Power Rangers 1. Chapter 1

To say Sky wasn't a happy camper would be an understatement. According to their teacher, they would be getting a new recruit today. Already, the idea was unorthodox. Sky was in the sixteen to seventeen age group; he'd had years and years of training in the Academy, just to get him to this point. They just didn't _bring_ new recruits in this late in the game. It just didn't happen.

But that was just the tip of the iceberg. His class wasn't a particularly large one as standard Academy years went. He and a couple of the other boys had their own quarters. Well, not anymore. The commander had informed him very succinctly that he would be sharing his quarters with the newcomer from this day forth.

Of course, he'd argued that as the top of the class, he'd earned his right to his own quarters. It wasn't necessarily written in the rules, but it might as well have been. Top students got top rooming picks.

Doctor Manx had been there, though, and she'd been all too quick to rebut the point. Apparently, it was _because_ he was the top boy that he would be getting the new roommate. She said a lot of the other boys in his class were a little too volatile – her words, not his – for the new boy to be around for such an extended period of time.

The assertion had only served to confirm Sky's belief that this new guy simply wasn't suited to Academy life. If he was too wet behind the ears to handle a guy his age, then he didn't need to be there training to be part of S.P.D.

Not that he got a chance to point that out. No, Doctor Manx and his teacher had made it clear that "that was that" and he was just going to have to go along with it.

That didn't mean he had to be happy about it.

Still, he couldn't deny that he was curious as he started back to his quarters after dinner. There had to be a reason that the Academy would make such an unorthodox exception to the rules. He guessed he would see what all the hype was about when he got to his quarters. Apparently, the kid was already getting settled in, so he would be in there when he got there.

Sliding his badge over the reader by the door, he waited for the wall of metal to give way and let him into his room.

The change was obvious the moment he stepped inside. There had always been two beds in his room – they were standard for cadet quarters – but now, there were actually signs of life on the other side of the room. The shelves weren't exactly teeming or anything, but there was the odd trinket here and there, now. Most of it looked like junk salvaged from a yard, and Sky didn't want to think about just what exactly it all was.

Even with the trinkets, compared to his side of the room, it was practically bare. And come to think of it, there was no new kid in sight.

Shrugging, Sky got his sleep clothes together and started for the bathroom. Just as he reached the door, though, it opened, and he hit something solid and a hell of a lot smaller than the door was.

Whatever – or, more accurately, _whomever_ – he hit, he and they both ended up on the ground. The other was quicker to get up than he was, practically hopping back to his feet whereas Sky gracefully pushed himself back up.

He found himself face to flushed face with another boy, and frankly, there was no way in hell this kid was sixteen. He was about a head shorter than Sky was, with a long, narrow face. His wild brown hair stuck out in too many different directions to count atop his head, and he seemed to be made up of long, coltish limbs. He was wearing the standard issue, gray S.P.D. Academy pajamas and white t-shirt, and they didn't do anything to build up his posture.

They had to be kidding him.

Almost immediately, the surprise faded from the new kid's face, and it was replaced with a broad smile that showed off straight white teeth and impossible dimples. He thrust out his hand towards Sky. "Hi. I'm Bridge Carson. I'm thirteen years old, and I'm not really sure what I'm doing here. Well, I mean, I know what I'm doing _here._ I'm sleeping here, or at least, I'm supposed to be, but I don't really sleep that much anyway. Don't worry, though; I won't make any noise while you're trying to sleep if I've tried to sleep but didn't do as well as you did."

As Bridge continued, Sky felt the vein on the side of his head popping more and more. This kid…God, it was like he didn't have an off button. He was practically thrumming with constant energy. Sky wondered if maybe he could cut the introduction short just by taking his hand, but the moment he reached for his hand, Bridge suddenly pulled it back.

"Sorry, I forgot," he said quickly, and slipped past Sky to run to his side of the room. Sitting on his bed was a pair of black leather gloves that he quickly pulled on, before turning back to Sky. He offered his hand again, and then cringed. "Oh, right, sorry. That probably looked really rude. I'm not putting the gloves on because I don't want to shake your hand or anything. That would be kind of weird, wouldn't it? I just don't touch things. It's better if I don't touch things, and especially if I don't touch people. It's okay with the gloves, though."

He nodded his head towards his outstretched, gloved hand, and hesitantly, Sky reached out and took it. The moment his hand settled in the other boy's, he felt something weird, like a tingle in his fingers. It felt a lot like he felt when he summoned his shields, only muted. He shrugged it off, though.

"Sky Tate," he said, giving Bridge's small, slender hand a quick shake before letting it go and returning to his bed.

Bridge was still standing where he'd left him by the time Sky sat down on his bed. "Sky," Bridge repeated, a smile pulling at his youthful face. Those dimples made another appearance, and Sky couldn't help marveling at the damn things. He'd never seen anyone over the age of ten with dimples and a smile like that; it was the sort of smile that had women cooing and girls swooning all at the same time. In all his seventeen years of life, Sky was pretty sure he'd never had a smile like that. His was always more on the cool, charming side rather than that bright beam stretched across the younger boy's face. "That's a cool name. I wish I had a cool name. You get the clouds and the birds and the sun. I don't get jack. I get water under me and lots of people burning me. Why can't "bridge" ever be used in happy idioms?"

"Bridge?"

"Yeah, Sky?"

"You talk _entirely_ too much."

For some reason, instead of blushing or frowning, or any other reasonable reaction, Bridge just smiled that smile of his and backed up until he was sitting on his bed. "Yeah, Sky, I get that a lot," he said. "I don't like the quiet, so I tend to think out loud. One thing leads to another – one thing _always_ leads to another. Bees lead to queens, which makes me think of Ancient England, which makes me want tea, which makes me think of how people stick their pinkies out when they're trying to look important, which reminds me of the time my dad—"

And suddenly, Bridge stopped. Of course, Sky had been just about to tell him to cut it out, so he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

All the same, he couldn't help wondering why the boy had suddenly shut up. As he laid down and shut off the lights, his thoughts continued to run rampant. What was a thirteen-year-old doing in his age group? And a _new_ thirteen-year-old, at that. And what was the deal with those gloves of his, anyway?

It would be another few months before things started to make sense, but that was the day Sky first met Bridge Carson.


	2. Chapter 2

From the moment Bridge arrived at the Academy, Sky was quite certain he was the most annoying person he'd ever met.

And he was friends with Sydney Drew.

That said, as the months wore on, he found himself gaining a new respect for the odd teen. It had started as frustration – maybe even fury – that first time when he arrived at the test score boards and found, to his surprise, that his name was _not_ at the top of every chart. Oh, he still had half of them. The charts for civics, combat, and leadership still bore the name Schuyler Tate in the number one position. However, in computational technology, mechanics, and problem solving, the name Bridge Carson took his place. He was still the second best in those areas, but still...he was used to being first in all of them.

Of course, then he got to know him a little better. Bridge would stay up until lights out tinkering with a computer, writing some new impossible program for some random thing. That, or he would find him in the mechanics lab with one of the Technician Trainees, Boom, tinkering with a bunch of scrap parts until they turned it into something useful. He figured out around that time what all the little pieces of junk were that littered Bridge's shelves – they were salvaged bits of metal and wires that he'd turned into something uniquely..._odd_.

As for problem solving...well, Bridge had his habits for that. Sky couldn't count the number of times he'd found the younger boy standing on his head. Apparently, it helped him think to stand on his head; he said the ideas flowed better. Sky informed him that it was probably just the blood rushing to his brain.

It wasn't just academics, though, that Bridge caught Sky's attention in. When he'd first started in combat training, Sky hadn't known what to expect. As far as he'd known, Bridge hadn't had any prior experience. It seemed like he was right on that count, because the first time he practiced on the mats, he got the floor wiped with him.

But the second time he fought, it was a different story. Every hit he'd taken in the fight before, he'd thought of some way to avoid. Most of the time, it involved some twist or contortion of his body; more often than not, he ended up on the floor. Somehow, though, even when one of his self-taught flips or twists landed him on the mat, he'd stay in the fight. Every day, he was getting better, between hand-to-hand and weapons, and anything else they tried him at. If he couldn't get it the first time, Sky would find him in the training room in his spare time practicing over and over again until he could do it like he'd been doing it all his life.

The only problem was, none of the instructors ever took the time to teach him how to do things. It seemed to Sky that he was expected to know how to do things, and if he couldn't, then that wasn't their problem. He knew they probably had to do that, to be honest; playing favorites never worked out well in training. It didn't exactly turn out badly for Bridge, either; he just ended up with a distinctly _Bridge_ way of doing everything.

Sometimes, though, especially as they got closer, Sky would help him. There were things that you just didn't let a thirteen-year-old teach himself.

So, between hours of hard practice, countless late-night study sessions, and months of just generally being around one another, it would've been impossible for the two of them _not_ to become close. He guessed he was sort of lucky, too, in that for the most part, his other friends had accepted his tentative friendship with Bridge as well. Syd, for one, had practically adopted the younger boy. She doted on him like a mother hen, always accusing Sky of taking it too hard on him, or not looking after him well enough.

