Chapter Text
Pink, after all, was a diluted red. Ferin found herself musing on this as she watched her blood seep away from her weeping wounds and the pink décor delicately darken. Scorpina had given her maybe ten seconds’ pause after extracting her latest implement from Ferin’s belly. ‘I want you to savor each experience of pain,’ she’d said earlier. Ferin couldn’t help but notice that the temporary reprieve made the next pain worse.
Scorpina twirled the implement – a long, slender awl – in her fingers and gave Ferin a wicked smile. Ferin’s blood ran down it in little drops onto Scorpina’s fingers. More drops soaked into the cuffs of Scorpina’s long sleeves, spreading more wisps of crimson to color the dress. It hadn’t been white for a long time.
She leaned in close to Ferin. The Yellow Ranger couldn’t shy away – she was bound to the floor – but she would have if she could. She wished she hadn’t lost her pride quite so fast.
Scorpina’s teeth were slightly serrated. Ferin tried hard not to picture those teeth tearing into her. “Ready for a question?” Scorpina asked.
Ferin froze. It had been several rounds of torment since she’d been given that choice. She desperately wanted to say no, she’d take the pain instead, but she hesitated.
“It’s a harmless one,” Scorpina cooed. Ferin shut her eyes, and both of them knew the meaning. “What is the most evil thing you’ve ever done?”
At least it wasn’t a hard question. “I murdered Kiori.”
The slight pressure of Scorpina’s thigh against her still-naked hip vanished. Ferin’s eyes snapped open, heart racing, terrified she’d see Scorpina already in mid-strike. But the villainness was simply sitting next to her, an expression of surprise on her face.
“You did? Really?” she asked. She sounded delighted. “How?”
“Electrocution.”
Scorpina barked out a laugh. “Amazing! And they say Eltarians can’t be evil. You know, if I weren’t going to torture you to death, I think we might work out something of a friendship.”
It was the first time she’d said it in so many words, and Ferin couldn’t help but shudder. It was still possible that Zordon would save her, she reminded herself. If he didn’t, she had no idea how she’d die with the slightest shred of dignity. She’d had no concept of what torture at Scorpina’s hands meant.
“Now, what do you think? Hands next, or breasts?” Scorpina said in the same conversational, cheerful tone, twirling the thin rod.
The shudder turned into a sob. Tears mingled with streaks of blood on her cheeks, stinging as they rolled down to stain the room a delicate crimson pink.
*****
“Starting the sensor sweep,” Sarrai announced in response to her leader’s order. The Rangers had been on the bridge for about two minutes. Aemil was sitting uneasily in the captain’s seat while Atalanta and Sarrai were at their usual stations at communications and sensors, respectively, but only Sarrai was paying attention to her console. Atalanta was facing Aemil, arguing with her leader with impeccable respect but passion. Zordon was rigid, pacing back and forth as if trying to bleed off enough nervous energy to make himself stay on the ship. He hadn’t said a word since Aemil had shot down his own plan as reckless.
“It’ll take too long,” Atalanta protested. “Right now, the Wizard’s telling them to move the Terrans. If we have any hope of rescuing them before we lose almost all value from our intel so far, we can’t pause for a full sensor sweep. We know where she is. Probably.”
“I don’t like probablies,” Aemil said stubbornly, “especially not when it’s an obvious trap.”
“I know, sir!” Atalanta snapped uncharacteristically. She swept back behind one ear the strands of black-and-gray hair that had fallen into her eyes during the debate. The gesture seemed to help her restore her composure. Calmly, she said, “And if we were equally matched, I’d probably agree with you. But we’re not. Zordon’s right.”
“I am?” Zordon stopped his caged-tiger pacing to look at the Black Ranger.
“What’s the Terran expression you used? Go in…”
“Guns blazing,” Zordon finished. He was too startled by Atalanta’s endorsement to follow it up.
“But,” Atalanta added in that silence, “you have to take Sarrai.”
Zordon’s face went through at least three distinct expressions in quick succession. It settled on calm and rational. “If I’m going in at full power, she won’t be able to match me. Keeping her safe would limit what I can do.”
“Yes, it would,” Atalanta agreed. “That’s not a downside. Stop making excuses, sir, please. It’s beneath you.”
“I’m not…” Zordon started, but he hesitated. “I…”
“I’m sorry,” Sarrai said quickly.
Zordon looked at her squarely for the first time all day.
“I don’t understand, but I hurt you, and I’m sorry.” There were little flecks of fire at the corners of her eyes. “I’m so sorry. If you’re going to rip Ferin out of the hands of your worst nightmares, please let me catch you.”
Zordon’s composure finally cracked. His breath started coming fast and hard while his eyes darted anywhere else, like a caged animal.
“I’m fine,” he said, one last attempt. “I’m fine!”
So gently, Aemil put a hand over Zordon’s. The Blue Ranger was trembling all over. Aemil wondered how much he was reliving his own torture at Scorpina’s hands. Zordon met his eyes with tears swimming in his own. Aemil wanted to pretend not to see, knowing how Zordon hated to cry, but he didn’t dare look away from his Teammate yet. “No, you’re not,” Aemil whispered. “But we will be.” Zordon didn’t answer, but Aemil was pretty sure he’d at least heard.
The Team needed him to be decisive, and, to his surprise, Aemil found he knew what to do. “We follow the general outline of Zordon’s plan, but we go together and in Morph. They sure as Stars escalated this battle first. Agreed?”
Sarrai burst into a grin. Atalanta gave a pleased, rather fierce smile with her brisk nod. Last, reluctantly, Zordon nodded.
“You get her out,” Aemil told him. “We catch you.”
“Okay,” Zordon gave the barest whisper.
