Chapter 03: Ultimate Overdrive
Ruins of the Ryujinn
INET served as a front company for several of Dr. William "Billy" Cranston's initiatives. Months ago, the Prevention and Recovery Initiative formed the SGS Division to find and seal artifacts of power codenamed Precious. Recently, SGS formed a Ranger team, the Overdrive Task Force Titan Rangers.
INET recruited three Rangers to join the team: Shane, Titan Red; Jake, Titan Blue and Rose, Titan Pink. Three days ago, SGS recruited the final two Rangers: Will, Titan Black and Kelsey, Titan Yellow.
On their first joint mission, Titan Black and Titan Yellow joined Titan Pink in her submarine zord, which dove into the ocean near the coast of Japan.
The Sub Driver plunged into the depths of the dark water. Titan Pink sat at the controls, while Titan Black and Titan Yellow stood at her side, crouched within the cockpit.
The Yellow Ranger looked out the window with awe. "It's so dark..."
The zord activated its lights and shined ahead, revealing the ruins of a lost civilization.
Titan Black leaned on her chair. "Is that really it?" He reached for her controls. "Rose, let me take the wheel..."
She swatted his hand away. "Just sit back and wait."
"No need to be rude..." Titan Black said.
"I'm not being rude," she said. "And when we're on missions, use codenames."
"That's right," Titan Yellow said, her voice chipper. "I'm Titan Yellow. You're Titan Black."
"Yeah, I can see that, Kelsey," Titan Black said.
"It's Yellow," she said.
"I'm not calling you Yellow," Titan Black said.
"Why?"
"You have to ask?"
The sub approached the ruins and extended its grappling arms. Titan Yellow leaned towards the viewport to see.
"We're getting closer," she said with excitement. "What is this place?"
An image of Titan Red appeared on the Pink Ranger's communications console.
"The ruins of the Ryujinn," Titan Red said. "They lived alongside the dinosaurs 1.7 million years ago. Legend says one of their witches, Bandora, used a device that could control the weather."
"That's right," Titan Blue said as his image appeared. "But it's not just a legend. Bandora fought the first Power Rangers back in 2001."
"Right," Titan Yellow said with excitement. "I learned all about that."
"Who cares about some legend," Titan Black said.
"The original Rangers never learned how she could summon that kind of power," Titan Red said. "INET thinks it had something to do with a device called the Heart of the Ryujinn."
"And that relic is in these ruins?" Titan Yellow asked.
Titan Black leaned forward. "The Heart of the Ryujinn.Our first Precious."
"That's right," Titan Red said. "It's part of a system of ancient technology, but enchanted. Titan Black, Titan Yellow. Find the Heart of the Ryujinn. Move out."
The sub's grappling arms moved massive boulders away from the ruins. Titan Black and Titan Yellow armed diving packs and dropped from the sub's rear bay.
Titan Pink watched from her cockpit as the Black Ranger and Yellow Ranger streaked towards the ruin's entrance.
"Are you sure about these two, chief?" she asked.
"Don't you approve?" Titan Red asked.
Titan Blue shook his head. "I don't think they get what we're dealing with. They think it's a game."
"It's an adventure," Titan Red said. "It's OK to enjoy it."
Titan Black and Titan Yellow emerged in a dark stone corridor. They pushed themselves from the water and activated their helmet lights to see. Water dripped from the rugged wall and ceiling.
They moved ahead, but a wall of stone blocked their path.
"Great," Titan Black said. "A dead end."
Titan Yellow looked around the corridor. "I have a bad feeling about this..."
The corridor shuddered, and bats flooded the passageway. The rush of rodents blew past the two Rangers and startled them, forcing them back.
Titan Black and Titan Yellow fell backward and collapsed through a wall, landing in a circular room lit with a golden hue. Ancient glyphs and patterns lined the room, with a pedestal at its center. A short spire rose from the pedestal.
The two Rangers climbed to their feet.
"What is this...?" Titan Yellow asked with awe.
"Some kind of shrine," Titan Black said.
Titan Black moved around the edge of the room, and Titan Yellow moved to the pedestal.
"Look..." she said. "There's some kind of switch."
"Don't-"
Titan Yellow pressed a stone lever; the spire spouted bursts of flame that knocked the Rangers backward with bursts of spark.