The irony of it was that Sky knew all the "extra special" attention made Bridge a little uncomfortable. He wouldn't say that, though, because for one, Bridge seemed to have grounded his normally flippant friend. On the reverse side of that, Syd looked after Bridge. The kid had a tendency of getting so caught up in things, he forgot to do other things that seemed like common sense to others. Eating, for instance (though that one was quite rare), or remembering which way around his shirt was supposed to go. One time, he'd walked around with his trademark gloves on the wrong hand for a whole day. Even Sky sometimes had to remind him of things, like the meaning of "lights out."

Of course, the latter he didn't hold against the younger man. Whatever went on in that head of his at night, Sky sometimes got the feeling that it wasn't all that pleasant. There had been a few rare occasions where he'd actually woken up to the sounds of the young boy murmuring or whining in his sleep. His long limbs would twist in the sheets, and his shirt would always ride up around his jutting ribs. Sky was certain that had it not been for the lean muscle definition, he'd be skeletal. With all he ate, the kid had to have a hell of a metabolism.

The problem was that not _every_ one of Sky's friends got on with Bridge as well as Syd did. It wasn't until the day their deployment announcements came out that he was made aware of just how big of an issue that was.

It was getting pretty late, and Sky hadn't been able to find anyone but Syd since he got his deployment letter. He was relieved to find that both he and Syd would be staying on Earth base, to continue their training to be Rangers. He needed to find Dru, though, and Bridge (assuming the youngster _got_ a deployment letter). After checking in the mess hall, his quarters, the rec. room, and the lab, he was down to his last idea as to where either of his friends could be. Bridge had been trying to work on his upper body strength, so he thought he would probably be in the workout room doing reps or working on the suspended course.

He heard the yelling before he even got the door open. It was a good thing most of the halls were empty – most people were out celebrating their deployments – because otherwise, another cadet probably would've called a commander on them.

Then again, he thought as he stepped inside the workout room, maybe that wouldn't have been such a bad thing.

The first thing he saw was few of Dru's friends. Sky had never really liked those guys too much, but he tolerated them because of Dru. Now, they were all huddled around something on the ground, and a figure that looked a lot like Dru was on his knees in the middle of the circle. It wasn't until he got closer that he realized that there were actually a couple of guys on the ground – Dru, a couple of his friends, and…Bridge.

Dru's voice was the first to catch Sky's ears. "Aw, look, the little dweeb's a germaphobe! What's wrong with your hands there, runt?"

That's when it hit him. Dru had Bridge pinned on the ground. He had a knee on the smaller boy's back, and a couple of his friends were holding his shoulders and feet still. Dru had a grip on one of Bridge's wrists, and he'd twisted it behind his back.

His glove was missing.

"How about a high-five, protégé, for stealing my spot in S.P.D.?"

The moment Dru's hand touched Bridge's bare skin, the younger boy let out a cry. Sky was already running towards the group, and threw the two nearest cadets out of his way to get to the middle of the circle.

When Bridge had first let out the cry, everyone had laughed. Now, though, as the real timbre of the cry seeped in – fear, anger, _agony_ – the smiles had fallen from their faces. Dru's three buddies had released their hold on the younger boy, and Dru himself had an odd look on his face.

It wasn't there for long. With more force than he probably needed, Sky grabbed his friend's shoulder and threw him back away from his roommate.

As soon as the weight was off him, Bridge scrambled forward. He didn't quite manage to push himself onto his feet, and he kept his ungloved hand tucked against his chest as he pressed himself back against the nearest wall.

Sky wasn't far behind him, hurrying over and dropping to his knees in front of the thirteen-year-old. Bridge had his gloved hand twisted in his hair like his head hurt, and his eyes were clenched tight. With his knees tucked to his chest, Bridge rocked back and forth, muttering to himself frantically.

Casting a furious glance over his shoulder, Sky immediately took control of the situation. "Dru! Why the hell are you just standing there? Go get Doctor Manx, now!"

He didn't wait to see if Dru did what he said, though he could hear his shoes on the mats. Instead, he turned his attention back to Bridge. He reached a hand for his shoulder, trying to get him to loosen the ball he'd curled into, but Bridge gave a cry and jerked away.

"Don't touch me!" he shouted, and tried to shove Sky away.

Sky didn't let him. Using his advanced height and longer wingspan to his advantage, he pushed Bridge's arms out of the way and grabbed his shoulders. "Bridge!" he said sharply. "Bridge, I need you to look at me!" He was trying hard not to lose his cool, and Bridge's unresponsiveness wasn't doing him any favors. He tried to keep himself occupied by doing a spot check for injuries. As he ran his hands down Bridge's uniformed arms and legs, he tried to get his attention again. "Did they hurt you?"

"I touched him," Bridge whimpered hysterically. "I touched him and I saw him, and it burned my eyes. I'm not supposed to touch things, not supposed to touch people. I see them, and it burns my head." He let out an agonized sound, somehow mixed between a sob and a scream, as he fisted his hand tighter into his hair. "It hurts so bad. My head, Sky, it's so loud in here. It's too bright!"

Sky had no idea what he was talking about. He thought maybe he was having a panic attack, and he'd learned in field medicine class that the first thing to do to quell hysteria was to keep the person from working themselves up worse. That meant getting his attention, and since talking wasn't doing it apparently, he reached for him.

The moment the skin of his palm met Bridge's reddened cheek, he felt a sort of spark. The spark was followed by a scream, though, on Bridge's part, as the smaller teen tried to shove him away again. Sky held his ground, though, forcing Bridge's head up out of his chest.

"Shh, Bridge, look at me," he said firmly, pressing his other hand to the other side of Bridge's angular face. "It's just me, okay? The others are gone. You're safe now, okay, so just look at me."

And after a long moment, he did. At first, there was nothing but fear and pain in his eyes, but after a moment, a look of almost confusion seeped into the mix.

"Bridge? Bridge, what's wrong?" He didn't like that look.

"You don't hurt," he said softly.

"Of course I don't," Sky said. "I'd never hurt you, Bridge."

But Bridge shook his head. He seemed to promptly decide that wasn't a good idea – his face paled and his jaw clenched – but all the same, that look of wonder was there. "_You_ don't hurt. Your colors…soft and blue…you don't burn."

It was the first tear that welled in Bridge's young eyes that broke Sky's heart. He had no idea what was going on in Bridge's head, but from what Sky could see, he was just a thirteen-year-old boy who'd just been scared out of his wits. He needed to be comforted, and though Sky wasn't exactly the leading authority in that subject, he knew exactly what to do.

As gently as he could – he didn't want to scare him, and on the off chance Dru and his gang _had _hurt Bridge for real, he didn't want to make it worse – he wrapped his arms around the smaller boy and pulled him close.

And for the first time in the nearly half a year Sky had known him, through broken bones and failures and nightmares, Bridge started to cry. It registered vaguely to Sky that this should've made him feel awkward. After all, he wasn't the comforting type. But kneeling there, holding his scared, shaking young friend, while he waited for help to come, Sky somehow felt _right._ He felt like this was where he was supposed to be, and as Dru showed up with Doctor Manx, and the latter started to ease the younger boy out of his arms, he felt like he'd just lost something precious.

"You're going to be okay, Bridge," Doctor Manx said.

"He's just overreacting! I barely even touched him!" Dru protested.

Doctor Manx turned to him, and Sky could've sworn he heard her hiss. "Barely touching a psychometric is enough, Cadet Harrington. There's a reason he wears those gloves. Now report to your quarters. I believe you have some packing to do."

Dru opened his mouth to retort, but with a withering look from Doctor Manx, he left the room.

Shortly after, Doctor Manx and some medics took Bridge to the medical bay. Sky couldn't help following them, and he stood by his friend as the doctor sedated him.

He found out a lot of things that day. He found out Dru wasn't quite the person he thought he was, but he also found out that Dru wouldn't be around long enough for the two of them to make amends. He was being deployed to the Nebula Academy.

He found out what that spark he'd felt was, too. He'd felt Bridge's powers, his "psychometry." He found out why Bridge wore those gloves, and why he took special care not to leave his skin exposed. Sky didn't blame him for it, either. At first, he'd thought being able to read another person with a touch would be useful, but then, he'd seen Bridge. He'd said it was so bright, that it burned. Doctor Manx had explained it wasn't just seeing, but _feeling_ everything as well. To feel that many different emotions from different people, all from a touch…well, it was no wonder Bridge was strange.

And even though he didn't have the power of psychometry or empathy like Bridge, he'd learned a lot about the kind of person Bridge really was. At thirteen years old, he was one of the bravest people Sky knew. To know that a single touch could spark a debilitating migraine, could reduce him to a screaming, writhing mess, and to still face people every day…it was amazing. And to do it all with that smile on his face, with that same chipper disposition.

That was the day Sky truly learned to respect Bridge Carson.


	3. Chapter 3

Bridge was not a quiet sleeper. He didn't snore or anything; that would've been way too normal for Bridge. No, it was just...Bridge always had this constant energy, like he was thrumming with it, and it stayed with him even when he slept. He would shift in his sleep, twisting in his sheets until it was hard to tell where the fabric ended and Bridge began.

At first, it drove Sky mad. Absolutely up the walls, in fact. He himself had always been a light sleeper, so it would take him forever to get to sleep. He'd even tried ear plugs once, but he'd missed the wake up drill the next morning, so that just wasn't an option.

After a while, though, he got used to it. By the time they got their deployments, for instance, he wasn't even sure he could sleep without the added noise in the room. Luckily for him, it didn't come to that; Bridge got the same assignments as he did. The thirteen-year-old became the youngest person in history to be accepted into Ranger Squad training.