Aemil squeezed the Blue Ranger’s hand and let it drop, then put that hand behind his back. His fingers found the magical fold in space that Zordon had made to store his Morpher. “Guns blazing. Right,” he gulped. This was not at all his kind of plan. He found the cool solidity of his Morpher and thought of his Zord to steady himself. “IT’S MORPHIN TIME!”
“MASTODON!”
“PTERODACTYL!”
“TRICERATOPS!”
“TYRANNOSAURUS!”
*****
“You know, there is one other option,” Scorpina said in a languid, pleased tone. “Besides death, I mean. But first, I have a question. Would you like that?”
Ferin paused her sobs long enough to nod. “Please,” she whispered.
“Why does Zordon still fight with you?”
Ferin’s brow creased a moment in confusion, but terror drove her to figure out Scorpina’s meaning without asking. “He wouldn’t at first. I ran so he wouldn’t kill me.”
“Zordon, kill a Teammate? That would have been something. What changed?”
“He needed me, because of Serpentera. We’re not… not friends.” A wave of new panic rushed over her – had Zordon decided not to come? Was he finally punishing her for Kiori’s murder?
Scorpina chuckled. “Maybe he is,” she replied to Ferin’s thoughts. The Yellow Ranger’s mental guard had broken long ago. “But I don’t understand. What difference would one more Ranger make against Serpentera?”
“Because of the M-“ Ferin’s eyes, closed as they always were when she was answering Scorpina’s questions, flew open wide as she cut herself off. She shoved her thoughts away from the answer as hard and fast as she could. Scorpina had finally maneuvered her into almost revealing something that mattered.
Scorpina’s eyes went flat and hard with anger. “Oh come on, aren’t we past this?” she muttered. She drove her current tool, a slender, serrated knife, through Ferin’s hand.
Ferin screamed and bucked against the pain, but her instinctive reaction only drove it deeper into her. [Never. Resist. Me,] Scorpina sent into Ferin’s mind as the room filled with her screams.
“No! No!” Ferin screamed. It wasn’t fear – it was more refusal. The Ranger wasn’t nearly as broken as Scorpina had hoped. The villainness was professionally insulted. She twisted the knife and felt a satisfying scrape against bone. Ferin’s screams redoubled.
And the door burst open.
Scorpina twisted around, furious. “How dare you-“ she snarled before she saw who the intruder was. Then, she plunged the blade into the floor, through her toy’s hand, brushed off her own hands, and stood.
“Are you finished yet?” Zedd said in a bored tone.
“Do I look finished?” Scorpina demanded. “You just interrupted a critical moment. Go away.”
Zedd rolled his eyes. “I’m helping you. You don’t want to be caught without results to show when Rita gets here.”
The effect was electric. Scorpina went ramrod straight, wonder and shock replacing fury. “Empress Rita? Here?”
“Arguable. But Rita, here.”
A chuckle bubbled up from deep in her that set Ferin’s heart racing again. “Well, that changes things for us, doesn’t it,” she murmurred down to the Yellow Ranger.
“Do you need help finishing up with her in time?” Zedd teased.
Scorpina glared murder at him. “I was breaking Power Rangers when you were in diapers.”
Zedd barked out an incredulous laugh. “I doubt it!”
“Want to bet?”
Zedd saw something in Scorpina’s expression that made him hesitate. Distantly, Ferin was very glad she couldn’t see it. “One day,” he said coolly. “But not today. If I want to keep Rita’s favor, I really can’t waste time right now chatting with slaves.”
Scorpina’s rage broke loose in a snarl. Zedd gave her a little, nasty smile and left, shutting the softly pink door behind him.
Knowing her reprieve was over, Ferin felt more tears fall. It surprised her. She thought she didn’t have any more to shed.
With strangely delicate grace, Scorpina sank to Ferin’s side again, folding her legs under her. “Now then,” she murmurred, “let’s discuss that other option. It seems we’d need to move fast on it. Once my Empress arrives, if you’re still resisting, she will take you herself. I wonder if she’d be gentler or harsher with you than she was with Allaise?” Scorpina savored the burst of anger and grief from Ferin for a moment before continuing. “I’d be curious to find out. But I do like our other option better. Ask me.”
The sharp tip of one of Scorpina’s fingernails idly traced a shallow, ragged cut that stretched from Ferin’s chin to her collarbone. Ferin gave a whimper. “What is it?” she asked obediently.
Scorpina smiled. “I cast a little spell. You relax and let me.”
Ferin chanced a look at her torturer, eyeing her for sincerity.
“Then there’s no more torture. No more pain. No more of all that insipid Light crap that got you into this mess, either.” She pressed the sharp tip of her nail into the cut, deepening the wound just enough to make it bleed again. The young Ranger whimpered but didn’t even try to resist. “You go free – for the first time in your life. You think you’ve felt the Power, but you never have. Just the tiniest diluted drops of it available on the Light. Lay back and don’t fight me, and you’ll be more powerful than you ever dreamed.”
Ferin’s terrified, exhausted mind finally caught up. “Evil,” she whispered. She remembered vaguely learning at some point that spells to turn someone evil had a greater effect if the victim didn’t fight. Like Scorpina’s questions, Ferin wanted to refuse, but she hesitated. She could be done. No more pain.
“You could try to hold out for some miracle rescuer who’s probably not coming. I think you know you won’t last that long. I’ve played with your type before. You’re so dedicated to resisting that your sanity will give out before you really break. You’ll tell me everything then, sure, but there’ll be nothing left of you after. So, you can refuse, I go back to torturing you, and we’ll see if your mind shatters before or after Empress Rita does so much worse than kill you. Or you can be done.”
Scorpina leaned in close, lips brushing Ferin’s blood-soaked ear. “One chance. What do you say?”