The Black Ranger rolled into a crouched position and pulled out his blaster.
"Drive Defender!"
He fired orange energy bursts that blasted the spire to pieces. Smoke sizzled from the rubble; the bottom half of the spire still stood. And a puzzle rested on top of it.
"Look," Titan Yellow said as she walked to the pedestal. "Come look at this!"
"A puzzle..." Titan Black said as he moved to the pedestal. Eight tiles rested on top of the pedestal, and each tile had a symbol engraved. "This is easy."
He slid the tiles so they formed a glyph, and the symbol glowed with golden light.
"There," he said with pride.
The chamber shook and nearly knocked the Rangers off their feet. They staggered but kept their balance. Then, the stone walls moved like a pair of hands and grabbed the two Rangers.
The ruins bubbled and rose from the ocean floor. Titan Blue appeared on Titan Red's communications console.
"I think they did something wrong..."
Titan Pink appeared next to him. "The whole ocean floor's shaking."
The ruins emerged from water like a small island. The ascension caused massive torrents that knocked the Sub Diver out of control.
Titan Blue moved in with his Gyro Driver, lowered his grappling hooks, and lifted the Sub Driver from the sea.
Part of the ruins formed a stone path that connected to the coast, where Titan Red waited in his Dump Driver.
The Red Ranger's zord throttled forward and steered onto the path while heading towards the ruins.
Deep in the ruins, the shaking stirred a stone casket bound in chains. The tremors snapped the casket's seal, which broke the chains and knocked the casket's lid loose.
A figure rested within the casket. His eyes snapped open and appeared solid black.
He grasped the sides of the casket and pulled himself up. He wore ash colored robes that matched the color of his gray skin.
The walls contorted, and rock figures formed from the stone and stepped onto the floor. Small flames ignited like candles within the heads of the ash gray grunts.
Titan Red steered his Dump Driver into the ruins and throttled down a shaking corridor. Stone and rubble collapsed around him as he struggled to maintain control of his vehicle.
He activated his zord's sensors and searched for Titan Black and Titan Yellow. His display showed their heat signatures down the corridor ahead. "There."
Titan Red whipped his zord around and throttled in reverse towards the heat signatures. The zord's dumping bed flipped back and extended like a pair of arms.
Dump Driver crashed into the shrine room, where massive hands of stone held Titan Black and Titan Pink.
Dump Driver grabbed the hands and pulled them aside, knocking Titan Black and Titan Yellow to the floor.
"Need a lift?" Titan Red asked through his zord's speakers.
Dump Driver let go of the stone arms, scooped Titan Black and Titan Yellow from the floor, and flipped them upward. The zord's arms retracted to form the dumping bed, and the two Rangers landed on top of the vehicle.
Titan Red throttled forward as the ruins trembled.
The robed figure Gajah led a group of stone grunts down a bridge within the ruins. The grunts, Karths, carried torches that lit the dark chamber around them.
Rubble and debris rained down as the ruins shook. But Gajah didn't break his stride.
"Time..." he said, his voice like a gravely whisper. "...has started moving for us again."
Dump Driver burst from the side of the ruins with a cloud of stone and rubble. The zord skid to a halt and lowered its dumping bed, knocking Titan Black and Titan Yellow onto the island.
Titan Blue and Titan Pink ran towards them.
Above, Titan Red stepped from his cockpit and stood on his zord. "Black. Yellow. Things went well, I take it?"
The Red Ranger leapt to the ground to join his teammates.
Titan Black dusted himself off. "Don't call me by my color."
Titan Blue shook his head. "You set off a trap in under a minute. Was that an example of your burglary skills at work?"
"I wasn't a burglar," Titan Black said. "I was a treasure hunter."
The Black Ranger walked to the edge of the island and looked over the cliff. He crossed his arms over his chest.
"It would have been hard to find the Precious with the ruins submerged," he said. "So we picked up the ruins."
Titan Yellow tilted her head. "We did it by accident..."
Titan Black shushed her.
The Red Ranger looked to the center of the ruins, engraved with the features of a stone giant.
"The Precious has to be deeper in the shrine," he said.
Titan Pink nodded. "And to put this much effort into hiding it...there's no telling how powerful it is. Black and Yellow are still new. They should wait here while we head in."
