"

"Alpha," Carlos gasped, turning to the robot, "we have to get her to the med lab!"

"Contact Andros first," Alpha decided, opening his chest plate and pulling out a small scanner, "I'll start registering her wounds. I have one with me all the time, just in case."

Carlos nodded, and activated his communicator. He had to force himself to remain calm in order to inform Andros what had happened.
Chapter Twenty-Nine

As Andros and Cassie continued skimming through the ship's internal offensive programs, the sound of the communicator cut through the continuing clanging of Astronema and Darkonda on the bridge door.

"Andros here."

^Andros, it's Carlos! We got Ashley out of the Simudeck, but she's hurt pretty badly.^

Cassie looked up in horror, and met Andros' shocked gaze.

"How is she?" he demanded.

^I don't know, but the Simudeck was running without the safeties, with program level Sigma.^

Andros' jaw dropped, and he immediately stood up. "What?!"

"What's Sigma?" Cassie wanted to know. For the time being, Andros ignored the question.

"Get her to the shuttle, Carlos," Andros ordered, "and stabilize her in the infirmary. We're evacuating the Megaship."

^What? But we can't let --^

"We won't," Andros cut him off, "Just get yourself and Ashley out of harm's way."

"Where's TJ?" Cassie asked into Andros' communicator.

^He's in engineering.^

^Aye yi yi!^

Alpha shrieked over the communicator, ^What about me?^

Andros' eyes narrowed in thought. "Go with him, Alpha, and help him take care of Ashley."

^You got it!^

Andros turned off his communicator, and folded his arms over his chest. Cassie rose from her seat, and stood beside the pensive Red Ranger.

"Andros, we're running out of time," she said as gently as she could, "Darkonda and Astronema are breaking through!"

Andros nodded, pinching the bridge of his nose. "We need to get Astronema and her gang off the Megaship. If we abandon the ship with them on it, we'll seal Earth's fate."

"Aren't there any emergency systems to fight off invasion?" Cassie asked.

"Almost every program is compromised," Andros reminded her, "All we have are shields, which are barely functioning enough to defend against anything, and the life support and environmental controls."

"Environmental controls," Cassie repeated. Her eyes lit up with inspiration. "Andros, do you think we can run an infestation sweep? Like the one you ran to rid the ship of alien bacteria?"

"If the environmental controls are functioning, it shouldn't be a problem," Andros said. A smile began to tug on his placid face. "Of course! The chemical is poisonous! It should be able to force Astronema off the ship!"

Andros grabbed Cassie's shoulders in excitement. "You're brilliant!"

Cassie shrugged, "Well, I won't argue that."

Andros immediately returned to his station, and began pressing buttons on the computer. However, before he could even open up the environmental controls system, a huge explosion threw the door into the bridge, smashing into a panel alongside the wall and causing it to explode into a powerful fire. Andros and Cassie backed away, and saw Astronema and Darkonda board the bridge.

"Nice try," Astronema said dismissively, pointing her staff at the two Rangers, "but not good enough. Now the Megaship's mine!!"

Cassie and Andros threw themselves to the ground as streams of purple lightning flew over their heads. They rolled behind a console to take cover.

"We can't get to the controls," Cassie whispered, "Now what do we do?"

Andros nodded. "We're not finished yet. There's a control panel in engineering, too."

Cassie smiled with understanding. "We need to reach TJ!"

"Let's get off the bridge first," he said, pulling his Astro-Blaster from its holster. He peeked out from the side of the console, and fired an array of laser beams at Astronema and Darkonda, forcing them to take cover themselves. The Red and Pink Rangers saw their opportunity, and hurried to the Galaxy Glider launch tubes. Andros holstered his weapon, and together the two Rangers leapt through their tubes.

"Cowards," Darkonda huffed, standing up and brushing the dust from himself, "Couldn't meet their fate."

"Those who fight and run away live to fight another day," Astronema reminded him, taking a seat in the center chair on the bridge, "They'll be back."

Chapter Thirty

The Blue Ranger braced himself as a metal column crashed into his body, throwing him into the wall. He pushed the heavy object off and raised his Astro Axe to meet Ecliptor's huge saber at a comfortable distance from his head. Still, TJ couldn't muster the strength to push Ecliptor off him.

"Surrender, and I will make your end quick and painless," Ecliptor breathed, pushing down against TJ's weapon with all his strength.