Now, three years later, he'd gotten to the point where Bridge's sleep had become somewhat of a staple in his life. He wasn't exactly sure when it had started, but he found himself more and more just sitting there, watching his best friend sleep. He knew it was odd, really he did, and he tried to get himself to stop, but there was just something so…peaceful about it.

It wasn't like he looked _serene_ in his sleep. No, Sky had never seen anyone move around as much as Bridge did when he slept. It seemed all that twisting he did back when he first got to the Academy wasn't just some sort of childish phase. If he'd calmed down any, it wasn't by much, and Sky would still awake some mornings to find his friend so tangled in his sheets that he was amazed each and every time Bridge managed to extract himself without falling flat on his face.

Of course, there were times when he _didn't_. Those were the times Sky would laugh, but only after secretly assessing his friend to make sure he was okay. Sometimes, if he was feeling especially generous, or the fall looked like it would hurt particularly badly, he would make a shield beneath him to soften the blow.

Still, as much as he moved, there was something decidedly relaxed about him. Bridge was an innately happy person, and everyone that met him figured that out pretty fast. There was always a certain tension about him, though, that Sky didn't think that a lot of people picked up on. With his powers, he always had to be on guard. He had to keep his shield up, lest he get blasted with the feelings of everyone on base. With his gloves, and their long-sleeved uniforms, he didn't have to worry so much about touching people, but there were times….

After all, as it turned out, Bridge was a very physical person. He loved hugs, or standing impossibly close to someone when there was absolutely no reason to. That was something else that had annoyed Sky at first, but after he got to know him, and he got to understanding, he could sympathize. He'd lived the first thirteen years of his life deprived of positive social interaction – physical or otherwise.

God, that was another thing, too. The nightmares. Sky wasn't exactly the most blessed when it came to subconscious conjuring – he'd had his fair share of past traumas to color plenty of nightmares – but Bridge...

The younger cadet was never really forthcoming with his back story. Sky would've thought for all he talked that something would've had to slip out just from pure statistical probability. He'd learned pretty quickly though, that Bridge _never_ ran out of things to talk about. From random things on the news to trivial facts in quantities that no human being had a right to know, he could talk for hours on end and not run out of things to say. Sometimes, it was endearing; sometimes, it was annoying; whatever it was, though, it was always entirely and uniquely Bridge. Besides, sometimes something serious or meaningful would slip through the cracks. A compliment, for instance, usually aimed at Sky, but also distributed to pretty much anyone he met.

It was the times when Bridge _stopped_ talking, though, that Sky found out the most about him. It was those times, when getting the younger man to talk was like pulling teeth and gargling turpentine, that Bridge would say the things that made Sky's heart break for the younger man.

Like that one night a few months ago, after their first official day of Ranger training. Bridge was sixteen, and Sky was twenty. Their drill instructor had been a real bastard, even by S.P.D. drill instructor standards. Sky wasn't sure why exactly, but he seemed to have taken it as a personal affront that Command would stick a bean pole of a teenage kid in _his_ training class. How that man had screamed and hollered and just generally _bullied_ Bridge that whole three-hour initiate course…Sky had tried to step in, but his every effort was quashed as soon as he made it.

Somehow, though, Bridge had made it through, and Sky had felt that increasingly familiar surge of pride and _something else_ that he felt every time Bridge did something spectacular. He'd done every exercise, performed every task, and he'd soared above his classmates with that typical accidental excellence of his.

It wasn't until Sky found him throwing up in their quarters, in too much pain from one of his migraines to even stand, that he realized just how much it had taken for the youth to do that. He, having more experience with that particular scenario than he cared to think about, had promptly dimmed all the lights in the room, fetched Bridge's analgesics from his cabinet, and hunkered down for an evening of quiet reading and Bridge-tending. Not that there was much to the latter part – he sometimes thought he looked after the other more than he cared to be looked over.

Of course, then there were the times where Bridge would do his honest best to keep Sky within arm's reach. Evenings like that, he'd grab his book or manual or whatever he was reading, and squeeze in next to Bridge on his admittedly small bed. The size wasn't so bad, he guessed, because Bridge would always curl into Sky's side, sometimes even resting his head in Sky's lap. Oddly, Sky wouldn't mind, not even when Syd would drop by to check on "her boys" and end up teasing him for it. Bridge would be too far out of it, between the headache and the painkillers to even register that she was there, and Sky would be too relieved that Bridge was comfortable to care about Syd's teasing.

Besides, if he was being honest, he really didn't mind being nestled up close to the younger boy. Bridge made him feel needed, and Bridge never kept it a secret how much he appreciated Sky.

This was one of those times, and it was when Sky thought Bridge was dead asleep in his lap that he found out more about Bridge than he had in all their years of friendship.

"I screwed up again, Sky," he mumbled. At first, he thought he was just talking in his sleep, but then the younger boy shifted a little bit. He wasn't looking at Sky, but at the wall directly in front of him.

Sky paused in his reading, and knotted his eyebrows. "You didn't screw up," he said simply. Sometimes when he was like this, Bridge would say things without really meaning to, and Sky would have to set him straight, but that would be that and he'd let it go and go back to sleep. Not today, though.

"You didn't see him," Bridge replied.

Sensing that this conversation was going to take a little longer than expected, Sky marked his place in his book and set it on the bedside table before he responded. "I was there, Bridge. I saw him."

"No, you didn't." Bridge sounded so matter-of-fact, like he knew something Sky didn't. As much as that used to frustrate him, Sky had come to accept that was a strong possibility. "Not really."

Ah, this was one of _those_ things. Bridge's powers. Given their current freak out, it didn't seem like that much of a leap to think they'd gone a little haywire during training. Maybe he'd seen something he hadn't liked.

"The colors," he said knowingly, with a sort of half sigh. It wasn't that he was annoyed with it or anything, it just bothered him that he couldn't understand his best friend any better.

Bridge nodded into Sky's leg, and Sky rested a sympathetic hand in his hair. He'd been hesitant to touch Bridge at first, after finding out about his abilities, but according to Bridge, his "colors" were different. He'd worked on building up his mental shields – you don't have a psychic as a best friend without taking a few precautions – and he was already a calm person. Even when Bridge's powers were on the fritz, he could touch his skin without sending the young man reeling.

"He was so…red. They're always red when they yell. My dad was always burning when he…he wasn't very nice. Not like you, Sky." Suddenly, Bridge shifted so that he was lying on his back, staring up at Sky with a goofy grin on his face. His eyes were still squinted – his headache was persisting – but it was good to see the smile back in place. "You're gonna be a Ranger, Sky."

Sky chuckled. "Yeah, that's me. The next Red Ranger."

Eyes sliding closed, Bridge nodded. "Yep," he agreed, his voice thick with sleep. And just when Sky thought he'd nodded off, he added, "But you'd look good in blue, too."

Something about the way he said it, about the peaceful look on his face or the earnest in his voice, sent a spark through Sky. His heart jumped, and the corners of his mouth pulled up.

That was the day Sky learned to love Bridge Carson.


	4. Chapter 4

"Bridge, you really should eat something," Syd insisted as the trio's youngest member continued to pace through the Rec Room. She herself had a very nice fruit bowl sitting in front of her, and Sky's bowl of cereal was sitting next to her. The man himself had gone back into the kitchenette to fetch something, leaving her alone with the twitchy teen.

It was times like this that reminded Syd of just how young Bridge really was. He was always a little aloof and confused, but right now, the seventeen-year-old was downright bouncy. He blatantly refused to sit still long enough to even eat, and frankly, she was starting to get tired just watching him.

Not that she could blame him. They were getting their squad assignments in a couple of hours, and she herself could only pray that she'd end up in the same squad as her boys. After all, they'd been together for four years. She got the feeling it was especially bad in Bridge's case. The teen didn't get a chance to get really close to a lot of the people at S.P.D. given his unique personality and abilities. He was hard to follow on the best of days, and frankly a little annoying on the worst. It wasn't his fault or anything, it was just how he was. As the years went on, he and Sky had become best friends, and getting separated would be hard on the teen.

Sky would never admit it, but Syd knew it would be hard on him, too. He thought he was tough and all, but she knew him better than he thought she did. She saw those looks he gave Bridge when he thought no one was looking. There was affection in those icy cold eyes of his – a chink in the armor, she thought. She'd never say it out loud, but she did sometimes wonder if there was more than a brotherly love going on there.

"I'm too nervous to eat!" Bridge exclaimed, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet. "Or, you know, not really nervous, but I've got that feeling like my stomach's all heavy, like I swallowed a lead weight or something. That's a funny saying, isn't it? Swallowing a lead weight. I mean, who would swallow a lead weight? They can't _taste_ good, and what if you—"

Bridge was cut off by a hand on his shoulder, and he turned around to see Sky standing behind him with an eyebrow arched amusedly. He had one hand behind his back, and used the other to steer Bridge into the seat next to where he'd been sitting on one of the sofas.

"If you don't eat now, you'll be starving later," Sky said simply.

"But I'm too nervous to eat—" He pauses as Sky takes his hand from behind his back. Balanced on his palm is a plate stacked high with squares of glowing perfection. "Toast," Bridge finished, and his eyes flitted longingly between Sky and the toast. "Is it…?" He raised a hand and wiggled his fingers.