"Are you serious?" Titan Black asked. "No, I don't think so."
Titan Black pushed Titan Blue aside and rushed towards the ruins. Titan Yellow followed.
Titan Red placed his hands on Titan Blue and Titan Pink's shoulders. "The new guys are going to beat us to it. Move out."
Titan Black and Titan Yellow entered the cavernous ruins, filled with piles of rubble and stone. They moved through corridors that linked massive chambers, and made their way to a small room that nearly collapsed. They needed to duck to enter the room, which ended at a stone wall.
"Another dead end?" Titan Black asked with irritation.
"Maybe not," Titan Yellow said as she pulled out her Overdrive Tracker. The tracker served as a morpher, as well as a tool of various functions.
She flipped open the tracker, which scanned the wall. "There's a secret door!"
"Good," Titan Black said as he pulled out his Drive Defender and flipped the weapon to blade mode. "I'll take care of it."
The Black Ranger slid his sword into the wall's crevice. He twisted, and the wall opened, revealing a secret passageway.
They climbed through the passageway and entered a room the size of a volcano. They stood on a rocky ledge, connected by a bridge to a ledge on the other side of the massive room. Molten lava poured across the floor of the cavern far below, and its heat lit the chamber with a fiery hue.
"This place..." Titan Yellow said as she looked around. "It's massive!"
She noticed the fiery glow and leaned down. "Do you think that's magma down there? It's so far...it's hard to tell."
"Look," Titan Black said as he pointed to the ledge on the other side of the cavern. The ledge carried a stone alter, with a slight golden glow from its markings. "It's some kind of altar. Let's go."
They stepped onto the bridge; but part of it crumbled beneath Titan Black's feet, and he nearly fell. He grasped onto the side of the bridge just in time, and Titan Yellow leaned next to him.
The Black Ranger cursed beneath his breath. "A trap bridge?"
The other three Rangers ran into the chamber and sprinted across the bridge, passing Titan Black and Titan Yellow. The bridge crumbled with each step, but they stayed ahead of the collapse.
Titan Red looked over his shoulder. "What are you waiting for? Let's go."
Titan Black climbed back to the ledge. The Black Ranger and Yellow Ranger leapt through the air and landed near their teammates, and they ran across the crumbling bridge.
The Yellow Ranger nearly panicked as she ran. Each footfall knocked a piece of the bridge loose, but the Rangers ran fast enough to stay ahead of the collapse. Barely.
"We're going to fall!" she shouted.
"Not if you keep moving," Titan Red said.
The Rangers dashed onto the other ledge just as the last of the bridge collapsed into the magma below.
Titan Red, Titan Blue and Titan Pink faced the altar. An egg-shaped stone rested within the structure, and the stone glowed with the faintest of pale-blue light beneath it surface.
"The Heart of the Ryujinn?" Titan Pink asked.
Titan Blue flipped open his Overdrive Tracker and scanned the stone. The tracker's screen displayed the number 86.
"The Hazard Level's over 80," he said. "That sure is dangerous..."
The stone shot from the altar, hovered in midair, and split into dozens of duplicates that spread across the cavern.
"Whoa!" Titan Yellow said. "Where'd they all come from?"
Titan Blue looked to his tracker. "What the heck's going on...?"
The Blue Ranger leaned towards the nearest stone.
"Watch out!" Titan Yellow shouted.
The Yellow Ranger tackled Titan Blue aside just as the stone exploded.
"What the..." Titan Blue said.
The Pink Ranger kneeled at his side, and helped him and the Yellow Ranger sit up.
"How did you know that would happen?" Titan Pink asked.
Titan Yellow said nothing. She grasped the sides of her helmet, stood and turned away from the Pink Ranger.
The Black Ranger looked out upon the glowing stones. "Only one is real," he said. "The rest are just bombs for thieves. So...What do we do?"
Titan Red walked closer to the floating stones. He paused. Then punched the nearest stone.
"No!" Titan Black shouted. "You'll destroy the real one too!"
The impact knocked the stone back, and it crashed against the other stones, which crashed against the other stones, with rippling waves of explosions.
The explosions stopped. And one stone remained.
Titan Red powered down his armor. "The Ryujinn sealed the relic in the ocean. That means they couldn't destroy it. Little explosions like this wouldn't hurt it."