"I don't much like those terms," TJ countered, grinding his teeth with exertion.

TJ was, to put it mildly, disappointed with himself. He had decided to go to the engineering complex on Deck 6 to stop whatever villain was attempting to sabotage all the Megaship's systems. Unfortunately, by the time he got there, Ecliptor had already managed to somehow re-route DECA's energy input to the Simudeck, increasing the power output of that secondary system to allow it to continue to function despite the ship being in a state of emergency. TJ couldn't understand why Ecliptor would want the Simudeck to be operating optimally, but a nagging feeling convinced him it had something to do with the missing Yellow Ranger.

Not only did Ecliptor disrupt DECA, he also completely destroyed the teleportation and communications systems. The only way for any of the Rangers to contact one another would be their independent wrist units, which didn't rely on the Megaship for power.

"If you do not surrender, you will suffer insurmountable pain," Ecliptor warned, forcing the blade ever closer to TJ's blue helmet.

TJ continued to fight off Ecliptor's weapon by holding his axe perpendicular to the huge saber. Once he felt he couldn't hold off Ecliptor's superior strength a moment longer, he tilted his axe, causing the saber to slide off to the side. TJ immediately rose to his feet and delivered a powerful roundhouse to Ecliptor, knocking him onto his stomach and causing his sword to fall from his grasp. Yet Ecliptor was far from disarmed. He turned his head around, and fired twin beams of energy from his eyes. The beams smashed into TJ's chest, throwing the Blue Astro Ranger off the raised platform portion of engineering and into the lower portion. With a groan of pain, TJ rolled out of the way of the follow up blast, and took cover behind a work bench that stored a variety of tools.

"Stop firing!" TJ shrieked, "You'll blow us all to bits!!"

"I know what I'm doing," Ecliptor snapped, almost insulted by the lack of foresight TJ attributed him.

TJ backed away, taking a moment to catch his breath. Ecliptor didn't see exactly where he was hiding, but it wouldn't take long before Astronema's head sentinel would track him down. As he tried to figure out a strategy, he couldn't help but wonder what had happened to the four other Astro Rangers.

^TJ!^

a voice called from his wrist. TJ jumped in surprise at the intensity of the communicator's volume, and covered the speaker with his hand, praying Ecliptor didn't hear it. He then lowered the volume to a whisper, hoping the enhanced hearing that came with the Ranger helmet would be more acute than Ecliptor's.

"What is it, Andros?" he whispered, "Where are you?"

^Cassie and I are on our Galaxy Gliders. Astronema and Darkonda took the bridge, and we had to get out of there. Ashley, Alpha, and Carlos are in the shuttle on the lower deck.^

TJ blinked in surprise. "We're retreating?!"

^No. We're getting everyone off the ship. TJ, since you're in engineering, it's up to you to activate the infestation sweep. It'll fill the entire ship with a powerful toxin that no life form that breathes oxygen could possibly endure. And make sure you turn off the shields, so the shuttle can leave the docking bay. Galaxy Gliders are tuned to pass through the Megaship's shields, but the shuttle can't.^

"You're assuming that Astronema and company need to breathe," TJ noted.

^Very few species can exist without air, TJ. Besides, if they didn't need air, it's safe to assume that they would have exploited their advantage by destroying the environmental controls. But they didn't -- the ECs are one of the only systems operating correctly. It can't be a coincidence.^

"Stop hiding, Blue Ranger!!" Ecliptor's voice called, ringing in TJ's ear, "You're only delaying the inevitable! My Princess has taken the bridge! The Megaship is in our control!!"

"Where is the EC console?" TJ whispered.

^Across from the hyperspeed core, right next to the communicator panel. You can't miss it. All you need to do is type in the words Infestation Sweep-1 and place your thumb on the screen for fingerprint ID. Since you're an Astro Ranger, you can access that program.^

"Got it."

TJ deactivated his communicator, and pulled his white glove back over his wrist. However, before he could rise to his feet, two strong arms reached behind the work table and grabbed his upper arms, yanking him from his hiding spot. TJ gasped in surprise, and struggled as Ecliptor held him suspended at arm's length.

"The true hunter always catches his prey," Ecliptor breathed, his grip tightening on TJ's arms, "Now, where were we? Ah yes..."

Ecliptor walked to the nearby row of metal lockers, and slammed TJ into their unhindering doors. He continued to smash TJ's back and