Sky nodded gravely. "The butteriest."

Bridge's eyes suddenly lit up, and Sky could've sworn he heard the hallelujah chorus somewhere. The lanky teen took the plate reverently, and with all the glee of a child in a candy store, he took a giant bite out of the first piece of toast.

"It's so good," he said around a mouthful of buttered bread and an impossibly wide smile.

The compliment came as Sky was picking his own bowl of cereal back up off the table. He knew full well that it was soggy by now, but the smile on Bridge's face was so worth it. It was sort of unfair the way Bridge wielded that smile, but Sky guessed it was hard to hold it against him when he didn't even know the effect it had. Besides, Sky loved that smile. Not that he'd ever tell anyone that – especially not Bridge. He didn't even know if Bridge would understand the concept.

Suddenly, a piece of toast appeared in front of his face, and he turned to see Bridge holding it out to him with that same grin. "You want some, Sky? It's really buttery."

Insert finger wiggle.

Sky chanced a glance at Syd, who as it happened looked about one step away from exploding. She looked like she wanted to laugh.

He chose to ignore it, and instead shook his head at Bridge. "You have it," he said. Truth be told, he didn't understand what the allure was with buttered toast. Granted he didn't have much of an appetite that morning. Squad assignments came out today, and…well, it went without saying that he had hopes for how it would go. Squads spent all their time together, after all. If he and Bridge got put in separate squads, he didn't know what he'd do.

As the time rolled around to hear their squads, Sky figured he better start figuring that out. After all, he'd been way too lucky so far, staying on Earth with his two friends while over half of the class was weeded out and sent to other bases. Surely he was running out of luck by now.

At least he wasn't the only one feeling the heat, though. As he looked around him at all the other cadets lined up awaiting their instructions, he saw more than a few sweaty brows. Sky hoped he looked a lot cooler on the outside.

It seemed even Bridge wasn't immune to the tension. The teen was shifting his weight back and forth from side to side, and his jaw clenched and unclenched steadily. He looked a little bit pale, actually.

Everyone in the room suddenly straightened, as Commander Cruger entered the room. "Cadets," he said.

"Sir!" all the cadets replied in unison as they saluted.

"I'm sure you are all eager to hear your squad assignments, but before I give them, it is imperative that you understand what these squads signify. These squads will become your families. You will spend your days with them, training, studying, and even sleeping. See to it that you learn to work together; only then can your squad reach its true potential."

"Sir!"

"Very good, cadets. When I call your name, come to the front. You will receive your new bunk assignments and training schedules. H-Squad…"

With each name Cruger called that wasn't his, Sky felt his heartbeat quicken. One by one, through Squads H, G, F and on, the cadets went to the front where they met up with their fellow squad members and received their new orders.

"B-Squad…Schuyler Tate."

From the moment Sky heard his name, everything seemed to move in slow motion. As he made his way gracefully through the remaining people – this would be the last squad to be called, meaning the rest of these unfortunate cadets would be continuing their training – he felt like each step was a mile. It wasn't until he was standing in the front, his back to the rest of the cadets in full salute in front of Cruger that the commander called the next name.

"Sydney Drew."

Sky was careful to keep his face carefully schooled as he was hit with a wave of equal-parts relief and concern. Only one more spot in the initial squad. He for one thought that Bridge was the most qualified of any of the remaining cadets. He topped every score that Sky didn't, and his record was utterly impeccable.

But then, he was also young. Twenty-one was the standard age for squad assignments, and though Sky and Syd both met that age requirement, Bridge was only seventeen. He was also a little spacey, even on the best of days. It wasn't like it made him ineffective or anything; Bridge had his way of doing things, and it wasn't any less productive, it was just different. Command might not see it that way, though, and he worried that his differences could mean that Sky would be forced to separate from _his_ Bridge.

He almost couldn't hear anything over the thudding of his heart in his ears, but somehow, someway, he heard the last name leave Cruger's lips.

"Bridge Carson."

If Sky had been any less steely than he was, he probably would've collapsed to the floor in a pool of boneless relief right then and there. It was only through sheer will power (and the knowledge that Commander Cruger was staring straight at him) that Sky managed to keep what he was sure would have been the mother of all dopey grins off his face.

Bridge came to stand next to him, and right then, Sky could've died a happy man. Sure, it would mean more years of secretly pining for someone who probably didn't understand the concept of love. It would mean rooming with the oblivious object of said secret pining, training with him, and essentially spending all hours of the day with him, but if he was being honest, it was better than nothing.

He'd learned a couple months ago, after a particularly bad episode with his powers left Bridge under over-night observation in the medical bay, that he literally couldn't sleep without the young man making his usual noise. Besides, it wasn't like he was going to get into the dating scene _anyway_. He didn't have time for things like that.

That was his story, and he was sticking to it.

Needless to say, he was floating on a pretty nice high as he accepted his orders from Cruger and headed out to start packing up his things.

"Looks like we're roomies again," he commented as he reviewed his papers. It was in a different hallway, though, so they would still have to move.

He expected Bridge to go on one of his non-stop rants in response – probably something about the likelihood of being in the same room, or how he was going to move his stuff, or some other _something_ that he couldn't begin to understand – so one could understand his surprise when all he got was a noncommittal "hmm."

"Something wrong?" he asked. It wasn't like Bridge to be so quiet. He wondered if maybe all the excitement of the day had gotten to him. Surely being an empathy crammed in a room with so many other anxious cadets couldn't have been a pleasant experience.

Bridge smiled, though Sky noticed it didn't quite reach his eyes, and shook his head. "I'm good," he said. "Just thinking is all. You know how I like to think."

Yes, Sky did know how he liked to think. He liked to think _out loud_, and the fact that he wasn't talking was seriously starting to make Sky worry. Could it be possible that Bridge wasn't happy with this assignment? He couldn't think of anything he'd done to make Bridge want to get in another group; he'd always thought Bridge was happy being around him. But he was obviously upset about _something_.

Obviously, though, he wasn't getting anywhere pushing. He decided to wait a few hours, maybe until they'd finished getting settled in their new quarters, so that everything could chill out and maybe Bridge would be back to normal. If not, he'd sit him down and have a talk. After all, the silent treatment wasn't a great way to get this new squad started.

If he'd thought his mind was reeling that morning, he couldn't imagine what it was now. As he got all of his things packed, the room was quiet, and it gave his mind plenty of free space to wander. Frankly, he didn't like the places it was going, and he seemed to have absolutely no control over the directions it took. He wondered if this was what it was like inside Bridge's head all the time, all these random little tangents that led into one another, but somehow led nowhere at all. If so, it was a wonder he managed to even sort of make sense on any given day. This was freaking maddening!

He knew he'd told himself that he would wait until they'd gotten settled into their rooms, but after dinner passed in relative silence, he realized he just couldn't take any more. As Syd went her own way towards the women's quarters, he and Bridge walked back to their rooms.

It was strange walking into the room. It had the same format as the old room, with mirroring set ups on either side. It had the same shelves, the same beds, and the same door to what was probably a bathroom with the same design. The only difference was how bare it was.

Bridge walked immediately to the left side of the room – it was the same side that he'd had back in their own quarters – and Sky made his way to the right side. He started to unpack, but only because he was still trying to think of a way to start the conversation.

"Training starts bright and early tomorrow," he began as he started to unpack the boxes he'd stacked so neatly on his cart.

"Yeah," Bridge replied, and Sky turned around to see that he hadn't even looked up from the milk crate of trinkets he was trying to sort through.

Yep, that was it. Sitting the box he'd been unpacking on his bed, Sky turned around and made for the other side of the room. "Okay, what's the deal, Bridge?" he asked, folding his arms across his chest. He was right behind Bridge, so that when the youth turned around, he was barely a foot or two away from him. The height difference between them was even more impressive with this closeness – Sky stood nearly half a head taller than Bridge – and he felt sort of guilty. He didn't mean to be intimidating.

Bridge didn't even look up at him; he kept his eyes down and his hands folded behind his back. "What deal? There is no deal," he protested mildly.

Sky wasn't buying it. "Try again."

"Sky…" Bridge muttered. It was obvious he was comfortable, but he was hiding something, and that was something that Sky wouldn't tolerate. He told himself that it would be better for him in the long run to come out with it.

"Bridge, just tell me. Whatever it is, it can't be that bad."

"You say that," Bridge said, "but you can't really know that for sure until I've told you. And then once I've told you, it's too late, because if it really _can_ be that bad, it's already out there. You'd already know, and it would already be that bad, and you're my best friend, Sky. I don't want to lose that, and if it really was that bad, even though you said it can't be, if it really was…you'd hate me, Sky."

By the time he was finished, Bridge was almost in hysterics. Sky wondered if he'd even taken a chance to breathe in there. And what he'd said….

Sky unfolded his arms, resting a hand on Bridge's shoulder. He was alarmed to find he was shaking lightly, and knotted his eyebrows worriedly. Whatever this was, it had his best friend all out of sorts. "Bridge, I could never hate you. Just tell me what's wrong, and we can figure it out."

Finally, Bridge looked up, and Sky was taken aback by the conflict there. His brow was drawn in, and he was worrying his lip like he was debating something with himself.