Titan Pink and Titan Blue powered down their armor.
Rose smiled at the sight of the relic. She couldn't help but feel impressed by the chief's actions.
"You did it," she said.
Jake looked to Titan Black. "And that's how the Titan Rangers do things," he said. "I hope you took notes."
Titan Black punched Jake aside. He grabbed Titan Yellow, leapt from the ledge and armed his Overdrive Tracker. He fired the tracker's grappler, which attached to the cavern ceiling as they swung over the chasm.
"Grab it!" Titan Black shouted.
The Yellow Ranger grabbed the stone as they swung to the other ledge and landed. The two Rangers powered down their armor.
"Will...?" Kelsey asked, surprised by his actions.
Will took the stone and faced the other rangers. "I'll be taking this. Meaning I don't need you anymore..." He looked to Shane specifically. "Immortal Fang."
Jake tilted his head. "Immortal Fang?"
"There was this treasure hunter. The best in the world. He could get anything he wanted, anytime, anywhere," Will said. "The Japanese said no prey ever escaped his fang. So they called him Fumetsu no Kiba. The Immortal Fang."
Will tossed his tracker across the chasm, and Shane caught it.
"I won't be needing that," Will said. "I didn't join this group to play hero."
Shane looked to the tracker in his hand. "Not bad, Will. You did better than I thought."
"I bested you," Will said. He flipped the stone in hand. "I'll be selling this, by the way. Thanks for your help."
He turned and started walking from the ledge. "Kelsey, let's go."
"Wait..." Kelsey said. "You're going to leave them like this? Go back to being some treasure hunter?"
Will stopped and turned to face her. "What?" Will asked. "You prefer them over me."
"The Ryujinn Heart," a gravelly voice said from above.
The rangers looked to see Gajah standing on an upper ledge, along with a group of Karths carrying torches.
"Return it," Gajah said. "You foolish humans must not touch it..."
The Karths leapt to the ledge and attacked Will and Kelsey.
Shane smirked. "What will you do now, Will?"
Will and Kelsey dodged as the grunts swung their torches like clubs.
Shane, Jake and Rose activated their trackers and fired their grappling hooks.
A Karth knocked Will off his feet, and he plummeted over the ledge.
"Will!" Kelsey shouted.
A Karth lifted the fallen stone, and the grunts leapt upward to join Gajah. The villain took the Heart of the Ryujinn, smiled wickedly, and stepped into the shadows with his grunts.
Shane, Jake and Rose landed on the platform with Kelsea. She leaned over the edge and called for Will.
Will had crashed on a narrow outcropping, halfway between the platform and magma below. He held onto the small ledge to keep from falling.
Shane looked to Jake and Rose. "You two go after the Heart."
"What about you?" Rose asked.
"I'm getting our fifth member," Shane said.
Jake shook his head. "He never intended to join the Titans. He-"
"Blue. Pink. You have your orders," he said sternly. He looked to Kelsey. "You go too."
Shane casually jumped from the platform. He lifted his Overdrive Tracker and snapped a small parachute that slowed his descent, just barely, but enough for him to land on the narrow ledge with Will.
Will glared as he struggled to climb up.
"So..." he said. "You come down here just to laugh at me? I don't need-"
Shane punched Will's face and grabbed him by the jacket, pulling him close.
"Cut the act. Choose again," Shane said as he lifted Will's tracker. "Will you take this tracker? Or do you want to fry in the magma?"
"What?"
"You're the one who said it," Shane said. "No prey escapes my fangs. Right now, that prey is you."
"Flattering," Will said. "So you knew from the beginning. That I would betray you."
"I knew," Shane said as he pulled Will onto the ledge. "But you did a good job pulling it off. If you hadn't, you wouldn't be worthy of joining this team."
Gajah led his Karths to the edge of the island. There, four rectangular pillars sat in a square formation.
The villain walked to the edge of the pillars and leaned down. He twisted a rock, and a stone altar emerged in the center of the pillar's formation.
"The time has come..." Gajah said as he walked towards the altar.
Nearby, Jake, Rose and Kelsey arrived on the scene. They crouched beneath a small hill of stone and watched.
"What is he doing?" Jake asked.
Rose shook her head. "I don't know."