"Come on, Bridge, just—" Sky's urging was cut short by a pair of lips crashing into his own. It took him a few seconds to realize just whose lips those were, after the stars were done exploding behind his eyes.

Bridge was kissing him. Bridge…was kissing…him.

And just as soon as he got a grip on that fact, Bridge was backing away, until the backs of his knees hit the edge of the bed. The expression on his face was torn between dazed and terrified.

"I'm sorry!" he said quickly, his green eyes wide and oddly apologetic. "You said that you…well, I just thought that if I—I didn't know how to say it, so I thought that if I showed you, then maybe that would work, but I don't think that was such a good idea. You see, I really like you, Sky. It's like those books you always laugh at me for reading, but they're actually kind of fun, where the person gets that flutter in their chest and it's hard to breathe, and that's what it's like when I'm around you, Sky. It was just…I thought I wouldn't get to be around you anymore, because I'm not good like you and Syd are, and I don't think they like me very much here. I thought I would get sent to someone else or something, and when I wasn't, I got all hopeful and everything, but I knew that it wasn't going to happen, and it was just…I know I screwed up, Sky, and it probably _was_ that bad, but you said to tell you, and I really, _really_ like you, so I—"

"Bridge," Sky said firmly, and Bridge shut his mouth. That was good, because what Sky had in mind wouldn't have worked nearly as well if Bridge was slack-jawed, funny as it would have been.

Taking care to keep his face schooled, Sky took two slow, even steps to close the distance Bridge had put between them when he backed up. Carefully, so as not to alarm Bridge any worse than he already was, Sky slipped his hands around Bridge's narrow hips and pulled him close.

And then he kissed him. Unlike Bridge's, Sky's kiss wasn't awkward or rushed or anything. He took his time, gently pressing his lips to Bridge's and smiling as the younger boy started to respond. Once he was confident Bridge had taken the hint, he broke the kiss. He didn't take his arms from Bridge's waist, though, and Bridge didn't seem to mind.

"So, that means you…" Bridge started, but for once, he didn't seem to be able to pull the words together. He still had that stunned look on his face, like he couldn't quite figure out what was going on, but there was a smile there, too, so it wasn't all bad.

Sky nodded. "It means I really, _really_ like you too," he said. At that, Bridge's dimples returned to full force, but he still looked absolutely spacey. Sky couldn't help worrying if the direct content had overloaded his circuits or something. "Hey," he started, lifting a hand to Bridge's cheek, "you okay?"

"Better than okay," Bridge corrected. "Kissing…the books don't do it justice. Or maybe it's just kissing you. It's like all your colors exploded in my head…I've never felt anything like that before. That's definitely it. The books don't have you, Sky, but I do. I do have you, right?"

Sky resisted the urge to say something corny – _you had me at hello_ – and instead leaned in for another kiss from his awkward companion. "Bridge, you talk _entirely_ too much." he said.

"But you love me," Bridge replied. "Which is good, because if you didn't, then I'd just love you, and I'd be all by myself, and that would just be awkward. That _was_ awkward, back before you kissed me back and all. One really _is_ a lonely number."

Bridge continued along that vein for a while, before his wandering mind carried him off on some wild tangent. Sky didn't care; he had never been happier to hear Bridge's chipper voice.

When night rolled around, with all of his things unpacked and in their proper places, Sky settled into his bed and shut off the lights in their room. Bridge had already changed into his pajamas, but there were still mounds of junk piled on his bed, and by Sky's best estimation, he'd be working on that pile for a while to come.

After Bridge let out his third yawn in that many minutes, Sky let out a sigh and scooted over in his bed. "Come on, Bridge," he said.

Bridge turned and looked at him curiously, so Sky tried a nonverbal approach, gesturing for the younger teen to come over. This time, Bridge followed the cue, and padded over to the side of Sky's bed with a confused look on his face.

"Am I being too loud?" he asked, a hint of a kicked puppy expression creeping onto his face.

At that point, Sky was so tired he couldn't be bothered trying to explain this to Bridge. Instead, he reached out, hooked an arm around his waist, and pulled him back onto the bed beside him.

He promptly pulled the covers back up over both himself and a thoroughly perplexed Bridge, and shut his eyes. "Go to sleep," he commanded.

Miraculously, Bridge didn't ask any questions. No, he seemed all too happy to curl into the older cadet's chest, moving a lot closer than even the small bed called for. Sky was surprised at first – okay, so it wasn't shocking that Bridge would be a cuddler, but he'd certainly adjusted to the opportunity quickly – but it didn't take him long to relax. Since he had nothing else to do with it, Sky draped his arm around the Bridge and allowed himself a smile into the dark. As far as he was concerned, lying there with his new squad member (and boyfriend?) in his arms, this was the perfect end to the day.

With the steady rise and fall of his chest, Bridge gave all appearance of being asleep. Just when Sky was about to call it quits for the night, though, the softest whisper of a voice met his ears.

"Love you, Sky…"

That was the day Sky learned that Bridge Carson loved him back.


	5. Chapter 5

Sky was pretty sure he'd never hated any one person so much in his entire life. After all, he was the king of cool; he didn't _allow_ himself to get flustered enough to hate someone. For this guy, though, he was strongly considering making an exception.

Let's face it – if given the chance, Sky would've kicked Jack Landors's ass.

It wasn't just the fact that he was the Red Ranger. Sure, that was a nice hard kick in the nether regions on its own. He'd trained for practically his entire life, and yet some nobody _thief_ had come in and Cruger had appointed _him_ Red Ranger?

Pushing that aside, Sky could even sort of forgive the guy for being absolutely clueless on the battlefield. Granted, he thought it said a lot about the guy's leadership potential that he didn't even know that he was the leader. Even then, frustrated as he'd been, Sky had kept his cool.

But this…this was unforgivable.

He, Bridge, Syd, and Ashley had just spent all morning running through the mud course in practice, after Jack had sent them out. The guy had said he'd meet them out there, and yet as they came to the end of the course, there wasn't a Jack in sight.

It wasn't until they traversed the laser crawl that they finally found their fearless leader. The guy was chilling on a lawn chair, sipping some sort of fruit drink and looking for all the world like he was meant to be there.

That wasn't even the worst of it, though. He'd given him a thorough chewing for it, of course, though not in so many words, but he'd gone his way. He was a Ranger, after all, and if putting up with Jack was what it took, then he would shoulder that burden the same as he shouldered everything else.

Since Jack had so _graciously _given them a whopping five minutes to clean up before martial arts, Sky followed Bridge to the showers. The normally chipper nineteen-year-old looked about as miserable as Sky felt, and he had half a mind to suggest they just blow off martial arts. He almost felt like that would be admitting defeat, though, and that just wasn't something that Sky Tate did.

So, he started to peel off his muddy clothes to get in the shower. He'd gotten out of his shirt and had started on his pants, when he heard the most pitiful, frustrated noise. He turned to see Bridge trying and failing to pull his mud-caked gloves off his hands. It seemed like the mud had gotten inside them and they weren't coming off.

Making a mental note to get some sort of vengeance on the Red Ranger for this later, Sky stood up from his bench and knelt down in front of Bridge.

Bridge's face was set in a sort of childishly irked expression as he tried and failed various wacky methods of getting the gloves off. He'd kicked off his shoes, and was trying to pull the gloves off with his bare feet when Sky got over there, but he couldn't get enough grip or dexterity to manage.

Sky figured he should probably step in before the Green Ranger hurt himself. "Here, let me," he said, taking one of Bridge's hands in his own. Even with two free hands, it took some doing to get the glove off, and Sky winced when he did. It had been cold that morning when they'd first started, and gotten hot during the day, and Bridge's hands had been stuck in that mud all day. The younger man could hardly bend his fingers, between the stiffness and the layers upon layers of dirt.

By the time he got the second glove off, Sky had thought of at least fifteen different ways to hideously maim the other Ranger with absolutely no way to trace it back to him.

"Thanks, Sky," Bridge said, the smile returning to his face like it had been there all along. Coupled with the mud smeared on his nose, Sky had to admit he looked adorable. Miserable, but adorable.

"Anytime," he replied, and then stood up, offering a hand to help Bridge up off the bench. "We better hurry up and clean up, though, or else our fearless leader will probably sic us on the mud course again."

"He wouldn't do that," Bridge said as he accepted the hand. After a moment, though, a thoughtful look passed his face. "Would he?"

"I wouldn't put it past him. Now come on; you need a shower. You look like the swamp thing."

Grinning, Bridge stuck his arms out ahead of him and let his eyes roll back into his head as he followed Sky into the showers. "I want to eat your brains," he said.

Sky just shook his head at his boyfriend's antics, rolling his eyes fondly. "That's zombies, Bridge."

"Oh. Right."

As exciting as all that had been, though, it still wasn't the reason Sky wanted to douse Jack in meat-flavored motor oil and set RIC on him. The reason actually came a few hours later. Because he'd had to go get some fresh gloves – his old ones were pretty much a lost cause after the mud course – Bridge showed up late to martial arts practice. Apparently, that was grounds for Jack's fury, because the ex-con proceeded to put Bridge through the ringer.

Now, nearly an hour after the rest of them had stopped their regular practice, Bridge was still running through the light ball reflex simulator. Jack was lording over him like an evil dictator, while Sky, Syd, and Z watched.