Gajah placed the Heart of the Ryujiin onto the altar. He whispered an incantation in a language known only in Hell. The heart sank into the altar, which started to pulse with shadow energy.
Kelsey opened her eyes wide and started moving down the hill. "Something's glowing..."
She nearly tripped over a rock, accidentally kicking pebbles that scattered down the hill.
Gajah looked to his grunts. "Karths. Deal with them..."
The altar glowed with fiery energy and sank into the ground. The entire island shook once more.
Shane looked towards the magma. "Do you think you could survive the flames? Seems like a fun gambit."
Will glared at Shane. "Someday...I'll be better than you. Until then..."
He grabbed his tracker.
The chamber shook, and part of the ledge crumbled, knocking Shane towards the magma below.
"Shane!" Will shouted.
Shane grabbed his tracker. "Start up!"
He slid the tracker across his arm and sparked his morph into Titan Red. The Red Ranger leapt upward, passed Will and landed on the platform above.
Will flipped open his tracker. "Start up!"
An explosion hurled Titan Blue, Titan Yellow, and Titan Pink through the air.
The Karths advanced with their torches, which shifted into short sickles.
A group of Karths slashed at Titan Blue. He dodged and blocked. But several strikes slashed his armor with bursts of spark.
The other grunts attacked Titan Pink and Titan Yellow. They dodged and blocked, and fought back with punches and kicks.
Titan Blue punched a Karth. The impact crumbled part of the grunt's chest, but the stone knitted back together.
The grunt slashed at the Blue Ranger's head, and he barely dodged the blow.
Nearby, a grunt chopped at Titan Pink. She slapped the weapon aside and side-kicked the grunt off its feet.
A Karth chopped at Titan Yellow. She dove aside, and the sickle carved through a boulder with bursts of dust and stone.
The grunt hopped towards the fallen Ranger and swung downward. Titan Yellow braced herself for a blow that never came.
"Drive Defender!" Titan Red shouted as he leapt onto the scene and fired his blaster.
Orange energy bursts whipped the grunt backward with bursts of spark.
The Red Ranger landed next to Titan Yellow. A grunt charged towards him and swung its sickle. Titan Red parried the blow, then side-kicked the grunt to the ground.
From nearby, Gajah narrowed his eyes as he watched. "You would defy the will of DaiSatan...who are you?"
"Titan Red!" the Red Ranger shouted as he fired bursts of energy that blasted a grunt to pieces.
"Titan Pink!" She rolled into a crouched stance, pulled out her blaster, and opened fire. She blasted through several grunts with bursts of spark.
"Titan Blue!" He leapt against the side of a hill, pushed off, and blasted several grunts with bursts of spark.
"Titan Yellow!" She shifted her weapon to blade mode and slashed a grunt with a burst of spark. The Yellow Ranger bashed her pommel against the grunt, hurling it through the air.
Titan Black appeared, chopped his blade, and smashed the grunt to pieces. "Titan Black!"
"Will!" Titan Yellow shouted.
Titan Red slashed a Karth with a burst of spark. The grunt chopped its sickle. But the Red Ranger parried and stabbed through the grunt's chest. Titan Red pulled his sword free and slashed the grunt, which burst into pieces.
The Red Ranger turned to face Gajah as his teammates regrouped around him. "We're the Overdrive Task Force..."
"Titan Rangers!" they shouted together.
"You're too late," Gajah said. "The vessel of my lord awakens."
The island shook, and the shrine stood. The colossal structure took shape to form a giant monster called the KamiGolem.
Gajah leapt through the air and landed on the stone giant's shoulder.
"Smash them under your feet!"
The Rangers dove aside as the monster stomped on the island. They rolled across the ground and rose to their feet.
"Destroy the giant," Titan Red said. "Then retrieve the Heart of the Ryujinn."
He pulled out his Overdrive Tracker and flipped it open. "Driver-zords, mobilize!"
The KamiGolem stomped towards the shore. Gajah smiled with fiendish delight, and his black eyes glistened with madness.
Suddenly, explosions sparked against the giant's back. Gajah turned to see the five Driver-zords charge towards him. Along with the Dump Driver, Gyro Driver and Sub Driver rode the Black Ranger's Speed Driver and Yellow Ranger's Dozer Driver.
KamiGolem turned to face the zords.