"Bridge, just stop running the simulator!" Sky shouted for the umpteenth time. He didn't care if Jack called him for insubordination; this was insane! The light ball simulator was hard enough by itself, never mind the day-long mud course or the three hour martial arts class that had come before it. Bridge was doing his honest best to avoid the ball as it pinged off each wall and bounced at him, but as sweat soaked through his green t-shirt and his breath came in quicker and quicker pants, he was starting to slow down. He'd already been pegged by it going on a dozen times.

"That sounds a lot like you're undermining my orders, Sky," said Jack.

Normally, that would've been an insult to Sky. Orders were law in his world, and even if he hated the person giving them, he followed them to the letter. Right as Jack spoke, though, the light ball shot out and nailed Bridge right in the nose, and the Green Ranger went down with a startled cry.

Sky was on his feet in seconds.

"What do you think you're doing?" Jack demanded as Sky brushed past him.

"I'm keeping you from killing my best friend," Sky retorted, and with no further ado, he aborted the simulation.

As Sky walked into the simulator room, Jack made it clear he didn't appreciate the challenge to his authority. "I can write you up for this."

"Go for it," Sky said. Bridge was just starting to sit up as he made it to him, and the Green Ranger had his hands cupped over his nose. Sky was quick to kneel down next to him and help him sit the rest of the way up. "You okay?" he asked.

"I'm good," Bridge said.

Something about the way he was panting – or maybe it was the dazed look on his face – made Sky think that maybe Bridge wasn't being entirely honest.

He didn't get any time to comment on it, though, as a page came over the comm. system telling them to report to the Control Room.

After the fight, Sky felt a little less animosity towards their newly appointed leader. Of course, it didn't hurt that the humbled Ranger agreed to run the mud course that he had subjected his teammates to.

It was when he was coming back from watching Jack run the course that he was reminded why he wanted to beat Jack over the head with his DeltaMax striker. He was looking for Bridge, but he couldn't find the younger man anywhere. When he ran into Jack in the hall, the now-clean Ranger suggested that he check in the Rec Room. Frankly, Sky wasn't too keen on listening to any of Jack's advice, but then, he'd already checked everywhere else.

However, when he made it to the Rec Room, he found Syd and Z, but no Bridge anywhere. As he walked in, planning to ask Syd or Z if they'd seen his M.I.A. boyfriend, he heard the door open behind him. He whipped around, but instead of Bridge's lean, green shape, he saw Jack.

"Still can't find him?" Jack asked as he walked in. He had the decency and good sense to look worried; that understanding part of Sky admitted that he probably was actually worried. As much as he pissed him off sometimes, Jack really was a good person.

That didn't change the fact that Bridge was missing, though.

"It's getting late," Z observed. "Maybe he headed to bed and you just missed him?"

It was possible, he guessed. Not probable, but possible, and he was all out of other leads. Brow setting deeper into a scowl with each Bridge-less moment that passed, he turned on his heel and made his way back for his room. With any luck, he'd find his missing partner bunked down and turned in for the night.

It was with that possibility, however unlikely, in mind that Sky proceeded with the utmost caution and silence. He took care to keep his footsteps light as he approached the door, and he winced at the hydraulics in the door that made what he considered to be a completely unnecessary amount of noise as they pulled it open. They had mastered space transport, created relative peace between countless alien species, and engineered suits with amazing power; was it too much to think they could manage to invent a quieter door?

But he digressed. With as little noise as possible, though he probably couldn't have woken Bridge if he'd stormed in on tapping shoes with a full galactic polka band, he slipped into their room.

He only made it a few steps before the tension in his jaw slackened into a small smile. There, lying on his bed – that is, _Sky's_ bed – was none other than the missing ranger in question. Or, perhaps "lying" wasn't the best word for it. Sprawled, maybe. Yeah, sprawled: on his stomach, with his long, thin limbs cast around him like some sort of demented, sleeping starfish. His face was buried in Sky's pillow, and though Sky couldn't see it, he didn't have to to know that Bridge was sleeping. He'd probably just wandered in and flopped down on the first bed he reached. That it was Sky's instead of his wasn't unheard of; sometimes, he was just too tired to care. From the looks of things, this was one of those times, what with how he hadn't even seemed to manage to take off his uniform or even kick off his boots.

If anyone asked, Sky would say it was because he didn't want those boots on his bed that he walked over and knelt by the foot of the bed. He would say that it was because he was hygienic, not because he had a soft spot a mile wide for the goofy young ranger that, with painstaking care, he unlaced each boot and slid them off Bridge's feet. The socks soon followed.

However, just as Sky was pulling down the second sock, the left one, something caught his eye, and he paused. His left ankle seemed thicker than the other. Brows furrowing, Sky pulled the sock the rest of the way down.

He winced.

Beneath the sock, blotched with bruising that had already begun to bloom, Bridge's ankle was swollen, and not just a little, either. It was enough to make even a seasoned ranger, someone that had seen his fair share of sprains and bruises and the like, uneasy.

Sky stood from the floor and instead took a spot at the end of the bed. Carefully, he pulled the injured limb into his lap. "Sorry, buddy," he said to his sleeping companion, mostly because he knew he wouldn't be sleeping for long. Bridge was a heavy sleeper, but even heavy sleepers didn't sleep through getting poked and prodded in their what-looked-to-be sprained ankles.

Only…

Bridge did.

Sky didn't think anything of it at first. He rotated the ankle, feeling for cracks or grinds or anything that might suggest something skeletal, all the while waiting for that gasp or that groan that would mean Bridge had woken up.

But it never came.

"Bridge?" Sky said, pausing in his examinations to look down at the head of the bed. It didn't even look like Bridge had stirred. "Bridge, wake up."

Nothing doing.

Pulse picking up, Sky slid out from under Bridge's injured leg and came around to the head of the bed. "Stop playing around, Bridge," he said, giving Bridge's shoulder a good shake. Still, the younger ranger didn't stir, until finally, Sky rolled him over himself.

His stomach sank at the sight that greeted him: Bridge's nose, the victim of the light ball's attack, had a smear of dried blood beneath it, and dark bruises had spread beneath his eyes like angry shadows. It was hard to say if it was broken, but at the very least, it didn't look crooked.

It did, however, make the pallor of his skin stand out all the more. Besides the flush of his cheeks and the bruises beneath his eyes, his face had lost all its usual color, and lying there, unmoving, he looked almost…doll-like. Porcelain. Frail.

Sky shook his head to clear it and, cupping a hand to Bridge's cheek – he cursed to find it was warm to the touch – he slapped him lightly. "Come on, buddy," he said. "Come on. You need to wake up, now." His slaps came sharper; his words, louder. "Bridge! Wake up!"

Just as Sky was starting to lose his cool – _yes_, he maintained, only _starting_ to – Bridge spared him with just the faintest flutter of his eyes behind their puffy lids. The swelling had spread into his cheekbones, it seemed, and Bridge seemed to be having trouble getting his eyes open.

So, when the first slivers of green finally broke through, the relief was so disproportionately strong that Sky couldn't help smiling with it. "There you go," he said, letting the pads of his thumbs lightly trace the outer edges of the bruises. "Good, Bridge. That's good."

Slowly, Bridge's brows began to furrow. "Sky…?" He blinked blearily, his lips pulling into something dangerously close to a pout as he raised his hand to the cheek Sky had just abused. "Why'd you slap me?" he said, his voice rough from disuse. "If I 's good, why'd you slap me?"

He sounded almost…hurt, and Sky quickly set about righting the perceived wrong. "Sorry, buddy, I was just trying to wake you up."

"Why'd I need to…" A look of donning cut Bridge's question short. "This isn' my bed, is it?" The blue covers he was lying on should've been a dead giveaway, but Sky wasn't in the mood to point that out. Poor Bridge seemed to be having a hard enough time getting his head around things as it was. "This's your bed, isn' it?"

"Yeah, Bridge, that's my bed. But that isn't—hey."

Bridge had started trying to push himself up, presumably to give the bed he was occupying back to its rightful owner.

Sky caught him before he could get very far, putting a hand on his shoulder and pushing him back to the bed. From the wince that flashed across Bridge's face, though, his interference might not've been necessary.

All the same, he kept his hand right where it was. "You're fine, Bridge. You're fine right where you are; don't try to get up."

That only seemed to get Bridge all the more wound up. His eyebrows pulled closer together, and his lips set in a frown as he started to try and sit up again. "Wha's goin' on?" he said. "Sky, why're you—" Rather than struggle to get more words together – because clearly, it was a losing battle – Bridge opted just to _struggle_. Physically. He tried to push against Sky's restrictive hand, and he whined piteously when Sky didn't yield any.

"Bridge, stop."

"No," Bridge retorted childishly, and Sky had every confidence that if he could've crossed his arms over his chest, he would've. "If I stop, then you'll let go." After a second, whatever scowl he was attempting gave way to a confused, almost thoughtful expression. "No, wait, that's not – I meant if you stop, then I'll let go." Another second, and then came another scowl, though this one wasn't so much in Sky's direction. "That's not it either," he said.

Sky had the sneaking suspicion this could take a while. On a good day, that head of Bridge's was two stirs short of scrambled, and a good day this was not.

"Here," Sky said, "how about I let you go, and you stop trying to get up?"

"But I'm on your bed, and it's bedtime, and where're you gonna go to bed if you don't have a bed to go to? You don't wanna sleep on the floor, Sky. Syd said that she thought there were things living under Z's bed, and what if we have things under our beds, too? If the Bed Things got you 'cause I stole your bed, Sky, then I…" Bridge rambled on, his green eyes filled with anxiety that was mirrored by the speed of his words. Bridge always rambled when he was upset, and

Never mind the fact that those things living under Z's bed were gym socks. Never mind the fact that, as easily as Bridge had taken Sky's bed, Sky could do the same. The fact that Bridge was still worried about him, even in the state he was in, was proof of just how good a person his boyfriend was.

Besides, Sky didn't exactly see sleeping in his immediate future. A date with a first aid kit – maybe even the infirmary, if more bumps and bruises kept showing up. Or maybe even if they didn't.

Saying all that seemed like it might take a while, though, and getting Bridge to _comprehend _all of it seemed like it might take an eternity. Instead, Sky silenced his protests with a kiss to his head, and then sat back on the side of the bed. He took his hand of Bridge's shoulder as a sign of good faith. "Bridge?" he said.

"Huh?"

"You talk entirely too much."

For a second, the seemingly random statement seemed to confuse Bridge further. But then the confusion ebbed, and a sort of understanding colored his features. He beamed his trademark smile, shadowed as it was by the black eyes and bloody nose, and didn't try to sit up.

"But you love me," he said, completing the familiar exchange.

"That I do," Sky agreed. Which was why his heart was beating a marathon against his ribs and his stomach was doing flips, seeing Bridge like this. In the span of a day, Bridge had been worn down, beaten up, and laid out, and still he managed to smile like that. He smiled, and he hadn't said a word.

That was the day Sky learned to worry about Bridge Carson.


	6. Chapter 6

Sky awoke to the feeling of something cool tracing his face. It was soft, yet somehow still firm. Tender. Purposeful. It felt…nice.

But then his brain caught up with him, and with a muted gasp, he jerked upright.

A thud drew his gaze over the side of the bed, and his brows furrowed when he saw the cause of it.

"Bridge?"

The green ranger lay sprawled on the ground, a vaguely stunned look on his face made all the more pitiful by the lingering bruises still shadowing his eyes.

As soon as he saw Sky, though, his lips split into a wide grin. "Oh, hey, Sky. Good morning."

"Bridge, what are you doing in the floor?" Sky said.

Bridge's eyes widened momentarily, and Sky watched him glance around a bit. Sky recognized it as his 'looking for a reasonable explanation' face, although the 'reasonable' part was usually kind of debatable. At any rate, he must have found one, because he looked back up at Sky.

"I was looking for the things under the bed."

Sky resisted – barely – the urge to sigh. Instead, he asked, "Why?"

"Because I didn't want them to get you while you were sleeping," Bridge said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "You're always so peaceful when you're sleeping. I didn't want them to ruin it." Smile still firmly in place, he sat up, folding his arms across the side of the bed and laying his head on them.

"And?"

"And I'm happy to report no under-the-bed-things were spotted," he informed dutifully. "The coast is clear."

Briefly, Sky considered setting Bridge straight on this whole under-the-bed-thing thing. But then he saw the look on Bridge's face, the cheerful satisfaction, and he decided to let the rouse continue, if only for one more morning. Besides, it was too early for dispelling myths.

Instead, he scooted over in the bed, patting the side he'd vacated meaningfully. "Alright, soldier," he said, "come on back to bed." The clock beside his bed read two in the morning, and it being a weekend, he still had another five or six hours before he planned on getting up.

Bridge seemed to agree, because his eyes lit up, and it was like he couldn't scramble up fast enough. In his rush, one of his hands landed somewhere near Sky's kidney, and he let out a grunt.

Of course, considering Bridge flipped back out of the bed again, it was kind of hard to take it personally.

"Bridge!" He reached for him, but Bridge shrunk back. He frowned. "Bridge? What's—" But then he saw it: bare skin. The bare skin of Bridge's hand. He hadn't noticed before, but it made sense, now. Bridge had been touching his face before, with his bare hands; he'd caught Sky's stomach without his gloves, and his surprise must've come through.

Sky was quick to practically leap out of the bed, dropping to his knees in front of his boyfriend who had only just managed to drag himself upright. "Hey," he said, "are you okay?"

For his part, Bridge look like he'd just stuck his finger into a power outlet. His eyes were wide, and he was cradling his hand to his chest.

Vaguely, Sky wondered if that had been what it felt like – sticking his finger in a power outlet. Sky knew he'd been surprised when Bridge had accidentally palpitated his liver, and surprise probably didn't feel so great to a psychometric.

Bridge blinked a few times. A few more times.

But then his grin came back in full, sheepish, semi-apologetic force and he laughed. "Shocking," was all he said, before going to push himself up.

Sky caught him, though, before he could. "Hang on…what were you doing?"

"I told you: looking for—"

"No, Bridge," Sky interrupted. "I mean what were you really doing? Why is your glove off?"

He could tell just by looking at the blush that spread across Bridge's face that he understood what Sky was asking. And, that he wasn't to apt to answer. He didn't; answer, that is. At least, not for a few long seconds.

Finally, though, he seemed to settle on something. "I was testing something," he said.

"What were you testing?"

"I dunno yet," Bridge replied. "The results were inconclusive. Which is okay, because I didn't really have a hypothesis or anything, so it probably wasn't a great experiment to try in the first place. No variables…maybe my gloves were variables." He held up his hands, one gloved, and one bare. "Control," he said, wiggling his gloved fingers, "and independent." He wiggled the fingers of his bare hand, then.

He looked so pleased with himself and the answer he'd come up with – and honestly, Sky was so tired – that he didn't press. Instead, he stood, and offered a hand to help Bridge up. He made sure it would be the gloved one Bridge grabbed with, and he hauled him up onto his feet.

"Alright, buddy," he said. "Back to bed."

"But—"

"No buts. Bed."

This time, Bridge didn't protest, and allowed himself to be led back to bed. As they both lay down, Sky held the covers up and allowed Bridge to curl as close to him as he deemed fit. He always let Bridge do that, always let him set the boundaries. As long as he was comfortable, Sky was happy. The last thing he wanted was to startle him in the middle of the night with a nightmare, or even just an unexpected touch. It didn't matter that there would always be something between them; as long as Bridge could sleep soundly, as long as Sky could still feel the rise and fall of his chest and the warm puffs of his breath, he was content.

"Good morning, buddy," he said softly as he felt Bridge begin to settle in.

"Good morning, Sky."

By the time morning – or, at least, a decent hour of it – rolled around again, the two were already up. After all, weekend as it might've been, it wasn't like the bad guys respected office hours. There'd been a disturbance in the city, and though it hadn't required Delta Runners, it had been no walk in the park.

It was after lunch time when they made it back, and everyone was practically tripping over themselves to make it to the mess hall.

"I'm starving!" Jack announced as he sat down with his tray at the table. Sky, Z, and Syd were all sitting already; they were just waiting for Bridge.

They didn't have to wait long. A few seconds after Jack, Bridge came trotting away from the line, his plate stacked precariously with a few pieces of buttered toast. Comfort food, Sky recognized.

It was strange; Bridge been a bit sulky ever since they'd woken up that morning. He thought maybe he just hadn't slept well or something, but it seemed like it was more than that. He hadn't been snappy or short-tempered – Bridge was rarely ever any of those things, and when he was, there was usually some other force at play – but Sky had noticed little things. He'd been sticking closer than usual to Sky, and Sky couldn't be sure, but he could've sworn Bridge had been pouting when they had gotten back from the mission.

He looked okay now, though, Sky thought. With his plate of toast – _buttery_, no doubt – and a cup of juice balanced precariously on one hand, he dropped onto the seat beside Sky.

It didn't escape Sky's notice that he was practically on top of him, although he pretended not to notice. Maybe, he thought, it had something to do with Bridge being weird the night before. A nightmare or something. Bridge had plenty of those, and even if he'd gotten better lately, he knew they flared up from time to time. Maybe he was just out of sorts. If that was the case, then Sky couldn't help feeling a little happy that he was where Bridge turned for comfort. And if it wasn't, well then he didn't exactly mind the closeness, either.

"God, this is the best pizza I've ever eaten," Z was saying, her mouth still full of melted cheese that was somehow still connected to the pizza.

Sky thought about reminding her not to talk with her mouth full, but he generally left things like that to Syd. She took the bait, too. "Chew, swallow, _then_ talk," she said. "We don't all want to see your pizza gunk."

Naturally, in retort, Z stuck out her tongue, and with it, a blob of semi-chewed pizza.

"Oh, that's charming," Syd grumbled. There wasn't any bite to it, though; they had all pretty much gotten used to each other's quirks; if anything, it was just banter to pass the time.

"That was pretty sweet, though, the way we took that guy out," Jack butt in.

"Sweet?" Sky scoffed around a bite of French fry. "That, my friend, was the result of brilliant planning and execution. Strategy in action." He popped the rest of the fry in his mouth, and when he reached for another—

Something brushed his arm. Skin. He looked down, and saw Bridge's arm, bared under his t-shirt, resting against his. Confused, he chanced a glance over at Bridge's face.

Bridge, however, didn't seem to notice. He looked deep in concentration, staring at his toast as if it held the secrets of the world.