The Black Ranger gripped onto his control wheel. "So the Heart of the Ryujinn powers that thing?"
The Yellow Ranger shook her head. "I didn't think the Precious could do something like this."
"The Precious are powerful," Titan Blue said. "If they fall into the wrong hands, they could split the Earth in two."
"That's why we safeguard them," Titan Pink said.
"We protect the Precious from evil," Titan Red said. "That's the job of the Titans."
"Okay," the Yellow Ranger said with excitement. "Let's go then."
The Dozer Driver charged towards the monster and smashed against its legs. The zord wedged its dozer beneath the giant's feet and flipped upward, knocking the monster back.
KamiGolem staggered but stayed on its feet.
Titan Black swerved his Speed Driver towards the monster. The front of his zord flipped open, revealing a missile rack.
The Black Ranger fired a volley of missiles that exploded against the monster with massive bursts of spark. The impact knocked Gajah from the giant, and he crashed against the ground below.
Titan Red spoke to his teammates through their communications consoles. "Let's combine. Titan Formation."
"But Black and Yellow haven't finished training," Titan Pink said.
"The spur of the moment can be an adventure too," Titan Red said. "Are you two ready."
"Of course!" Titan Yellow said.
"Let's do this," Titan Black said.
"Good," Titan Red said. "Driver-zords, assemble!"
He pressed a button on his Overdrive Tracker, connected to his control console: "FUSION SYSTEM, ON!"
"DUMP!"
"GYRO!"
"SPEED!"
"DOZER!"
"SUB!"
The Red Ranger swiped the device's small wheel, sparking a charge: "TITAN FORMATION!"
The five zords shifted shape and combined to form a massive robo. The Rangers grabbed their portable control consoles - Titan Drivers - and their chairs slid to a central cockpit. They slid their Titan Drivers into place.
"DriveMax Megazord!" Titan Red called out. "Titan Robo!"
They attached their Overdrive Trackers to their Titan Drivers. "First Gear, in!"
The Titan Robo armed a weapon shaped like a pickaxe. The Megazord chopped the axe into the ground; the impact created a shockwave that tore through the ground, shot towards KamiGolem, and exploded against the monster with bursts of spark.
The monster stomped forward, reached out with its massive arms, and grabbed the Megazord. KamiGolem squeezed, and explosions tore across the Megazord's armor.
Titan Robo swung a volley of punches that sparked on impact. The blows knocked the monster loose and sent it staggering backward.
The Megazord armed a shovel-shaped weapon.
"DriveMax Megazord Saber!" Titan Red shouted. The pickaxe and shovel combined to form a broadsword. "Titan Slash!"
The Megazord's engines whined with power, and the sword vibrated with energy. Titan Robo swung the blade through a crescent arc, then chopped through a streak of energy that ripped KamiGolem apart with massive bursts of spark.
The giant collapsed and exploded into pieces of stone and debris.
Shane and the rangers ran to the beach, where they found the Heart of the Ryujinn in the sand.
"Here it is," Jake said as he crouched next to the device. "It still looks safe."
Kelsey smiled with excitement and reached towards the Precious. "We did it."
"Don't touch it," Rose said.
She pulled a metallic card from her pocket and placed it on the sand. The card flashed with a red light and expanded to form a base. Rose lifted the Heart of the Ryujinn and placed it onto the base. The base expanded to form a black-and-silver colored box that surrounded the Precious.
"There." She stood and handed the box to Shane.
Will crossed his arms over his chest. "Mission complete, right?"
Jake shook his head and walked away.
Will narrowed his eyes. "What?"
"Cut it out, guys," Shane said. "Let's head back to base."
Suddenly, energy crackled from a nearby cliff.
"Bastards!" a voice shouted.
The rangers looked to see Gajah holding a scepter. The weapon crackled with orange electricity. The villain swung the scepter, which fired strands of energy that exploded around the rangers with bursts of spark, knocking them off their feet.
"You're wrong if you think there was only one treasure of the Ryujinn," Gajah said. "As long as I, Gajah, King of the Ryujinn remain, there will-"
A roar sounded from the ocean. A massive red serpent sprang from the water and snapped towards the shore. The giant serpent clamped its jaws around Gajah, swallowed the villain, and whipped back into the water.
To be continued...Chapter 04