For a moment, Sky was content to let himself enjoy it. It wasn't often he got to feel Bridge's skin against his own, even if it was just his arm. It felt charged with something, like there was a current flowing between them, and it was all he could do to keep himself still and calm. After all, he didn't want to have another repeat of last night, where he accidentally shocked Bridge via touch.

Unfortunately, this time, he didn't have a choice.

"Yeah right," Jack said. "That was my mad skills, and you know it." And then he reached across the table to give Sky a playful nudge on the shoulder. Which would've been fine, really. A little annoying, and definitely a retaliation-worthy offense, but fine.

Except he didn't _hit_ Sky.

No, he went a little bit wide, and his hand hit Bridge as well.

Bridge acted like he'd just been shot. He jumped up from the table so fast, his knee or something must've collided with it, because it bounced all of their plates up a good few inches. He nearly tripped, too, climbing out of the seat. Given the sprained ankle he was still recovering from, that worried Sky.

"Hey," he tried to stop his startled boyfriend. "Where are you going?"

But Bridge had already stepped away from the table and, as an afterthought, grabbed his plate of toast when he now held almost protectively to his chest, like some sort of safety blanket.

"I just remembered something I forgot," he said quickly.

Syd frowned. "What did you forget?"

"I don't remember. But I know that I forgot it, and now I remember it, and I need to go do it before I forget it again." And with that frankly mind-boggling explanation, Bridge was off.

They all stared after him for a second, before turning to look at each other.

"What was that about?" Jack said. He, more than any of the others, still had trouble following Bridge's little tangents.

Syd's frown deepened. "I don't know. That was weird, even for Bridge."

"I'm gonna go check on him." He had to. Syd was right: Bridge _had_ been acting weird, even for Bridge, and he knew from experience that that didn't usually mean good things. Without bothering with his plate – he knew Syd would get it, if none of the others did – he pushed away from the table and headed out of the mess hall after Bridge.

There were only a few places he reasoned the other ranger could be, but considering the circumstances, he kind of put his bets on one. Following the familiar route through the hallway, his suspicions were confirmed as he stumbled across a cadet pushing himself up off the floor.

"What happened?" he said.

The cadet scowled, rubbing his arm and looking down the hallway. "Some guy just ran into me. Took off down the hall."

Sky could've cursed. He hadn't realized before, but the hallways were packed, and if Bridge had been running through them in a hurry without his jacket on, there was no telling how many people he could've run into.

With new incentive driving him on, Sky took off down the hall as fast as his long legs would carry him. His feet slid around the corners, his boots skidding on the tile, until at long last, he practically slammed his hand into the keypad at the door.

The lights were out inside the room, and as he stepped inside, Sky slowed his pace to a careful walk. He'd barely made it inside the door before it slid closed behind him, plunging the room into a darkness that would've been absolute were it not for the single lamp on Sky's side of the room.

And over in the corner, tucked against the wall and the foot of Sky's bed, sat Bridge. He had his knees pulled up to his chest, his toast lying forgotten on the floor beside him, and his head was buried in his arms. Around his shoulders, he'd pulled Sky's blanket tight, like he was trying to hide away from the world.

Maybe he was.

"Bridge?" he said softly, because even if Bridge wanted to hide from the world, he didn't have to hide from Sky. He never had to hide from Sky. "Bridge, buddy, what's the matter?" As he spoke, he walked slowly up to the younger ranger, until he could kneel down just in front of him.

Bridge didn't emerge from his little cocoon; if anything, he just curled tighter. "Go 'way," he mumbled into his knees.

"I'm not going anywhere, buddy. Not until you tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong," was Bridge's muffled response. "Nothing's wrong. Everything's fine. I'm fine."

"You're sitting alone in the dark," Sky deadpanned.

Bridge peeked up a little bit at that, his eyes just barely visible through his messy hair and the tops of his arms. "So are you," he said accusingly.

Never mind the fact that, because they were both sitting in the dark, they were technically no longer alone. Sky was just glad Bridge was looking at him again. It was definitely a start. "What happened back there?"

And Bridge was back in the cocoon.

This wasn't working. "Bridge, look at me."

"No."

"_Bridge_," he pressed firmly, but patiently. It wasn't Bridge's fault he was upset; he wouldn't take it out on him. Besides, that seemed to do the trick, and hesitantly, Bridge lifted his face up out of his arms and looked at Sky.

Sky was alarmed to see moisture brimming in his red-rimmed eyes. Either he'd been crying, or he was about to start.

He felt something shatter in his chest.

"Don't—" But when he went to reach for Bridge's cheek, the younger ranger flinched back from him. Hurt welled, but Sky stifled it. It wasn't Bridge's fault, he told himself again. None of this was Bridge's fault. He was just scared, and if the darkness was anything to go by, he was probably hurting. Jack, all those people in the hall…it had to have been a massive overload. He should've just been grateful Bridge hadn't shut down completely.

So, instead, he tried a different tactic. "Hey," he said, "hey, it's okay. It's just me, alright? It's just me." And carefully – after moving Bridge's toast out of the way – he slid in beside him, wrapping his arms around him and pulling him close. The blanket served as a buffer between them, and Sky was able to pull the younger man against his chest and hold him.

That was it. That was the drop of water that broke the dam. The first sob that broke from Bridge's throat was a knife through Sky's heart, and he held him closer as more followed. His whole body trembled with them, and Sky could feel them soaking through the fabric of his shirt as Bridge buried his face in it.

"I just—I just wanted t-to t-touch you like they do," he managed to choke out.

And suddenly, it made sense. The thing that morning, the way he'd pouted when they'd come back. He hadn't thought anything of it when Syd had traipsed up and started fixing his hair; it was just something she did all the time. Something he took for granted.

Something Bridge never could.

He'd thought about it before, what it would be like to have Bridge's abilities, but he'd never been so thoroughly smacked in the face with it. He'd thought about the pain Bridge felt when he touched someone, thought about the strength he had to show to even face people every day. But he'd never thought about the isolation. He'd never thought about what it had to be like to have to watch everyone else's casual little touches, everyone else carelessly trading things that he would have valued more that they could ever know.

"Bridge." The word sounded broken to his ears; he could feel his own eyes burning. That was why he'd touched him at lunch, why he'd been concentrating so hard. He just wanted to be able to touch someone, casually. Because that really was different. To be able to touch Sky when his shields weren't up, when he wasn't trying to give Bridge something to hold onto and the ability to hold onto it.

He just wanted to be able to touch his boyfriend. And this was what he'd gotten for his trouble.

"It's not fair," Bridge whimpered. "To you. You could—you could touch someone all you wanted. Hold hands. Fix their—fix their hair and—and you c-can't with me, and I—" the rest of his words were lost to the most heart-wrenching sob Sky had ever heard. It was a desperate sound, an anguished sound.

He had to make it better. "Bridge," he said gently, "Bridge, that's not…I don't _care_ about that. As much as I love touching you, holding you, kissing you…as much as I love doing all those things with you, I just love _you_ more. I love having you, seeing you smile. And it isn't fair, but not for me. For you." He pulled him closer, and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. "You don't deserve to have to go through this. You deserve to be happy."

Bridge raised his head at that, and a lump rose in Sky's throat when he saw the tears still gleaming in his eyes. "I am happy," he said. "I just…I wanted you to—"

"I'm happy as long as I have you," Sky told him. "In whatever way that is. Do you understand that?"

It took a second, but slowly, hesitantly, Bridge nodded. Still, it seemed he wasn't quite ready to give it up just yet. "But, Sky—"

This time, Sky silenced him with a kiss. This time, he didn't try to change it in anyway. He didn't try to be comforting, to be loving, to be anything but genuine, and as he pulled back, he cupped a hand to Bridge's cheek.

He was relieved to see not a single sign of pain on Bridge's face, but instead a look of utter…relief.

"See?" he told him, brushing the pad of his thumb gently under Bridge's eyes, mindful of the bruises still lingering. "You don't have to try. Neither of us. We don't have to try. We work just the way we are."

"Like butter and toast," Bridge suggested helpfully.

Unable to keep from smiling, Sky nodded. "Like butter and toast."

And finally, at long last, a real smile spread across Bridge's flushed face, one that crinkled his eyes and dimpled his cheeks. Then, and only then, did Sky relax.

"Sky?" he asked after a second.

"Yeah, buddy?"

"Could we stay in here a while?" Bridge's voice wasn't so much timid as just…soft. Sky could hear the fatigue in it, and the barely-there rasp that told him that, although the emotional pain had been resolved, the physical still remained. Poor guy probably had a whopping headache.

"Sure," Sky said, "we can stay in here as long as you want."

They did eventually make it to the bed; the floor was hard, and after today's fight, they would both be sore enough tomorrow already. After shedding their shoes, their uniform pants, and changing into more suitable flannel pajama bottoms, they slid under the covers.

This time, Sky was the one to pull Bridge close. This time, he didn't worry about keeping a blanket or clothing between their skin. This time, he didn't worry, because he knew that the only thing he felt in that moment was content, and he didn't mind if Bridge felt it, too.

He waited until he felt Bridge's breath even out, until he saw the lines of tension ease from his young face, and then he followed Bridge to sleep knowing that, powers or no, he had everything he wanted there in his arms.

That was the day he learned to touch Bridge Carson.


End file.

Power Rangers, Hurt-Comfort, Romance